Dawn of the Dead Image Analysis (2004)

This scene of Ana gazing longingly into the distance is due to the fact, Kenneth, has broken the news to her about him being bitten by a zombie. Kenneth, being the courageous man he is, chooses not to go on, and lets the rest of the survivors sail free to safety, or what we believe is safety. Kenneth, although he does not survive, has been portrayed at the male hero. This is a collision cut between Ana looking into the distance at Kenneth, and Kenneth with a swarm of zombies behind him gazing at Ana in the distance. Instead of leaving himself for the Zombies to kill him, Kenneth gets his gun (a phallic symbol) and shoots himself in the head through his mouth. We do not see any of the blood or gore but we just get the restricted narration of a distant fun shot and Ana with a tear in her eye. As the survivors set sail into the distance, we are lead to believe the film ends with a more or less happy ending, but this is not the case. As they draw close to land they are attacked by zombies and we then have to assume that they do not make it but we are left with an open ending. The critic Andre Bazin was interested in the development of early film narrative. Bazin was mainly focused on how carefully the structure of a film was. At the beginning of the 1930s, the hays code was put into place meaning a lot of films were either banned or simply not made. Restricted narration meant films could still stick to their original story line, but could get away with killings as long as they were not seen, e.g the suicide of Kenneth.