With the remake poised to hit theaters within the next couple weeks, and the Blu-ray release less than a month away, I figured it’d be a good time to bust open the classics locker and drag out a movie that both ranks as one of my personal favorites AND is extremely relevant, George Romero’s classic film, The Crazies.

In The Crazies, a supervirus developed by the government and given the almost comically innocuous name of Trixie is accidentally set loose on the populace following a plane crash near the small Pennsylvania town of Evans City.  Trixie renders its victims irreparably insane on contact, and now, Trixie has found its way into Evans City’s water supply.  With the town collapsing, the government tries desperately to contain the outbreak.  But if they can’t fix the problem, the highest echelons of government have another idea in mind–the total nuclear annihilation of Evans City and surroundings.  Can a solution to the Trixie problem be found in time?  Or will Evans City go up in a mushroom cloud?

Dead series fans will remember Evans City mentioned in the 1990 remake of Night of the Living Dead, giving us a great touchstone between films.

For its time, The Crazies was an extraordinarily brave film, but you’ll find that many of the references to military incompetence aren’t all that far off today.  Scheduling errors, logistical failings, and a massive dose of Murphy throw themselves into an already volatile mix.  It’s downright amazing to watch how this operation slowly falls apart under the massive strain brought about by Trixie’s depradations.  Indeed, if only a handful of things had been changed, the final outcome might well have been altered as well.

It’s a chilling little title that’s made even more unnerving by the sheer plausibility of it all.  And though there are plenty of things that could have been improved–some awkward dialogue and truly low-budget effects among them–there’s still plenty of joy left in this title.

The Screenhead Ten Scale hands down a final rating of eight out of ten for this one, and frankly, if the remake turns out even HALF this compelling, we’re all in for a real treat.