1. Shaun Of The Dead
If you were familiar with Simon Pegg's work before Shaun of The Dead, you would probably have known he was a big zombie film fan. However, before 2004, the genre was pretty much dead in the water. With the exception perhaps of George A. Romero's offerings, zombie films were generally regarded as low budget, low brow B movies with no place in mainstream cinema. That all changed after the release of Shaun Of the Dead. We're not saying it single handedly revived the zombie genre but....no wait, actually that is exactly what we're saying. Shaun Of The Dead single handedly revived the zombie genre and this huge resurgence in popularity we've seen over the last ten years, a popularity the likes of which it has never seen before, was solely down to this film. The only other films that you could argue contributed, were the Dawn Of The Dead remake which was released the same year, and 28 Days Later a few years before. However, Shaun Of The Dead made the genre much more accessible to people who would have previously never given it a chance. The film follows a group of survivors as they experience the horror of a zombie outbreak, contrasting against a quintessentially British backdrop. The premise alone would have made a good film in anyone's hands, but with Edgar Wright's superb directional style and a genuine zombie connoisseur doing the writing, the result was spectacular. Even without the comedy, it would've been a great zombie film. With it, it's a genre spanning modern masterpiece.