Night Of The Living Dead and Collateral Murder

In our most recent class, we discussed the ending of Night Of The Living Dead. I would like to further our discussion in this blog post. In class, we mentioned a lot about race and gender toward the ending of the movie, but I would like to discuss the idea of a target. At around 0:44 of this video, the men who are off in search of the living dead are having casual conversations. They are drinking coffee and discussing their next move. In class, this made me think of the first video we watched, "Collateral Murder." In "Collateral Murder," the men in the helicopter were talking very casually, just like the men in Night Of The Living Dead.

At 3:25 in this video for Night Of The Living Dead, the men searching for the living dead, happen to see Ben in the window. They shoot him, thinking he is one of the living dead, when he is actually alive. For me, this resembled "Collateral Murder" in that the men in the helicopter thought that the men on the ground were holding guns, when they were actually holding cameras.
The point I believe I am trying to make here, is that in both of these films, the men who are killed are seen as targets, and thus, are meant to be destroyed.

Another similarity I noticed in these two films, is that the men are very proud when they kill their targets. In "Collateral Murder" they say good hit and good job, just like they say "good shot" in "Night Of The Living Dead." These similarities also stood out to me because they are not only focusing on targets, but they are focusing on targets that are innocent. The targets are not truly what the shooters think they are. To view something as a target is to destroy, and that is exactly what happens in both of these films.