Dawn of The Dead (2004) image analysis (2)

In this shot Ana is about to shoot Steve. Ana is the ‘final girl’ and goes against the conventions of blonde females in horror films through her courage and independence. This supports the rise in feminism in society. Ana is a nurse and therefore can cope with blood and body horror as she deals with it on a daily basis. Steve plays a very self-centred character in the film; showing arrogance, selfishness and plain bullying. He is a rich man with no feelings towards anyone but himself. This is shown in different parts of the film where he is on the roof of the mall telling Andy to kill zombies, which look like particular celebrities. Throughout the film he shows no remorse at all towards the killing these previously normal people’. He was also given the job to hold a door open while some of the other men went to save Nicole and Chips but he failed to do this and almost got everyone killed. Even during this scene he was not unapologetic. Even though Ana is seen shooting Steve, this was an ironic scene as Steve had earlier said to her “If I ever turn into one of those things, do me a favour and blow my f***ing head off” and she kept to her promise by fulfilling this by using a typical phallic weapon but claiming its symbolic male power. Although Ana is portrayed as a strong character, she does show compassion to Frank when he is bitten and shows her intelligence by working out how the infection spreads.