Night of the Living Dread

Barbra and Johnny drive to their father's grave in a rural Pennsylvania cemetery. A pale man in a tattered suit appears and kills Johnny, then assaults Barbra. Barbra manages to flee, setting the stage for the nightmare to begin.

Barbra runs to a nearby farmhouse in a rush for safety and discovers the resident's corpse lying half-eaten on the stairs. A growing horde of ghouls begins to surround the house. A stranger named Ben arrives and initially mistakes Barbra for the homeowner.

Ben takes command, boarding up the windows and doors to keep the ghouls at bay. He searches the house for supplies and eventually locates a lever-action rifle to use against the undead. Barbra remains largely catatonic as the siege begins in earnest.

The farmhouse cellar becomes a refuge for several others: Harry, his wife Helen, and their daughter Karen, along with Tom and Judy who joined after hearing an emergency broadcast. The group consolidates in the cellar as the army of ghouls closes in on the aboveground refuge.

From radios and televisions, the refugees learn of a nationwide wave of brutal killings by cannibalistic corpses and the existence of armed patrols trying to exterminate them. Reports confirm that the ghouls can be killed by head blows, bullets to the brain, or fire. Scientists speculate radiation from a returning space probe might have reanimated the dead.

Ben devises a plan to obtain medical supplies for Karen and transport the group to a rescue center. He teams up with Tom and Judy to refuel his truck at a pump on the farm while the others hold off the ghouls with torches and Molotov cocktails.

Gas spills at the pump, causing the truck to catch fire and explode. Tom and Judy are killed in the blast, and Ben returns to the farmhouse to find the others still trapped inside. The disaster intensifies the group's peril.

Harry tries to bar Ben from re-entering, creating a tense standoff. Ben eventually breaks down the door and confronts him in a lethal struggle. Harry is shot by Ben and dies, later found in the cellar beside Karen.

Karen dies from her injuries and rises as a ghoul. She consumes her father's remains and, in a shocking moment, she stabs her mother Helen to death with a masonry trowel. The family tragedy deepens the horror in the house.

Barbra, still attempting to aid Ben, is grabbed by a reanimated Johnny and dragged away from safety. The remaining survivors scramble as the ghouls assault the doors and windows.

Ben retreats to the cellar, using his rifle and improvised defenses to fend off the encroaching ghouls. The others are either dead or missing, and Barbra remains in danger as the siege worsens.

They pause to watch a 3 a.m. news update before the power fails. The darkness allows the ghouls to press their attack, and the defenders struggle to hold the line.

In the morning, an armed posse arrives to dispatch the remaining ghouls. Ben emerges from the cellar, but the group mistakes him for a ghoul and shoots him. His body is then discarded with the other corpses by being placed on a bonfire.

The morning bonfire burns Ben's corpse along with the others, marking the bleak culmination of a desperate struggle for survival. The farmhouse and its survivors are left to the dawn without a clear rescue in sight.