|
|
Ron Miller's DARK CORRIDORS VOL. 10, No. 11 |
|
ZOMBIE MOVIE ROUND-UP #1 "KING OF THE ZOMBIES"
|
Would you believe it got
an Oscar nomination?
of TheColumnists.com
Okay, it's true that "King of the Zombies" has been around somewhere or other since it first came creeping out in 1941 as the latest zombie movie from Monogram, the busy little studio on Hollywood's "poverty row."
But I claim it qualifies as a "forgotten" horror film of the Golden Age of Horror Movies because everybody judged it on its overall quality and its ability to produce thrills and chills. Judged that way, it deserved to be forgotten almost before the prints reached movie theaters.
In my opinion, the 68 years that have passed since it first came out have provided us with fresh perspectives on this "B" movie, designed for the lower half of the double bills most U.S. movie theaters booked in the 1940s. Does that mean it's a much better movie than it looked in 1941? Definitely not. I'd say it's now a Hollywood curio, worth looking at because it's so...curious.
For example, "King of the Zombies" was nominated for a 1941 Academy Award. The nomination went to composer/arranger Edward Kay in the category of musical scoring for a dramatic motion picture. Now doesn't that make you want to hurry out and rent "King of the Zombies" to find out what that was all about?
I mean, look at the competition: Bernard Herrmann's scores for "Citizen Kane" and "The Devil and Daniel Webster" ("All That Money Can Buy"); Meredith Willson's score for "The Little Foxes"; Max Steiner's score for "Sergeant York"; Alfred Newman's scores for "Ball of Fire" and "How Green Was My Valley"; Franz Waxman's scores for "Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde" and for Hitchcock's "Suspicion"; Victor Young's score for "Hold Back the Dawn"; Miklos Rosza's scores for "Lydia" and "Sundown." And a whole bunch more. There were 20 scores nominated that year instead of the usual five.
The list of nominees included some of the most legendary names in the history of film music. The winner was Bernard Herrmann, not for his immortal "Citizen Kane" score, but for the one he did for "The Devil and Daniel Webster." And right there among the contenders was Edward Kay for "King of the Zombies."
So, I thought, before I write this column, maybe I should watch the movie again for the umpteenth time. I plopped my brand new DVD copy of "King of the Zombies" in the player and off we went. And, yes, I still don't get it. Kay's score is basically a monotonous series of voodoo drum beats with a little canned orchestration tossed in here and there. What was the Academy thinking?
But I know what you're thinking: What does Miller know about music? Have you ever heard him play the piano. Talk about monotonous drum beats! I'd better go rent "King of the Zombies" and check out that immortal musical score for myself!
Ahah! Gotcha. See, "King of the Zombies" is a curio. You must check it out!
Quickly, I'll give you the basic storyline. Lost in treacherous mists, two pilots (John Archer, Dick Purcell) flying a twin-engine plane are lost "somewhere between Cuba and Puerto Rico." They pick up a mysterious radio signal and, running low on fuel, decide to drop down below the mist to see if that means there's an island right below them. And, what do you know, there is an island after all!
Landing in a forested area, the trees knocking off the plane's wings and pretty much rendering it instant junk, they come to rest in a primitive graveyard. Miraculously, the two civilian airmen are unhurt, but a third occupant of the aircraft is thrown from the wreckage--and wakes up next to a tombstone with the words "Rest in Peace" above his head. This gentleman is Jefferson Jackson (Mantan Moreland), their African-American "valet."
Regaining consciousness, "Jeff" sees the tombstone and the inscription and decides he must be dead. When the two white men reassure him he's still alive, he observes:
"I thought I was a little off-color for a ghost!"
Now here is the main reason why you should go dredge up a copy of "King of the Zombies" immediately: Mantan Moreland was one of the funniest men in movie history and he's at his ludicrous best in "King of the Zombies."
Moreland was the "valet" to virtually everybody in "B" movies, most notably as Birmingham Brown, valet to detective Charlie Chan in the many Chan mysteries made at Monogram in the 1940s. That's why the two fliers have a valet. Monogram had Moreland under contract and wanted him in the movie. And since Hollywood never would have thought of having him play one of the pilots in those socially-ignorant, racist times, he had to be a valet, as silly as it appeared.
In fact, "King of the Zombies" is an ideal vehicle for young film fans to study just to see how African-Americans were portrayed on screen in the days just before America entered World War II. It has scores of black characters, including most of the zombies, and not one is treated with what we'd today call dignity.
For instance, when the three men finally enter the only occupied house on the island--a large, manorial building--"Jeff" is told to go around to the servants' entrance. Though Mantan Moreland's specialty was bugging his eyes out, I think we can see them bugging way the hell out at that line. Reading his mind, you might think he's saying, "What you mean, servant's entrance, you honky devil!? Take a look at yo' check stub and see who's gettin' the most money for this stupid picture!"
Eventually, "Jeff" meets up with an ancient black woman who's cooking up black magic spells in the basement. She is played by an actress named Madame Sul-Te-Wan, whose acting pedigree went all the way back to several roles played in D.W. Griffith's "Birth of A Nation" in 1915. She was, in fact, a lifelong friend of Griffith, the pioneering filmmaker, and one of the few actual black people he hired to play black people in that racist saga about the Ku Klux Klan riding to the rescue of white girls in the post Civil War south. (Most black roles were played by white actors in blackface!)
The old mansion the plane crash survivors enter is owned by Dr. Sangre, a mad scientist and black magic practitioner who's raising dead men to use as his household staff. That's right: He has non-union zombies working for him. He's really an enemy agent who has captured an American admiral and is holding him prisoner while he uses black magic to try and make him reveal secrets of America's Panama Canal defenses.
Here's another reason to watch this movie. Dr. Sangre is played by Henry Victor, a huge actor with a Teutonic accent, best remembered as the villainous Hercules, the carnival strong man in Tod Browning's classic horror film "Freaks." Victor acts as if he was standing in for Bela Lugosi, who was also working for Monogram at the time. When we first see him, he's wearing a tux and doing a low budget imitation of Lugosi as Count Dracula. Victor died in 1945 at age 47.
Dr. Sangre's niece, Barbara, is the beautiful young heroine of the movie. She doesn't want any part of her uncle's voodoo nonsense and hopes she can leave the island soon. Barbara is played by "B" movie leading lady Joan Woodbury, who's best remembered for playing the title role in the 1945 Columbia serial "Brenda Starr, Reporter," based on the popular comic strip. Woodbury gave up her screen career in 1949 to work in regional theater, where she became a great success, making only a few screen appearances from then on.
The two male leads also are interesting. Dick Purcell, who died at age 36 after a busy career as a "B" leading man, also is best remembered for a role in a movie serial--Republic's 1944 "Captain America," the first screen appearance of the famous comic book superhero. The other male lead, John Archer, is best remembered as the star of George Pal's 1950 "Destination Moon," the first big color sci-fi movie. He was married to actress Marjorie Lord of Danny Thomas' "Make Room For Daddy" TV sitcom and their daughter, Anne Archer, became a popular leading lady in the 1980s, probably best remembered as Michael Douglas' wife in "Fatal Attraction."
Taking a look at all these interesting "B" movie stars interests me, but I think the most likely reason for anyone to look at "King of the Zombies" today is to see Mantan Moreland do his comedy schtick. When surrounded by ghosts, goblins or zombies, he was an eye-rolling riot. The writers always gave him unique ways to express his cowardice, including the immortal line "Feets, don't fail me now!"
In "King of the Zombies," the writers came up with: "Eyes, if you look, I ain't responsible for anything you see!" and, on another occasion, "Let's get outa here! This place is a walking cemetery!"
Moreland had a long, long career in "B" movies and died in 1973 at age 71, finally starting to get some of the public acclaim and tributes he deserved all along.
As for the zombies themselves, they aren't very frightening by today's standards. If you look closely, they're just a group of black extras, all trying to stifle laughs as they try as hard as possible to look dead.
An excellent quality DVD version of "King
of the Zombies" is currently available from Sinister Cinema
at a very reasonable price. You can check out their catalog online
at
www.sinistercinema.com.
©2009 by Ron Miller. The movie poster is courtesy of Monogram Pictures and Sinister Cinema. This column first posted Feb. 9, 2009.
Ron
Miller is a former nationally syndicated television columnist
and the author of "Mystery! A Celebration," the official
companion book to PBS' "Mystery!" series.
You can comment on this column online. Please address your message to either "The Editors" or Ron Miller. To send an email, click here and don't forget to mention Ron's name: talkback@thecolumnists.com
|
|
|
Archives |
|
|