Bela Lugosi Week Film 2: White Zombie

This week I've decided to do something a little different here at Blues In The Night. Every film reviewed this week will star Bela Lugosi. This is the second of 7 films I'll be reviewing starring everyone's favorite vampire. Bela Lugosi hangs up his fangs and is now making zombies do his bidding rather than young ladies.

White Zombie
1932
Directed By Victor Halperin



SYNOPSIS

Madeline (Madge Bellamy) and her fiance Neil (John Harron) head to Haiti to be married at the home of Beaumont (Robert Frazer.) Beaumont is infatuated with Madeline and makes a deal with a local witch doctor (Bela Lugosi) to make her fall for him. Problems arise when she dies and comes back a mindless zombie!



MY THOUGHTS

The first feature film to feature those slow, lumbering zombies in action.

Though shot in just 11 days, the film does have the slow, lumbering pace of an early talkie (or a zombie.) Much of the film was shot on the Universal lot (it was an independent production) and made use of some standing sets from Dracula, Frankenstein and others.

The film's eerie and atmospheric tone echoes those great horror classics... but ultimately it is no where near as good.

Bela Lugosi (with mustache and goatee) hams it up a bit as the villain, but not nearly as bad as everyone else. The acting performances are the film's greatest fault. Many of the actors were silent film stars who'd hit the skids. Their performances still show the exaggerated emotions common in the silent era.... and are often ridiculous. The goofy-looking zombies are even worse.



The script also has problems. It relies too much on talking rather than action and this causes the film to drag in many places. This makes it hard to maintain the great atmosphere set up by the cinematography.

The first zombie film did set up a good framework for all that was to come in this still-popular horror sub-genre.