VHS : I Walked With a Zombie [1943]

Rating: - Lots of atmosphere, with jungle drums and a wife whose problems go well beyond sleep-walking
"Everything seems beautiful because you don't understand," says Paul Holland (Tom Conway) to nurse Betsy Connell (Frances Dee), on their voyage to Haiti where she will take care of his seriously ill wife. "Those flying fish, they're jumping in terror because bigger fish want to eat them. That luminous water...it takes its gleam from millions of tiny dead bodies, the glitter of putrescence. There's no beauty here, only death and decay." If that attitude isn't enough to be off-putting, Betsy discovers that Holland's "ill" wife is actually a zombie.

This is one of the low-budget horror quickies Val Lewton produced in the Forties and which form the basis of his reputation today. With little money to spend, Lewton and director Jacques Tourneur managed to create a movie heavy with atmosphere and foreboding. To their credit, it doesn't look like a cheap quickie. At the same time, the movie is a strange amalgam of dread and eerie atmosphere which works well despite there being almost no zombie thrills. The title of the movie, which the studio insisted Lewton use, is something of a bait-and-switch.

The story tells us of Betsy's care for Holland's wife, and the relationships that developed before Betsy arrived at Fort Hollland, the sugar cane plantation, among Holland, his wife, Holland's half brother and their mother. And in the distance, past the sugar cane fields and in the jungle, is the beating of the drums, frenetic dances and those native beliefs. The movie, in my opinion, works well until the full story is disclosed and the fate of Jessica is determined. Then, for me, things veer into melodramatic silliness. Still, the movie is worth seeing for fans of dramatic use of an eerie atmosphere.

Holland is played by Tom Conway, George Sanders' older brother. He never achieved his brother's success in films and ended destitute and an alcoholic. Jacques Tourneur was an amazingly variable director. He churned out countless low grade movies, yet was capable of bringing to the screen one of the best noirs ever made, Out of the Past, and one of the creepiest movies, Night of the Demon.

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Rating: - A classic Val Lewton production
We are treated to exotic titles and expectations with titles such as "I walked With a Zombie." My only encounters with Zombies are those that process in an UNIX operating system that can not be killed. I also watched "Weekend at Bernie's II."

As with other Lewton productions he got a way with a psychological thriller in the guise of a monster movie. In the days of sailing ships a nurse (Frances Dee) is employed to go to San Sebastian to look after a plantation owner's wife (Christine Gordon.) She fined that her charge is more than just a victim of a disease that heft her without will. Turns out if you cut the wife she does not bleed. We all know what that means.

The true story is the relationship to man and wife, man and nurse, nurse and wife, brother and brother, brother and wife, need I say more? Could it mean that there is nothing supernatural or is love moving in mysterious natural.

Can this all be straightened out or is Jessica Holland the wife destined to be zomiated for ever and the nurse must learn to love from afar?

Yeah Lord pity them who are dead and give peace and happiness to the living.

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Rating: - Do you believe in wthcraft?
A film which revolves around the ambiguity of supernatural goings-on, I Walked with a Zombie is the best example of Tourneur's supernatural work. The film casts you in to a world where nothing is quite as you orignally expexted and is still totally captivating nowadays. One of the best and most beautiful examples of the supernatural horror film which truly expresses the ability to scare with only a suggestion of horror. If only there were more films like this.