I Walked with a Zombie
                                                                                              
Director: Jacques Tourneur
Year: 1943
Rating: 8.0
In 1942 RKO put Val Lewton in charge of the horror division of the studio with a few rules to follow. Make the films for less than $150,000, keep them to less than 75 minutes in duration and allow others to pick the title. Lewton had been around the film business for a few years at this point, primarily as a writer for Selznick at MGM (he had advised Selznick to stay clear of Gone with the Wind). The low budget and the short running time were probably a blessing. It forced Lewton to go with imagination, unusual stories and piles of thick atmosphere. Over the next five years of wartime, he produced nine horror films and became a sub-genre of horror. He brought on a few directors - Jacques Tourneur for the first three films. Mark Robson for four films, Robert Wise for one and Gunther von Fritsch for one.



At the time, they were just considered B horror films with the New York Times calling this film, "a dull, disgusting exaggeration of an unhealthy, abnormal concept of life". Ok. Some would disagree with the NY Times and the asshole reviewer. Time has treated these films better and they are now held in high esteem; in particular the three directed by Tourneur. RKO shut down the division after the war as it cut back on costs and sadly Lewton was to die within a few years at the age of 46, never realizing how long lasting these films would be.



I Walked with a Zombie was the second of the Lewton horror films after the very successful Cat People. The director Tourneur had been born in France but moved to America with his well-known director father when he was ten, then returned to France for some years before again going to America. His first job as a director in Hollywood was for MGM in 1939, but they let him go and Lewton who had known him for years hired him. Tourneur was to go on to a fine career, later directing the classic noir Out of the Past utilizing some of the same techniques of light and shadow that he drenches his Lewton films in. His Lewton films are nearly horror noir.



This is a really peculiar film bringing in elements of Jane Eyre (that is its inspiration), brooding romance, slavery, colonialism, brother rivalry, guilt, shame, mother love and of course voodoo. It begins in classic film style. Betsy (Francis Dee, married to Joel McCrea) narrates the story that is reminiscent of other innocent women in gothic tales going to work at a male dominated wealthy mansion. It initially feels hopeful and comfortable. She has been hired in Canada to be a nurse to an ailing wife on the Caribbean Island of San Sebastian, a colony populated by the descendants of slaves and a few white overlords. On the boat trip to the island, she meets her employer Paul Holland (Tim Conway), who brings her down to earth by telling her, "There is no beauty here. Only death and decay". The sin of slavery and its current manifestation seeps through the film. It seems to say, what are these white people doing here intruding in our culture.



Home life at the Holland house is a nightmare with the wife (Christine Gordon) in state of walking somnambulism, unable to speak or think. Just walk at night in her white nightgown floating like a ghost. The two brothers are at each other's throats for some past actions to do with the wife. Betsy begins to fall in love with Paul, I suppose because he is basically a shit. Then the drums begin. A wonderful voodoo ceremony using a real voodoo song. The terrifying Darby Jones as a zombie (he was to play one in a couple other films) and an end that is like an old wound oozing out. As strange as the film was for its time what has made it into an enduring classic is the uneasy unnerving mood, the understated horror that is kept at arm's length, the lovely clean black and white photography, presenting the voodoo culture in a positive way and its refusal to play on our sympathies or expectations.