The zombies are revolting. Yes, I agree they’re disgusting.
During WWI an Oriental priest is condemned to life imprisonment when he refuses to divulge the secret of how to turn men into zombies. In his cell he is preparing to burn a parchment that divulges the location of the secret formula. Gen Mazovia (Roy D’Arcy) kills the priest and takes the parchment.
After the war, to make sure the secret doesn’t fall into the wrong hands, an expedition is sent to Cambodia to find and destroy the “Secret of the Zombies”. In the group are General Mazovia; a slimy looking guy if I ever saw one, Armand Louque (Dean Jagger), Clifford Grayson (Robert Noland), General Duval (George Cleveland), and his daughter Claire (Dorothy Stone).
Claire is in love with Clifford. Armand is in love with Claire. Clair agrees to marry Armand to try to make Clifford jealous. When Cliff and Claire finally get together Armand backs out. Mazovia has also been causing accidents and now the natives refuse to work. The expedition returns to Phnom Penh. Armand finds something in a photo that he missed before. The revelation sends him to Angkor to find out answers.
Armand witnesses an ancient ceremony. He then follows a servant of the priest through a swamp to a small temple. After the servant leaves he finds a hidden panel with an inscription on it. He copies the inscription. After translating the inscription he now has the power to make people into zombies. He tries it on his servant. Now he has the power to make anyone do anything he wants. And what he wants is Claire.
“Revolt of the Zombies” was released in 1936 and was directed by Victor Halperin. I heard this movie was crap, so I had to watch it to make sure. It does have some interesting and bizarre moments, but they are fleeting and short. I watched the movie for 10 minutes before I realized I was watching Dean Jagger. It’s dumb and silly, but I’ve seen worse. One of the reasons “Revolt of the Zombies” got such a bad rap is because its predecessor “White Zombie” was so good. Taken by itself “Revolt of the Zombie’s” is your average poverty row, low budget movie. I didn’t hate it, and I didn’t love it.
Could it have been better? Absolutely. There are so many other ways this movie could have gone. Instead it leaned heavily toward a melodrama. The love triangle situation occupied more of the movie than most zombie loving, horror movie fans could tolerate. In that sense I get it. I agree that it would have been better had it delved more into the zombie ritual, or the evil things that could have happened if Mazovia had gotten the secrets. Those are the movies horror fans were looking for. Instead people got basically the same thing they got in “White Zombie”, a love triangle. Only not done as well.
Zombies back in the 30’s are different than what they are today. Back then they didn’t have a taste for brains. All they were; were mindless slaves that did whatever you told them to do. Nowadays they all have attitudes.
The footage used in the movie of eyes that hypnotize people and turn them to zombies belong to Bela Lugosi. They are from “White Zombie” which was also done by Halperin Productions in 1932. Another little dig to horror fans that said, this movie is not “White Zombie”.