Ho camminato con uno zombi

"I Walked with a Zombie" is one of the most highly regarded of the handful of horror films that Val Lewton produced in the early to mid forties. The story is based partly on Charlotte Brontë's "Jane Eyre" and partly on a magazine article by Inez Wallace.

In the film, a young Canadian nurse accepts a position in the West Indies where she will care for a plantation manager's convalescent wife. She finds that the woman's mental faculties have been affected by a fever and the locals refer to her as a zombie. She determines to effect a cure, even if she has to enter into the mysterious (and potentially dangerous) world of voodoo.

The acting is decent enough but nothing to write home about. The top-billed James Ellison gives a forgettable performance but co-stars Frances Dee & Tom Conway fare better. In support, some actors seem more authentic than others but overall the cast is satisfactory.

Jacques Tourneur was handed the directorial duties and he did a fine job with the resources that were available to him. The direction, cinematography & score (by Roy Webb) create an ominous atmosphere that makes up for any inadequacies inherent in the film's low budget. The screenplay (co-written by Curt Siodmak) also deserves praise for its psychological depth and ambiguous treatment of the supernatural.

All in all, "I Walked with a Zombie" is a worthwhile horror picture and a welcome change from today's stereotypical flesh-eating zombies. While its B-movie origins are sometimes apparent, this film elevates itself above the usual expectations with intelligent screen writing and skillful technique.

Director Jacques Tourneur and producer Val Lewton are noted for their more cerebral forays into the horror genre and this is one of the finest of their partnership. The basic story centers around voodoo in the islands and the real or imagined effects it has on one particular family. I never know whether Tom Conway is a good, low-key actor or not an actor at all but here he does a passable job as the tortured husband. Frances Dee is sweet as the nurse who gets entangled in the family problems and tries to help to no avail. Although Christine Gordon says not a word during the whole film, her image and unusual beauty is haunting. Edith Barrett, an actress who was pitifully under used in film, is outstanding as the mother who plays a rather surprising role. The whole film is based on atmosphere and great cinematography....it is chilling without showing much, therefore leaving a lot to the imagination. There is no violence,no special effects and no gore but it will hold you in suspense just the same. The choice of title is unfortunate (but so was "I Married a Monster from Outer Space" which was also a good film). I rate this movie as one of the Tourneur/Lewton masterpieces and highly recommend it to all lovers of the genre.

"I Walked with a Zombie", besides having one of the oddest movie titles, took a different approach to the horror genre than the popular Universal movies of the day. Maybe it harkens back to the earlier Universal heavies like "Dracula" and "Bride of Frankenstein". Made by Val Lewton and Jacques Tourneur, they crafted their collaborations using a poetic, dreamlike approach to cinematic storytelling. Lyrical and atmospheric, "I Walked with a Zombie" recounts the story of a Canadian nurse sent to a small West Indian sugar island to tend for a young comatose woman, the wife of the island's plantation owner. What's wrong with her? Hints abound through the songs of the calypso singers, bits of dialogue, objects in the movie. The story, as odd as it is, is not told directly. You may think it is, but at the end of the film, you're not so certain of what's happened. Were the events the work of the supernatural? Was a crime committed? Or both? Or neither? It's difficult to say. I recommend this movie, it's important not to forget the older, off-beat films.

The basic plot: A Canadian nurse arrives at the isle of St. Sebastian to take care of a plantation owners mentally entranced and disturbed wife, but once she get's there, she learns more than she should about the family secrets, voodoo , and zombie fever......

The praise: A truly poetic, hypnotizing, and creepy film experience. The poetry of the island traditions, the family mysteries and everything else about the movie is truly evocative and sensitive. There are smatterings of spooky moments throughout, all frightening suggestively, using sound , imagery and implied chills. All classically and romantically constructed and written, a flagon of longing, taste, and character in every little detail. Well-shot, especially the impressive voodoo ceremony. Very atmospheric, with black& white used to enhance the mood, as in all Lewton movies. Watch for calypso singer Sir Lancelot, who Lewton also used in " Curse of the Cat People", an equally poetic movie, which I also have reviewed. A masterpiece of the horror film, it has many scenes which take together the essential elements of suspense and atmosphere , sound and imagery , such as Dee traveling to the voodoo ceremony. A must-see. Very hard-to-find. The only way I could find it was to order a copy of an unauthorized copy of it from Canada.Truly great.

The film opens with Betsy Connell (Frances Dee) being interviewed for a home-care nursing position. Oddly, she's asked during the interview if she believes in witchcraft. She gets the position, working for Paul Holland (Tom Conway), who is a wealthy plantation owner on the Caribbean island of St. Sebastian. Holland has hired her to take care of his wife, Jessica (Christine Gordon), who is in a perpetual state that resembles somnambulance. As Betsy spends more time on the island, she learns that most of the population believes in and practices voodoo, and she learns that Jessica had a relatively tumultuous past with Holland's family.

This was director Jacques Tourneur and producer Val Lewton's second horror/thriller collaboration (the first being Cat People (1942) and the third The Leopard Man (1943)). For many viewers, it is their favorite of the three. While I like the film, I don't like it quite that much--I prefer Cat People. But still, I Walked With A Zombie ends up with a 7 out of 10 from me.

The horror aspects of I Walked With A Zombie are really very minor. They're really present only as a kind of personification of the results of complicated romantic and familial relationships. Yes, there is an admirable "haunted house"-styled scene involving a spooky stairway and creepy, distant sounds, and yes, the trek to the voodoo "home fort" is well done, but this kind of material doesn't work as well for me here as it did in Cat People, because here it's not really the focus of the story. It's ancillary material with the function of helping to solve a very different kind of mystery. Also, much of the voodoo material (such as the actual ceremony) tends to be overrated in my opinion, although the final sequence related to the voodoo theme is appropriately eerie.

But what works best for me in I Walked With A Zombie are the many dialogue-heavy scenes where the three main characters--Connell, Holland and Wesley Rand (James Ellison)--gradually learn more about one another, and where the "mystery" is gradually uncovered. A scene where a local "minstrel" sings part of the backstory while Connell and Rand are having a drink is exquisite, for example. Yet, even with this positive aspect, I never felt that the backstory was sufficiently explained. The mystery remains, and the moralizing bookends of the film do not help, either.

Still, I Walked With A Zombie is definitely worth a watch, and based on the extravagant praise that many viewers utter towards the film, you might like it much better than I do.