Monday, January 3, 2022

WHITE ZOMBIE In Color - 1932

Allied Artists just colorized a number of old horror movies available on Prime. Besides this one they also did THE SCREAMING SKULL, THE MANSTER, MONSTROSITY, THE BAT and others. I'll be posting these as we go along. Of course this is a redo of our original black and white White Zombie version which we have already posted.

It stars Bela as 'Murder' Legendre, zombie master. Other stars are Madge Bellamy, Joseph Cawthorn, Robert Fraser, John Harron and Brandon Hurst. The story is about a rich young man who seeks the help of a white witch doctor to lure the woman he loves from her fiancé, but she ends up as a zombie slave instead.

Madeline Short and Neil Parker are in Haiti to have their wedding at Charles Beaumont's plantation there.

After getting through a night of the dead ceremony in the middle of the road, Madeline and Neil are approached by a sinister character who ends up snatching Madeline's scarf from her.

At Charles Beaumont's home, Madeline and Neil have arrived, and a friend, Dr. Bruner, is there to greet the young couple, whose wedding is set for the next evening.

But something is screwy, Charles has set up a meeting with the witch doctor, 'Murder' Legendre that same night. When Charles gets there, he sees zombies turning a huge stone grinding sugar cane as Beaumont watches with disbelief as to what he's seeing.

He's instructed by a zombie to follow him...

Beaumont explains his problem.. He's madly in love with Madeline and wants Legendre to interfere with the wedding tomorrow, so that he can hide her for a month and persuade her to change her mind about Neil.

The only thing that Legendre gives him is this vial and tells him that just a drop of the liquid in a drink or a drop on a rose will put her in a trance and that they can bring her out it later.

And of course, Charles is desperate and puts a drop on a rose before the wedding. Madeline thinks he's just a friend after she met him earlier during a vacation.

As Neil and Charles stand at the door of the crypt, Madeline is put to rest.

I mean, like, Neil is nearly insane with grief and just stays drunk all the time.

Lagendre then has his zombies bring Madeline to his place in her casket.

Neil goes to Dr. Bruner's place for help, and the doctor tells him that his wife may not be dead, she has most likely been put in a zombie state by Legendre.

Beaumont is staying at Lagendre's place and has been trying to get Madeline to respond to him, but to no avail. Charles is confused and frustrated.

When Legendre pours Charles a drink and toasts to the success of their deception, well, Charles has sipped down some zombie juice, poor sap.

Dr. Bruner has been taking care of Neil, who's resting near this location, that's Legendre's castle looming over the Haitian shoreline.

Now the evil double-double crosser has Beaumont as his first 'thinking' zombie, which was probably a huge oversight on his part.

Neil has wandered in and collapsed upstairs. Legendre orders Madeline to go upstairs and stab Neil with a big old knife!!

As she's ready to plunge the knife into Neil's heart, Dr. Bruner grabs her hand, breaking her spell for a moment.

After Neil and the doctor get rid of the zombies, of all things, Beaumont, still thinking, grabs Legendre and tosses him over the edge of the castle.

And we get to watch 'Murder' Legendre plummet to oblivion!! Well, hope you enjoyed this colorized classic, breathing a little more life into it... It was a treat for me.

1 comment:

Realm Of Retro said...

Lugosi's glory days.
He could play a real villain when he wanted to.
The movie almost echoes Dracula
with Beaumont being a sedated Renfield or variant thereof.

Check out the weird occult symbols on the witch doctor's robe.

Zombies falling into sugarcane grinders like dominoes?
Next time I buy "Domino" sugar I'm going to take
a close look at that stuff!

Nobody's playing any tricks on me!

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