Fantasia Obscura: The Horror Film Behind the Genesis of a Legendary Rock Band
There are some fantasy, science fiction, and horror films that not every fan has caught. Not every film ever made has been seen by the audience that lives for such fare. Some of these deserve another look, because sometimes not every film should remain obscure.
Because sometimes, a single film can inspire someone to produce many, many more works to explore…
White Zombie (1932)
(Victor and Edward Halperin Productions/United Artists, Dir.: Victor Halperin)
The word “zombie” conjures up an image that owes almost everything to George A. Romero, whose small independent film, Night of the Living Dead, carried as big an influence on films about the undead and horror films as Star Wars had on space adventures and science fiction films. The image persists of the zombie as a member of a ravenous hoard that sluggishly crawls through the ruins of our civilization, consuming every person in its way. We cannot hear about them without associating the sins of our past consuming us, making us pay for our pollution/crass consumerist ethos/dehumanizing culture; when the zombies walk the earth again, they’re coming not only for Barbara, but all of us.
There was another tradition, however, an older one that came from another time and place: the idea of the zombie, or zombi, as the animated corpse who was under the control of a Vodou priest, put, through the use of magic, into servitude. In the Caribbean country of Haiti, said practices were believed to be real. It got to the point where Haiti’s legal code addressed the practice of trying to turn someone into a zombie, making those who made efforts to bring back the dead as punishable as a perpetrator of attempted murder.
Stories of the voodoo possession that came out of the land were popularized during the early 20th Century, with myth occasionally being buttressed by strange cases where science was called in to examine an occurrence. This pursuit of zombies progressed into the 1980s, when Professor Wade Davis examined a case study which was turned into the book, The Serpent and the Rainbow. Wes Craven then adapted this into a film in 1988.
But years before, in 1932 (eight years before George Romero was born), United Artists distributed the film White Zombie. Shot in 11 nights at Universal Studios, the film is the tale of two lovers, Madeline (Madge Bellamy) and Neil (John Harron), who want to be married when she reunites with him in Haiti after a long courtship. Neil has a rival in Charles (Robert Frasier), a plantation owner who so lusts after her that he’s willing to turn to Murder Legendre (Bela Lugosi), a white Vodou priest who owns a sugar refinery manned by zombies. Murder is willing to give Charles what he wants by turning Madeline into a zombie, making her his slave. The rest of the film shows just how bad Charles’ plan was; in fact, any plan that relies on turning someone into a zombie should, on general principle, be avoided.
What gives the film its agency for modern audiences are some of the semi-subtle messages it makes about the relationship between owners and workers (coming out as it did at the height of the Great Depression), as well as some consideration of colonialism in general. This becomes obvious in probably the film’s most memorable scene, where we visit Murder’s refinery and watch a worker fall into the sugar press and silently be crushed to death, with his co-workers unable to stop the process to save him:
While the scene had staying power, the film itself was less blessed. The fact that most of the cast demonstrate why the coming of sound to movies doomed all of their careers is obvious as they deliver near-undead line readings, with Lugosi showing considerable restraint compared to some of his non-Dracula work years later. This gave the film a rep of being slightly below B-grade, relegating it to late night and horror-hosts slots (when it even made it onto television).
While it had this run on the tube, it drew the attention of one Robert Barleth Cummings. An art student with an interest in horror and heavy metal, he would combine his interests while a student at Parsons School of Design in 1985, and name the hardcore band he formed after the film, White Zombie:
As part of embracing his interests, he took on the professional name of Rob Zombie, under which he would continue to do music, as well as bring about such films as House of 1000 Corpses, The Devil’s Rejects, and the reboot of Halloween.
Surprisingly, he’s yet to do a remake or revisit of the original film. There are supposedly rights issues related to the property, possibly from a Broadway play and novel that inspired the screenplay, even though the movie itself is now in the public domain. Then again, considering the penalty for bringing back the dead, in terms of karma and the Haitian legal code, we’re probably all better off just as well…
NEXT TIME: Remember that trippy cartoon movie with the weird settings and creatures? No, not Yellow Submarine, the OTHER one…
