- Directed by Victor Hugo Halperin
- Written by Garnett Weston, William B. Seabrook
- Stars Bela Lugosi, Madge Bellamy, Joseph Cawthorn
- Run Time: 1 Hour, 7 Minutes
- Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lOzgz1Ddmz8
Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone
Classic, slow zombies and a sinister Bela Lugosi are a winning combination. It’s a little slow and tame by today’s standards, but it was groundbreaking at the time. And it’s an interesting watch seeing how things were done 90 years ago.
Synopsis
In the West Indies, a carriage containing a young couple, Neil and Madeline, rides down the road and comes across a bunch of black people digging a grave in the middle of the road. There’s someone stealing corpses, so they bury them in the middle of the road where there’s always people.
They drive on and soon meet “Murder” Legendre standing in the road, who is creepy. The driver sees zombies coming out of the woods and rides away. Legendre is left holding Madeline’s scarf. He smiles and leads the zombies away. The carriage driver explains zombies to the couple. They’re the walking dead, and they’re following them to the Beaumont house right now.
Dr. Bruner meets up with the couple at the Beaumont house, and he says zombies are a common enough thing in Haiti. Gruner has been sent for to perform a wedding ceremony for Neil and Madeline, but he doesn’t know why. It’s not like old man Beaumont to be so generous.
The butler talks to Beaumont, and we see that he is indeed up to something. He’s working with “that man,” and the butler is afraid of him. “I’d sacrifice everything I have in the world for her,” he explains. Does he mean Madeline?
A carriage driven by a zombie comes for Beaumont, and he goes the the driver to the sugar mill, which is staffed by the living dead. Beaumont walks through the operation, and no one speaks until he comes to Legendre, the man in charge. “They work faithfully; they do not mind work for long hours,” he explains. Legendre shows Beaumont the scarf; he knows what they want. All Beaumont wants is a month to seduce Madeline, but Legendre says he couldn’t do it in a year.
“There is a way, but the cost is high,” Legendre states. Beaumont says he’ll pay anything. Legendre gives Beaumont a vial of something to feed to Neil, and that’ll solve his problems. “Send me word when you use it,” he commands.
Back at the big house, everyone is ready for the wedding. Beaumont tries to convince Madeline not to go through with the wedding, but she’s not listening. He gives her a rose, and she sniffs it. Outside, Legendre does a spell with a candle and the scarf. Inside, Madeline drops dead.
They have a funeral, and Neil goes to the bar to drink heavily. He hallucinates seeing Madeline in his drink and then freaks out. Legendre introduces Beaumont to his favorite zombies in the graveyard, all of whom used to be his enemies. “What if they regain their souls,” he asks. Legendre says that can never be. The zombies pick up Madeline’s coffin and take it home to Beaumont’s place. Outside, they hear a drunken Neil running around screaming her name. He shows up in the tomb and finds it empty.
Dr. Bruner comes clean and tells Neil his suspicions. He thinks that Madeline may actually still be alive. He says that zombies aren’t really dead; they just have no mind or soul. He reads from a book about “lethargic comas.” Beaumont wouldn’t have been able to do this, so it must have been the natives.
Elsewhere, Madeline plays the piano for Beaumont. She plays pretty well for a dead girl. He puts an expensive-looking necklace on her, and she doesn’t even notice. He sees that she’s just a brain-dead, soulless zombie and regrets what he did. He can’t bear to look at her anymore.
Beaumont wants Legendre to give her back her soul, but Legendre says that’s impossible. Legendre gives his drug to Beaumont so that he can take Madeline from him. The zombies carry away Silver the butler.
Neil and Bruner go looking for Pierre, an old witch doctor. Pierre warns them to turn back before it’s too late. Pierre says he’s the only man who ever came back from being a zombie. The pair head to Legendre’s castle, where, inside, Legendre gloats over his control of Beaumont.
Neil staggers in and sees them, but he passes out before he can say anything. Legendre controls Madeline, who picks up the knife and walks over to Neil. She drops the knife and comes back downstairs as Neil wakes up and embraces her. Legendre calls in his zombie crew, but Dr. Bruner sneaks up and whacks Legendre over the head. The spell broken, one by one, the zombies all jump off the cliff, preferring suicide to following Legendre’s orders.
Neil goes to Madeline, and she wakes up. Legendre wakes up and makes his escape— at least until Beaumont grabs him from behind and they both go off the cliff as well. Legendre’s pet vulture will eat well in the morning…
Commentary
Ah, the “real,” classic semi-historical Haitian-style zombies, not the plague-ridden, flesh-eating monstrosities of Romero and the Walking Dead. We don’t get enough of those.
Why would Madeline and Neil go to Beaumont’s house, knowing full well that he had a crush on Madeline and would do anything to win her over; what kind of judgment is that?
Bela Lugosi looks suitably evil here, and he glares at the camera a lot. There are some other actors here too, but they aren’t subtle or particularly noteworthy. It’s decent enough, and probably very original at the time, but it’s a little slow-paced for a modern viewer.