Nonureva Really Surprised!

2hotFeature one of my absolute favorites!

GazerRise Fantastic!

Ava-Grace Willis Story: It's very simple but honestly that is fine.

TheRedDeath30 I don't want to do it. It's talked about enough, but I feel like I have to address it. That giant elephant in the room of our culture anymore. Of course, I mean racism. It's such a touchy subject, but one that has become so implicit in our culture that it seems like you can't discuss any film anymore without defending or abusing it's portrayal of minority characters. The film should be judged, fairly, on its' comparison to other cheapie horror films of the era and how it stacks up, but there is so much discussion of the stereotyping of black characters in this movie that you almost have to discuss it. By not addressing at all, you run that risk of being labeled a racist yourself because you dared to embrace a film that has obvious stereotypes.I do not champion those stereotypes, nor approve of some of them, but I am also willing to say they are products of their age. That does not excuse them, but also does not mean that an audience looking at it with the benefit of 70 more years of racial understanding should judge it by today's standards. I'm already discussing this far more than I intended, so I will say this. Mantan Moreland is the star of this movie. He is hilarious. He is the entire reason that this movie is so enjoyable. It would be another 20 years before Hollywood really started giving starring roles to black actors, so I would say that Moreland is a pioneer here and should be appreciated for it. So, enough of my rant.The movie has a lot in common with the other Monogram Pictures of its time, cheap throwaway horror films, produced with a small budget, bad writing and bad acting and pushed out. Most of them had ridiculous plots with people acting in ridiculous ways and this movie is no exception. What it doesn't have, that a lot of Monogram's best known pictures have, is Bela Lugosi, but they got Henry Victor to do his best Lugosi impersonation.Two guys are on a mission to find a missing admiral who has crash landed in the Caribbean. Naturally, they bring their servant along because you can't go on a trip without your valet, now can you? They end up crash landing on an island that seems to be mostly jungle except for a creepy European guy who has a big, Gothic mansion in the middle of the jungle. It's filled with his sleepwalking wife, his young niece and a house full of zombie servants. It is, actually, one of the last films that I can think of where Hollywood used the old style zombie, the idea of the Caribbean style mindless minion that became popular horror fodder in movies like WHITE ZOMBIE and I WALKED WITH A ZOMBIE. The movie is full of jungle drums, mindless walkers, hidden passageways and a big voodoo ceremony in the finale. On the surface, the Nazi type character is doing research on hypnosis and mind control. Ultimately, he is using it as a plot to help his allies with a nefarious plot against the Americans they are at war with.The two main characters are really just window dressing. We have the secret agent man, young and dashing, out to win the girl and save the day, but he's completely generic and forgettable. His buddy, the pilot, is along for some comic relief and to become the plot device as he is brainwashed by the evil scientist. It is Moreland who is the star. He has a majority of the screen time. He gets all of the best jokes. He is, also, the hero. Moreland is the one who realizes that something is afoot. He uses the other servants of the house to dig up information on what is really going on in this plantation. In the end, it is Moreland that saves the day. His sense of humor is fantastic. Yes, typical of the day there are a lot of one-liners and witty comebacks, but his facial expressions and use of body language is, also, just spot on.The humor makes this movie shine, but there is plenty of Saturday matinée monster goodness to satisfy my cravings. Watch this in a dark room on a Saturday night and it's perfect. The zombies go perfectly with the jungle drums, setting an exotic scene of scariness. The main villain plays his role well. Yes, he's clearly aping Lugosi, but he does it well. The creepy voodoo witch adds a nice touch, leading up to a finale, complete with voodoo masks that reminded me of something straight out of a Scooby Doo cartoon, which is what this whole movie feels like to me.

binapiraeus "King of the Zombies" certainly is one of the most MAGNIFICENT horror spoofs ever made - although, or maybe BECAUSE it was made by 'poor little' Monogram Pictures. Monogram had always had a VERY fine crew of actors, directors and screenwriters to make the very best of whatever means of production they had; and one of their best steady cast members was Mantan Moreland, known today mostly for his role as 'Birmingham' in the Monogram Charlie Chan movies. But here he's not just the second assistant to the great detective and his sons, but kind of a semi-lead - and of course the very core of the comical part of the movie.And just like the Monogram Charlie Chan movies always managed very elegantly to hold the balance between crime mystery and comedy, so does "King of the Zombies" with horror and comedy. There's everything the horror film fan's heart desires: an isolated island, a mysterious mansion with dark vaults, a strange scientist, zombies - and the adequate musical score to send shivers down your spine; and on the other hand, there's Mantan Moreland, better than ever (and getting, of course, a lot more opportunity to show his magnificent comical talent, with his eyes popping with fright and his knees shaking, and at the same time wisecracking and flirting with fate as well as with the kitchen maid...This much-underrated movie surely deserves more attention and a much higher ranking among classic horror comedies; the atmosphere is haunting, but at the same time you find yourself in the middle of a creepy zombie tale, you can't help laughing with the jokes thrown in at the most improbable moments - FIRST-CLASS entertainment from a small but classy production company, and a sublime cast and crew!

lemon_magic This movie reminds me of an episode of Scooby Doo, with Henry Victor playing the part of the spook master, the two bland men-of-action white guys playing the roles of Fred and Daphne, and Mantan Moreland playing the parts of Shaggy and Scooby. (I suppose the role of Velma is split between the white female lead and the black female lead, since they both appear to be waaay smarter than the men.) Obviously intended as a spooky comedy of sorts, the one good thing you can say about it is that it gives Moreland a chance to do his stuff, and he does so: he basically steals the movie with a wonderfully consistent and energetic performance.I realize that this sort of role might be painful and jarring for modern "politically correct" viewers to watch, but as a creation of his time and place, Moreland had the stuff. He wouldn't have been out of place on something like the Flip Wilson show in the 60s before people like Richard Pryor and Dick Gregory evolved black acting and comedy to the next step.The rest of the movie and cast is competent in that early B&W 40's Monogram way - the movie gets the job done, but it's nothing to get excited about.

JoeB131 This movie is kind of odd, you know it is something from a very different time.The plot is that in 1941, a navy plane full of weather equipment crashes on an Island where a suspicious foreign doctor is. (It's implied but never said he's German, because America hadn't gotten into the war yet.) He is using hypnosis to turn people into Zombies, and to get information out of an Admiral who crashed on the island previously.The best part of the movie is the banter between Jeff, played by Mantan, and the girl playing the maid. He really steals every scene he's in.The more dubious part of this movie are the racial attitudes. The two white male leads treat Mantan's character almost as badly as the Nazi villain does. Hollywood wasn't ready for change, just yet.