This is my favorite time of year, second only to Christmas. Autumn has arrived, the weather is cooling down, and October becomes the month-long celebration of scary movies called Shocktober. So, in the days leading up Halloween I’ll be posting some horror movie recommendations to help you celebrate Shocktober.
Night 1: Classic Horror Night “I know the value of the cold light of reason, but I also
know the deep shadows that light can cast.”
Curse of the Demon is not among the most well-known classic
horror films, and it’s from the late 50’s, well past the golden age horror of
the 1930’s and 40’s, but it is definitely deserving of “classic” status. Based on the story Casting the
Runes by M.R. James, this British production was written by Charles Bennett, who also wrote the Alfred Hitchcock films The Man Who Knew Too Much
(1934) and The 39 Steps, and directed by Jacques Tourneur, who directed
the low-key horror films Cat People and I Walked with a Zombie
for producer Val Lewton and RKO studios. The leads are Dana Andrews, from the mystery
classic Laura, and Peggy Cummins, co-star of the Noir cult classic Gun Crazy. So, all together this film has impressive credentials. Despite creative differences between Bennett, Tourneur, and
producer Hal E. Chester over the titular demon, the result is a memorable and
eerie film that successfully combines psychological horror with more overt horror elements.
Dana Andrews plays Dr. Holden, an American psychologist in
England investigating a satanic cult and its sophisticated but nefarious
leader, Dr. Karswell. Joanna (Cummins) believes that the mysterious death of
her uncle, a psychologist who was also investigating the satanic cult, is not only
linked to the Karswell but caused by dark supernatural forces. Dr. Holden
is skeptical, even about the death curse Karswell put on him, but then he begins
having strange experiences. As the calendar counts down his demise, Joanna
and Holden search for a way to reverse the curse.
It is not a spoiler to reveal that Karswell is in fact
summoning a demon to do away with his enemies since this is made clear in the
opening scenes. In fact, this is the creative choice that divided Bennett and Tourneur
against producer Hal E. Chester. Both Bennett and Tourneur believed that less
was more when it came to horror. They believed that suspense, ambiguity, and the power of
suggestion allowed the audience to scare themselves more than any monster or special effects. Chester had the opposite perspective. I can understand both points of view.
Relying on atmosphere, suspense, and tricks that only suggest a monster are
what make Tourneur’s films Cat People and I Walked with a Zombie
so great. A Hitchcock film like The 39 Steps relies on well-established characters
in tense situations instead of effects. On the other hand, Curse of the
Demon still has plenty of eerie atmosphere thanks to Tourneur’s style and
smart characters thanks to Bennett’s screenplay, and it is still suspenseful
but in a different way. Instead of being unsure about black magic like Holden,
we know that the curse and demon are real. The longer it takes for Holden to
accept this, the less time he has to figure out how to stop Karswell.
The demon is pretty impressive. It is big, has a scary
monster face, and appears in eerie light and fog. The movie would
have a different tone if the demon was only suggested, but its
inclusion does not undercut any of the low-key elements. The demon is
only used twice, each time to great effect. Seeing it at the beginning establishes a high level of danger for the characters and its appearance at the end is a satisfying payoff. If
there’s a monster that threatens to undercut the movie it’s the housecat that
turns into a panther (big stuffed animal) that Dana Andrews has to wrestle. It
doesn’t ruin the movie but it is the only moment where the seams show. Brief as
it is, this moment is up there with Christopher Lee fighting a stuffed dog in The
Hound of the Baskervilles (1959). The creepiest and most impressive special
effect is the glowing ball of fog that chases Andrews through a forest at night.
Though it is only in two scenes, you’ll find the demon’s
face on the movie poster, DVD art, and streaming service thumbnail images. That
image combined with a sensational title like Curse of the Demon might
make you expect a schlock B-movie, but this a well-done, creepy horror film
that relies on suspense, atmosphere, convincing characters, and clever
writing more than special effects, though the effects are well-done too. When
he collaborated with producer Val Lewton on horror movies, Jacques Tourneur
also created films that surpassed their sensational (or silly) titles and
frightened audiences in unexpected ways. He did the same again with Curse of
the Demon.
There are two versions of this film. It was released first in the
U.K. as Night of the Demon in 1957. A year later it was released in the U.S. as
Curse of the Demon because Columbia studio executives were afraid
audiences would get it confused with the John Huston film Night of the
Iguana and 13 minutes were cut so it could play as
a double feature. No matter which version you watch, you’re in for a spooky and satisfying night.
This is my favorite time of year, second only to Christmas.
Autumn has arrived, the weather is cooling down, and October becomes the
month-long celebration of scary movies called Shocktober. So, in the days leading up Halloween I’ll be posting some horror movie recommendations to help you celebrate Shocktober.
Throughout the 1940’s, the movie studio RKO released a
series of low budget horror hits that despite their exploitative titles (Cat
People, Isle of the Dead, Curse of the Cat People) were films
of first-rate quality and substance. These films were developed and overseen by
producer Val Lewton, who has the rare distinction of being a producer seen as
an auteur (or author) by modern film critics and historians. The best of Val
Lewton’s RKO horror films were his collaborations with director Jacques Tourneur, including I Walked With a Zombie.
You won’t find any flesh eating ghouls in this zombie movie.
Before George Romero’s landmark film Night of the Living Dead in 1968, a
zombie was a dark myth of the Voodoo religion. Specifically, a zombie was a
person that had been put in a deathlike trance, buried, dug up, and then
continued in a trance as a slave to the Voodoo priest that performed the
“resurrection.” This is the type of zombie the characters in I Walked With a
Zombie are confronted with.
Betsy (Frances Dee) travels to the island of St. Sebastian
in the West Indies to take a job as a private nurse. She moves in to the
Holland family sugar plantation and becomes friendly with Tom Holland (Tom Conway) and
his half-brother Wesley Rand (James Ellison), though the brothers are at odds. Her
patient is Tom’s wife, Jessica, who is in a perpetual catatonic trance and
wanders the plantation at night. As Betsy tries to understand Jessica’s illness,
she uncovers dark secrets about the Holland family.
The Val Lewton RKO horror movies emphasized atmosphere over
visual scares, though there are naturally a few of those in I Walked With a
Zombie. The titular scene of Betsy walking with Jessica through the cane
fields coming across eerie markers like a hanging dead animal and a skull in the
dirt is accompanied only by the sound of wind. The possibility of the
supernatural looms over the characters, but
this film delves more into the psychological effects of superstition. Betsy is
a in a new and exotic land with customs and beliefs strange to her; her lack
of familiarity puts her on edge. Perhaps the creepiest scene is also the
unlikeliest. When trying to wake Wesley at a bar patio, a street musician sings a melancholy calypso ballad of the Holland
family while walking slowly towards Betsy. Then he includes her in the ballad.
It’s easily the creepiest use a calypso song in a movie and also a clever way
to deliver exposition. The beautiful Film Noir-like use of light and shadow
further adds to the eerie atmosphere of every scene.
Slavery is at the heart of the Voodoo zombie myth. I
Walked With a Zombie is aware of this and deals indirectly with the
lingering effects of slavery, albeit only for the white descendants of the
slaveowners. A black carriage driver tells Betsy how the Holland family brought
“the long ago fathers and long ago mothers of us all” to the island, “chained
to the bottom of the boat.” The figurehead of that slave ship rests in the
center of the courtyard of the Holland estate, an ever present and morbid
reminder of the family’s past. It’s interesting that when Tom Holland says that
the slave ship brought “our people” to the island, he is referring to
his family as well as the slaves.
The central theme of I Walked With a Zombie is a
simple one: things are not what they seem. When Betsy is admiring the beauty of
the sea, Tom tells her with a resigned melancholy: “Those flying fish, they’re
not leaping for joy, they’re jumping in terror. Bigger fish want to eat them.
That luminous water, it takes its gleam from millions of tiny dead bodies. The
glitter of putrescence.” Voodoo is not dangerous; it is just a religion that
can be used for good or evil. The zombie is a victim, not a monster. The harm
to Holland family was done not by the natives; it was done by the Hollands themselves.
From its title, I Walked With a Zombie seems like a silly exploitation
film, but it is a genuine horror classic made with exquisite talent on and off
screen. This Lewton/Tourneur film is not as well-known as their signature film Cat People, but is easily of the same quality. Its moody and eerie atmosphere
hold up solidly, as do the performances, and will make for a great Shocktober
night.
This is my favorite time of year, second only to Christmas. Autumn has arrived, the weather is cooling down, and October becomes the month long celebration of scary movies called Shocktober. There are a lot of horror movies out there, but as a genre, horror is still looked down upon by some mainstream critics and moviegoers. It doesn’t help that, admittedly, there are so few quality horror movies made but, like comedy, it’s a very difficult and subjective genre. So, in the days leading up Halloween I’ll be posting some recommendations for scary movies to help you celebrate Shocktober.
In the early 1940’s RKO Pictures created a low budget
B-horror movie unit to compete with, and capitalize on the success of, Universal
Studios’ B-horror movies like Dracula,
Frankenstein, The Wolf Man and their
many sequels. Producer Val Lewton was put in charge of the unit and tasked with
churning out horror movies with sensational titles, miniscule budgets, and left
over sets from other movies. The result was a series of horror films that were
the opposite of what the studio was expecting, but were still box office hits.
Today they remain spooky and interesting films and Val Lewton is one of the few
producers that critics, film historians, and cinephiles consider to be an
“auteur,” or the author of a film. The first of these low budget horror movies was
Cat People, released in 1942, which
deserves to be included alongside horror movie classics like Dracula (1931) and Bride of Frankenstein (1935). If you are someone that doesn’t like graphic
violence or bloody horror, or even if you are, or if you want to become more
familiar with classic horror cinema, Cat
People is a great film to watch any Shocktober night.
Cat People stars
Simone Simon as Irena, a Serbian immigrant in New York City who meets and falls
in love with Oliver, played by Kent Smith. Irena lives in an apartment close
enough to the zoo to hear the animals at night and finds the roar of the big
cats comforting. She and Oliver fall in love and marry, but Irena’s belief in a
superstition of her homeland keeps her from becoming intimate with him, or even
kissing him. She fears that any passion or jealousy she has will change her
into a jungle cat and she will kill her lover. At a restaurant, a woman that
some characters say “looks like a cat” greets Irena by calling her “my sister.”
When Irena walks into a pet store with Oliver, animals go into a wild frenzy and
become calm once she leaves. Oliver is a good, decent husband and believes
Irena will overcome her superstitions with the help of a psychiatrist played by
Tom Conway, who exudes a cool, debonair, and condescending aura (not unlike
that of his brother, actor George Sanders). Oliver confides his marriage
troubles in his friend and co-worker Alice, played by Jane Randolph. Though
Alice is in love with Oliver her only intention is to be a friend and offer
advice, but Irena resents their closeness and becomes jealous and dangerous.
Lewton was a hands off producer when it came to shooting movies,
but there is a distinctive style to his RKO horror movies despite working with
different directors. The Lewton style was born out of necessity due to budget
restrictions, but he and his directors turned this handicap into creative
advantages. Cat People is shot with
stark shadows and low lighting resembling the look of a Film Noir. In fact, the
director of Cat People, Jacques Tourneur, perhaps Lewton’s best collaborator, would go on the direct the lauded Film
Noir Out of the Past.
It’s a well-established horror movie trope that you can scare
the audience more by showing them less; what you show them will never be as
scary as what they create in their own imaginations. Lewton and Tourneur fully
exploit this idea to great effect. They knew they did not have the budget for
decent special effects so the movie avoids showing the audience what they might
expect to see, namely a monstrous cat-person, and instead fills its spooky
scenes with shadows, dim lights, and darkness. Shadows are as important to Cat People as its characters, and they are
used along with a clear and effective sound design for maximum effect. They
hide the film’s low budget and put the audience at unease by denying them a
full picture and thus a full explanation. You may not see a lot of horror in Cat People but it builds a moody
atmosphere that primes the viewer for scares which the movie delivers, but
never quite how you are expecting. In one of the most memorable scenes Alice is
walking home through a park at night in shadows and small pools of light from
the street lamps. There is complete silence except for the clicking of her
heels and… another set of heels behind her. For just a brief moment, so
purposefully quick it’s easy to miss, we think we hear the growling of a big
cat, but the growl morphs into the rumble of a city bus. A few moments later,
however, large paw prints are found in the soft ground of the park.
Cat People plays
with the preconceived notions the characters and audience have about
superstitions and the supernatural. The movie begins in a thoroughly real world
in which there is no chance of anything supernatural. Then, slowly, it shows us
scenes to suggest otherwise and make the characters second guess their
rationale. Is Irena really a cat person of old world legend or does she just believe
she is so much that the people around her begin to unconsciously believe so as
well?
Cat People is the
antithesis of the Universal monster movies, in which the monster is the star of
the movie. It holds back showing you any horror or scenes of violence for as
long as it possibly can. The characters feel like full-fledged people, a rarity
in horror movies of any era, and their world feels like a real, lived in place. Cat People does all of this and more in
less than 75 minutes.
