User reviews

Betsy Connell (Frances Dee) is a Canadian nurse hired to come to the Caribbean island of St. Sebastian, to work at Fort Holland. There she will attend to the needs of the mute, unresponsive, yet seemingly alive Jessica Holland (Christine Gordon). Jessica is wife to a plantation owner named Paul Holland (Tom Conway), with whom Betsy falls in love. Betsy becomes determined to do the right thing by Paul by trying to cure her, if she can. That includes immersing herself in the local voodoo culture.

There may be modern horror fans who bemoan the lack of what one might consider horror in "I Walked with a Zombie". It starts to go for more of a traditional creep factor in its second half, using the imposing Darby Jones as the mysterious, zombified Carrefour to great effect. Everything is handled with a great deal of sensitivity and authenticity by screenwriters Curt Siodmak & Ardel Wray, producer Val Lewton, and director Jacques Tourneur. Unlike some of the horror product of the time, it actually treats its black characters with a great deal of dignity and respect, and also gives the actors a chance to shine, such as Theresa Harris as Alma the maid.

As was always the case with these Lewton productions, the story (based to some degree on Jane Eyre, with factual articles on voodoo in the West Endies also used as a basis) is pretty tight, and the running time is typically short. (69 minutes all told.) We don't get to know the characters all that well, but we do still like them, and in a refreshing touch, there are no clear cut villains or explanations for the strange events. The actors each do a solid job: Dee as the heroine, Conway as the husband, James Ellison as his half brother, Edith Barrett (in old age make-up) as their mother, James Bell as the doctor, and Sir Lancelot as the calypso singer. As one can see, some of the cast were regulars in these Lewton films.

Overall, there's a real feeling of sadness to the atmosphere, helping to make this one of the best of Lewtons' filmography. One wouldn't know from the end result how quickly and cheaply these productions were made, as they have the power to grip their viewers 70 plus years later.

Eight out of 10.

There are a lot of terrific elements in this movie. It is moody and atmospheric, subtly ominous, and like many Lewton movies leaves its supernatural elements ambiguous.

But the most unusual thing aspect from a 1940s movie is how it treats black people. First off, note that the West Indies natives don't speak in either the "yass ma'am" or "ooga booga" styles that represented the entire spectrum of black portrayals in the U.S. at the time. They talk in slightly accented, but perfectly normal English.

Also, the movie specifically mentions the slave industry at least twice. There is a wonderful scene near the beginning in which the main character discusses the island's history with her driver. He mentions they were brought here in chains and she says, well at least they brought you to a beautiful place. "If you say so," he says, very politely

That is such an awesome exchange. He is a servant and he's not going to argue with her, but he also won't kowtow. It is a conversation you can actually believe would happen.

The movie also shows surprising respect for the Voodoo aspects. The natives believe in it, but they aren't mocked for it, and in the ceremony they do actual African dance, instead of some weird Hollywood fakery.

The movie, again typical of Lewton, has a lovely complexity to it. Characters are more than they appear to be, and their motives are not simple.

It's not a perfect movie. Some of the acting is less than stellar and I suspect some explanatory scenes were cut, as it sometimes feels rushed and slightly disconnected. But it is not to be missed.

Canadian nurse Betsy Connell (Frances Dee) is employed by wealthy Paul Holland (Tom Conway) to take care of his catatonic wife Jessica in the West Indies. It is never said exactly where in the West Indies this is, but it is mentioned that there is a strong presence of voodoo on the island.

Betsy is told by Jessica's doctor that Jessica has been this way since she had a bad case of a tropical fever, and the catatonia was the aftermath. Jessica can walk and follow simple commands, but she is mute and doesn't seem to comprehend what is going on around her.

Betsy gets to know both her boss Paul, who is a joyless curmudgeon who proves to be secretly sensitive, as well as his brother Wesley, who is outwardly charming but dangerously embittered. But it's the permanently unavailable Paul whom she grows to love. When a voodoo-believing servant tells Betsy that voodoo has the power to cure Jessica, Betsy takes Jessica to the voodoo encampment to see if they can cause her to reclaim her sanity. Complications ensue.

The film is for sure atmospheric, like all of the entries from Val Lewton during this time period. That atmosphere includes lumbering women in billowing long white gowns, tall stone staircases, and high gray ceilings. A great sense of unease runs through the veins of this movie from start to finish.

What did I not like? Character development is very abbreviated. And the locals who inhabit the island seem more like they are sporting the accent of the blacks of the American south than the West Indies. Plus the explanation of events is delivered in just a couple of sentences at the end and left me very unsatisfied - Show me, don't tell me! But then this was meant to be a 70-minute RKO quickie, not a horror classic, so it is remarkable that with such a small budget it has managed to have such staying power over the years. I'd recommend it.

Present day viewers watching this wonderful movie after reading the label "horror" and seeing the word "zombie" in the title, might be in for a shock if they think they're going to be in for a Romero/Fulci gorefest. This is a completely different kind of zombie movie! In fact, calling it horror is quite misleading, mystery is the more appropriate description. Anyone who has seen 'Cat People', the earlier collaboration between director Jacques Tourneur and producer Val Lewton, will know what to expect. A haunting and subtle yet suspenseful, and yes, at times quite scary, thriller. 'I Walked With A Zombie' (a classic title! Later lifted by Roky Erikson for a classic song) follows 'Cat People's ambiguous format quite closely with a series of events which may or may not have a supernatural explanation. Add a dash of 'Jane Eyre' to it and a West Indies setting and there you have it. Tourneur was a master of atmosphere and there are moments in this movie which are truly unforgettable. The two leads Tom Conway and Frances Dee are both very good, and Dee is cute to boot. I don't think 'I Walked With A Zombie' is quite as brilliant as 'Cat People', which I still think ties with the film noir classic 'Out Of The Past' as Tourneur's greatest film, but it comes very close, and I highly recommend it. If you've never seen this one before, turn off all the lights and watch with someone special. You are in for a real treat!

The film opens with Betsy Connell (Frances Dee) being interviewed for a home-care nursing position. Oddly, she's asked during the interview if she believes in witchcraft. She gets the position, working for Paul Holland (Tom Conway), who is a wealthy plantation owner on the Caribbean island of St. Sebastian. Holland has hired her to take care of his wife, Jessica (Christine Gordon), who is in a perpetual state that resembles somnambulance. As Betsy spends more time on the island, she learns that most of the population believes in and practices voodoo, and she learns that Jessica had a relatively tumultuous past with Holland's family.

This was director Jacques Tourneur and producer Val Lewton's second horror/thriller collaboration (the first being Cat People (1942) and the third The Leopard Man (1943)). For many viewers, it is their favorite of the three. While I like the film, I don't like it quite that much--I prefer Cat People. But still, I Walked With A Zombie ends up with a 7 out of 10 from me.

The horror aspects of I Walked With A Zombie are really very minor. They're really present only as a kind of personification of the results of complicated romantic and familial relationships. Yes, there is an admirable "haunted house"-styled scene involving a spooky stairway and creepy, distant sounds, and yes, the trek to the voodoo "home fort" is well done, but this kind of material doesn't work as well for me here as it did in Cat People, because here it's not really the focus of the story. It's ancillary material with the function of helping to solve a very different kind of mystery. Also, much of the voodoo material (such as the actual ceremony) tends to be overrated in my opinion, although the final sequence related to the voodoo theme is appropriately eerie.

But what works best for me in I Walked With A Zombie are the many dialogue-heavy scenes where the three main characters--Connell, Holland and Wesley Rand (James Ellison)--gradually learn more about one another, and where the "mystery" is gradually uncovered. A scene where a local "minstrel" sings part of the backstory while Connell and Rand are having a drink is exquisite, for example. Yet, even with this positive aspect, I never felt that the backstory was sufficiently explained. The mystery remains, and the moralizing bookends of the film do not help, either.

Still, I Walked With A Zombie is definitely worth a watch, and based on the extravagant praise that many viewers utter towards the film, you might like it much better than I do.

"I Walked with a Zombie" is one of the most highly regarded of the handful of horror films that Val Lewton produced in the early to mid forties. The story is based partly on Charlotte Brontë's "Jane Eyre" and partly on a magazine article by Inez Wallace.

In the film, a young Canadian nurse accepts a position in the West Indies where she will care for a plantation manager's convalescent wife. She finds that the woman's mental faculties have been affected by a fever and the locals refer to her as a zombie. She determines to effect a cure, even if she has to enter into the mysterious (and potentially dangerous) world of voodoo.

The acting is decent enough but nothing to write home about. The top-billed James Ellison gives a forgettable performance but co-stars Frances Dee & Tom Conway fare better. In support, some actors seem more authentic than others but overall the cast is satisfactory.

Jacques Tourneur was handed the directorial duties and he did a fine job with the resources that were available to him. The direction, cinematography & score (by Roy Webb) create an ominous atmosphere that makes up for any inadequacies inherent in the film's low budget. The screenplay (co-written by Curt Siodmak) also deserves praise for its psychological depth and ambiguous treatment of the supernatural.

All in all, "I Walked with a Zombie" is a worthwhile horror picture and a welcome change from today's stereotypical flesh-eating zombies. While its B-movie origins are sometimes apparent, this film elevates itself above the usual expectations with intelligent screen writing and skillful technique.

The Canadian nurse Betsy Connell (Frances Dee) is hired to travel to St. Sebastian, in West Indies, to work at Fort Holland nursing Jessica Holland (Christine Gordon), the wife of the sugar plantation owner Paul Holland (Tom Conway). Betsy meets Paul in the ship and is welcomed by Paul's estranged half-brother Wesley "Wes" Rand (James Ellison) in the farmhouse. During the night, she overhears a woman crying and she believes that might be Jessica and goes to her room. She finds a creepy mute woman and she learns that Jessica had a mental paralysis after a severe tropical fever and is a hopeless case, unable to speak or have power. Soon Betsy falls in love with Paul and she decides to help Jessica to be cured to make Paul happier. She suggests an experimental treatment with shock to Dr. Maxwell (James Bell) but it fails. While talking to the maid Alma (Theresa Harris), she discovers that another woman was cured in a voodoo ceremony by a voodoo priest and she decides to use witchcraft to cure Jessica. However the natives believe that Jessica is a zombie that cannot be cured. When Betsy meets Paul and Wesley's mother Mrs. Rand (Edith Barrett), she finds that Jessica was the pivot of a fight between Paul and Wes and she believes that her daughter-in-law is a zombie.

"I Walked with a Zombie" is an ambiguous zombie movie directed by Jacques Tourneur. The plot is a family drama and the zombies in this movie are not like in George Romero's trilogy or "The Walking Dead", but related to voodoo in a Caribbean Island. There is a creepy atmosphere with a beautiful cinematography, the non-stop voodoo drums and the native Carrefour, but no gore, violent death or scream. The conclusion is ambiguous after the revelation of Mrs. Rand. My vote is seven.

Title (Brazil): "A Morta-Viva" ("The Living Dead")

Except for a single scream, no one speaks above a hard whisper. Wind rustles through sugar cane fields guarded by a pop-eyed, nearly skeletal zombie who stands as lifeless and stick-shouldered as a scarecrow. A dead rabbit hangs in a tree. Voodoo drums thrum the night air.

"I Walked with a Zombie" is a movie of such voluptuous atmosphere that if you surrender yourself to it, it almost seems as if you've been transported to another world. It's a horror movie of suggestion, inference, punctuated with the occasional visual just sharp enough to prick through the feeling of dread and send a chill up the spine.

All performances low-key and excellent (Frances Dee notably good), the dialog crisp, but it's the lighting, sets and camera work that make the movie what it is, a gorgeous vision of shadows that haunts the mind days later.

And it's only 69 minutes long.

I Walked with a Zombie (1943)

This sounds like a creaker, and it's not. The biggest reason? My guess is the director Jacques Tourneur, who had just finished the terrific "The Cat People" and was going to soon do the near legendary "Out of the Past." For this odd and enchanting zombie movie, he takes very little and makes a lot out of it. The mood, the plot (with help from writer Curt Siodmak, brother of the famous director Robert Siodmak), and the settings are made more substantial than was likely given the budget.

Besides the Jane Eyre-ish plot, the huge role given black actors is a rare thrill (for 1943) and they have complex and reasonably convincing roles to fill out, including the voodoo religious culture. There is one great dancing and drum scene halfway through that struck me as honest and great to watch.

There is no one of any fame here, yet all the key actors (there are half a dozen with critical roles) are really strong, not hammy and not faltering. I guess I keep addressing the fear that this is a low-budget cult film, and it doesn't feel like one. It's easily as good as most of the monster and horror films Universal was cranking out a decade after "Dracula."

"I Walked with a Zombie", besides having one of the oddest movie titles, took a different approach to the horror genre than the popular Universal movies of the day. Maybe it harkens back to the earlier Universal heavies like "Dracula" and "Bride of Frankenstein". Made by Val Lewton and Jacques Tourneur, they crafted their collaborations using a poetic, dreamlike approach to cinematic storytelling. Lyrical and atmospheric, "I Walked with a Zombie" recounts the story of a Canadian nurse sent to a small West Indian sugar island to tend for a young comatose woman, the wife of the island's plantation owner. What's wrong with her? Hints abound through the songs of the calypso singers, bits of dialogue, objects in the movie. The story, as odd as it is, is not told directly. You may think it is, but at the end of the film, you're not so certain of what's happened. Were the events the work of the supernatural? Was a crime committed? Or both? Or neither? It's difficult to say. I recommend this movie, it's important not to forget the older, off-beat films.

First of all: PLEASE don't let the misleading, rather silly sounding title discourage you! I walked with a Zombie is another brilliant result of the collaborations between producer Val Lewton and director Jacques Tourneur. Released one year after the simply astonishing movie 'Cat People', this is yet another intelligently elaborated and genuinely original genre-masterpiece. The solid screenplay contains a rarely seen before amount of eeriness and handles about a young ambitious nurse who goes to San Antonio in order to take care of Jessica. Jessica is the wife of plantation-owner Paul Holland and she suffers from a bizarre mental paralysis, supposedly caused by a tropical fever. She is – in fact – a zombie only not the type of walking corpse you usually expect in horror movies. Betsy, the nurse, is somehow convinced that Jessica may still be cured and turns to the Voodoo-community that is living on the island as well. Just like he pulled it off in Cat People, Tourneur manages to bring suspense in a subtle way. Without bloody images but with a unique photography and efficient set pieces! I walked with a Zombie contains great dialogs, intriguing characters and mind bending plot-twists. This is an intelligent and demanding film, especially made for people who take this genre serious! It ranks slightly under 'Cat People' but light-years above most other horror films. Check it out!

The basic plot: A Canadian nurse arrives at the isle of St. Sebastian to take care of a plantation owners mentally entranced and disturbed wife, but once she get's there, she learns more than she should about the family secrets, voodoo , and zombie fever......

The praise: A truly poetic, hypnotizing, and creepy film experience. The poetry of the island traditions, the family mysteries and everything else about the movie is truly evocative and sensitive. There are smatterings of spooky moments throughout, all frightening suggestively, using sound , imagery and implied chills. All classically and romantically constructed and written, a flagon of longing, taste, and character in every little detail. Well-shot, especially the impressive voodoo ceremony. Very atmospheric, with black& white used to enhance the mood, as in all Lewton movies. Watch for calypso singer Sir Lancelot, who Lewton also used in " Curse of the Cat People", an equally poetic movie, which I also have reviewed. A masterpiece of the horror film, it has many scenes which take together the essential elements of suspense and atmosphere , sound and imagery , such as Dee traveling to the voodoo ceremony. A must-see. Very hard-to-find. The only way I could find it was to order a copy of an unauthorized copy of it from Canada.Truly great.

After watching I Walked With A Zombie I was shaken a bit, a little unnerved as it were. But when I started to analyze the film I was wondering just what did I see?

Frances Dee has been hired to look after Tom Conway's wife Christine Gordon who is in a coma, but this is the sleepwalking type of coma and the natives have identified here as a zombie. Here illness whatever it is has cast a pall on the household. Conway and his mother apparently make a nice income which is half brother James Ellison drinks a lot of it away.

One thing that was interesting and highly unusual. The natives are the descendants of escaped slaves and the heritage there is one of reverting back to their tribal beliefs as an act of defiance. Slavery with few exceptions is rarely dealt with from the slave or former slave point of view.

Edith Barrett plays Conway and Ellison's mother. She likes Dee and views her as an ideal daughter-in-law for one of her kids. She also has another role on the island, one I can't reveal here.

Val Lewton produced and Jacques Tourneur directed I Walked With A Zombie. It's not great, I think it was butchered in the editing department. But the mood that is created will linger with you. And the ending is decades ahead of its time, something you might see in a Stephen King work.

A nurse (Frances Dee) comes to the West Indies to help two brothers (Tom Conway and James Ellison) tend to the older of the two's wife (Christine Gordon), who is stuck in a perpetual trancelike state. Her doctor is mystified, but it's clear that voodoo from the locals must be involved. There are some nice scenes at night in the film, such as a walk through the rustling sugarcane fields, which evoke a dreamy and gothic feeling. The characters involved in the voodoo itself are fantastic, most notably, the solemn Carrefour (guardian of the crossroads), played by Darby Jones, who has an extraordinary appearance. He alone makes the film worth seeing, especially as it's so short at 69 minutes, but it's also great to briefly see the voodoo dancers.

Unfortunately, the film's three main characters are all uninspiring, wandering through this script as if they were the ones who were zombies, at least emotionally. A love is supposed to develop between Dee and Conway, which isn't based on anything we can possibly see, and is therefore unbelievable. The character actions also seem hard to believe at times as well, for example, when they discover the wife doesn't bleed when cut, nothing is done with this information. As in 'Cat People' (1942), also directed by Jacques Tourneur, there are some really nice, eerie moments in this film, but the rest of it is too understated for my taste, and lacking in emotion.

A nurse (Frances Dee) is assigned to the West Indies to care for the semi-comatose wife of a plantation owner (Tom Conway). Over there she becomes involved with a very dysfunctional family and the realization that her patient may be a zombie--one of the living dead.

Eerie, poetic horror film--one of the great ones producer Val Lewton made for RKO on no budget. There are many creepy sequences--the crying and first meeting of Dee with her patient; the constant pounding of the voodoo drums in the distance at night; Dee being awakened by shadows outside her bedroom window; the walk through the sugar cane field to the voodoo ritual and the guard they must pass. There's also a man with a guitar who pops up from time to time acting as a Greek chorus--always commenting on the action. The script is very good and literate and the acting is actually not bad--except for Conway (who's lousy). But Ellison and Dee are good.

I almost gave this a 10--but one thing kept me from doing that. The silly love story between Conway and Dee. It's not needed and is a great distraction from the plot. Also Conway's acting is so bad that it makes the scenes play even worse. Those aside though, it's a truly great horror film. A must see.

Cute little trivia note: Look closely for the "Any characters and events depicted in this photoplay..." etc. etc. under the opening credits. Especially note this line: "Any similarity to actual persons living, dead, OR POSSESSED is purely coincidental." Cute joke...wonder how many people caught it.

Thought-provoking, literate horror from RKO Radio Pictures. This 'Jane Eyre'-like story is probably the most memorable Val Lewton/Jacques Tourneur collaboration. This eerie film still holds firm after all these years. The story's menacing fear is not what appears on screen, but what hovers in the minds of the characters on screen. A young American nurse(Frances Dee)comes to Haiti to care for a rich plantation owner's(Paul Holland)catatonic wife(Christine Gordon), who appears to be burnt out by a tropical disease. Of course the locals believe she is a zombie...victimized by rampant voodoo. The nurse falls in love with her employer and is desperate to find a cure for his wife and seeks a cure at a voodoo ritual. Creepy enough with great eerie atmosphere. Rounding out the cast are: James Ellison, Edith Barrett and the beach strolling zombie...Darby Jones.

Nurse Betsy arrives in the West Indies to care for Jessica, the wife of Paul Holland. Jessica was struck down with a fever that has rendered her in a permanent state of mental paralysis. As Betsy starts to fall for Holland, she resolves to cure Jessica and get to the bottom of just what is going on in this mysterious place.

Producer Val Lewton firmly carved out a reputation for having a keen eye with a number of literary horror adaptations in the 1940s, there is certainly a case for I Walked With A Zombie being one of the best of the bunch. Tho tagged as a horror film, and boasting a title to further that inkling, I Walked With A Zombie is more in keeping with the dreamy and atmospheric romanticism of Jane Eyre. Sure the voodoo core of the film is chilling in its intent, but to really sell this as an outright horror film would do it a big disservice.

Lewton's ideals are more focused on suggestion in a psychological way, the scares more cloaked in a shadowy unease, director Jacques Tourneur perfectly in tune with his producer to unhinge the audience by way of an approaching dread we can't see. Some of Tourneur's work here is wonderful, hauntingly elegiac sequences linger long in the memory, rustling wind blows as characters are appearing to float thru sugar cane fields, the distant rumble of ceremonial drums luring them forward with mystical powers. A voodoo zombie shuffling on a mission to fetch poor Jessica from the plantation home is not horrifying, its damn near gorgeous, soft and near silent in its execution, the whole film is simply full of memorable moments.

Written by Curt Siodmak, the concept for the piece came about by way of a number of newspaper articles that were telling of voodoo and witchcraft in Haiti, the scope for a screamathon horror movie was obviously there, but thankfully in this viewers humble opinion, we get a classy and chilling film that is dripping with ethereal beauty from first reel to last. 8/10

That's what I said. What in the world, or rather, other world was that all about? Beautifully atmospheric and photographed and as James Agee said about Frances Dee "one of the most beautiful faces in Hollywood", and well enough acted. But - what was going on? One absurdity after another. No real need to make any sense out of it. After all, what sense could be made? None. Too many loose ends and unfinished thoughts and jumpings ahead and poorly scripted without anything holding it up. And, finally, who cares and if you do, why? However - it was exquisite to look at which is all that you need to do for this film. Just look at it and breathe it in. And, in the end, in this film - that is all that really mattered. 6 stars for "stuff" and 11 stars for beauty.

Well, this was nothing like I thought it might be, which means good news and bad news.

BAD NEWS - Very little action, almost none. Mostly talk, talk and more talk. This was much more of melodrama with the only skeletons were the ones in the closet that are revealed near the end, uncovering past sins in a family. With the title of this film, I can't expecting something dramatic, something to happen....but it didn't.

GOOD NEWS - The black-and-white film offered some great visuals, wonderful contrasts and, as Lewton films are known to do - "atmospheric" cinematography. That, and the strange-looking anorexic voodoo man, are my main good memories of this film, which was transfered nicely on DVD as part of the Lewton Horror Collection.

The acting was fine and the dialog interesting at times. In summary, a so-so film I might watch again, and I might not. It's that kind of film.