Analog Medium

Review by The Silver Screen Kid

Well sir, zombies are a funny bunch of undead trouble-makers. They’ve gone back and forth from the fringe of popular culture so many times, how are you supposed to know whether zombies are hip or not? After their first appearance on the big screen, it took them about 80 years to break into syndicated television (The Walking Dead on AMC). But it took zombies just over a decade to make it to Broadway. Or, at least close to Broadway.

Zombies on Broadway, released in 1945, is somewhat of a misnomer. First of all, there’s mostly only one zombie on screen at a time. Secondly, the majority of the film takes place on a phony voodoo island called San Sebastian (I guess Haiti sounded too foreign for audiences back then?). The scenes that are set in New York revolve around a crummy OFF-Broadway nightclub, called The Zombie Hut, owned by a former mobster wise-guy. His advertising gimmick for the new club: opening night will feature a real, living-dead zombie. Only problem is, he doesn’t have one. So he sends his press agents to retrieve one for him. The deal: come back with a zombie, or else.

Have you ever seen the type of 1940’s tongue-in-cheek comedy in which every character spits out lines like a fast talking career guy? They speak in puns, and everything is so watered down that mobsters are reduced to using a joy buzzer as an intimidation method? If so, then you’ve already seen this movie, don’t bother. However, for the zombie completest, there are few interesting points to Zombies on Broadway. The zombies in the film fall into the murky transition area between traditional voodoo zombies and modern day rotting undead. They represent a time in zombie history before Romero had laid down the law, and people sort of bullshitted a creature together with no make-up except for bugged out eyes. You can totally sense the potential in the medium before it actually developed. And, in the end, there are a couple honest chuckles to be had here (not just at the film’s expense, mind you). My favorite comes at the end. One of the two press agents is turned into a zombie, so they beat a hasty retreat to the States. He’s taken to the club to be presented as the main attraction, but a cute chorus-line girl smiles at him from her dressing room and he snaps out of it. Classic. Back then, all it took to cure the zombie curse was a boner. Or, at least half a boner.

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Zombies on Broadway (1945)