Rating: 1/5
Hooptober 6.0 | 8/32 | film whose year ends in ‘6’ 2/6 | decades 2/6 | 1930s
CW // Racism, Xenophobia
Many strange events were recorded in the secret archives of the fighting nations during the world war… But none stranger than that which occurred when a regiment of French Cambodians from the vicinity of the lost city in Angkor arrived on the Franco-Austrian front…
The French army puts a Cambodian priest named Tsiang on trial. He claims he can raise an army of zombies capable of taking out a trench of soldiers. We cut to a scene of warfare in which French soldiers shoot at Cambodian men. Bullets turn their skin to mesh, but the Cambodian men do not falter. The witnesses claim the Cambodians seek to wipe out the white race. So, they sentence Tsiang to life in prison.
Tsiang tries to burn the parchment containing the location of the “Secret of the Zombies,” but General Mazovia kills him before he can finish and steals the parchment.
After the war, an expedition assembles to find and destroy the secret formula. But this is the 30s, so we get a heaping pile of love triangles and South Asian exoticism to pad out the 64-minute runtime.
All exterior shots use rear projection to preserve as much budget as possible. When people are stationary, it works. When people walk, oh boy.
The movie has brief moments of treasure hunting and puzzles that are kind of cool.
This movie was intended to be a sequel to White Zombie but couldn’t secure the rights or Bela Lugosi. They still regularly use the eyes close-up from White Zombie to show when zombies are afoot.
This movie is probably okay, but I’m on an unintentional “bad movie” streak, so this feels extra shitty today. I mean, it’s racist trash with a lot of talking, so I don’t know how it could be okay. But I wanted to note my mood for when I come back to this review.