Revolt of the Zombies (Victor Halperin, 1936)

A bit creaky compared to director Victor Halperin's previous horror films, White Zombie and Supernatural, Revolt of the Zombies is nevertheless one of the most complicated scorned lover's revenge stories in the history of film. It gets off to a rough and awkward start, but after several mostly static scenes of people standing and talking in rooms, tents, and the great outdoors, the movie picks up quite a bit in its second half.

Beginning, as all love triangles do, in the Franco-Austrian frontier during World War I, Revolt of the Zombies opens with military linguist Armand (Dean Jagger) trying to convince his crusty superior that a Cambodian priest knows the secret of telepathic control and is able to turn the colonized Cambodian soldiers into fighting zombies or robots (the two terms are used interchangeably by the colonial Allied powers). No one's buying Armand's story, though his British friend and fellow Allied military mid-level bigwig, Clifford (Robert Noland), says Armand needs more confidence and killer instinct in his delivery and opines that between Armand's brains and his own ruthless determination, they'd make one powerful dude. We then briefly see those zombified Cambodians in action, taking bullets to the chest and continuing to fight, before returning to our multitude of scenes of people standing and talking. The bigwigs are finally convinced. The zombies/robots are real.

The priest is imprisoned by the colonial powers after he refuses to spill his zombie-making secrets to them, but he's stabbed to death in his cell by the sneaky General Mazovia (Roy D'Arcy, who makes the film's greatest faces), who then steals a parchment held by the priest containing a powerful secret, just not the zombification secret.

The colonial muckity-mucks, deciding zombified colonial armies are the key to winning the war and any future skirmishes, embark on an expedition to Angkor, Cambodia, to attempt to discover the elusive secret. Armand and Clifford are part of that expedition, along with French general Duval (George Cleveland) and his wisecracking daughter Claire (Dorothy Stone). Claire appears on the scene with a new hat, asking all the men how they like it. Armand immediately falls hard for Claire, but when Claire sees Clifford, it's hubba-hubba aw-oogah time. Claire accepts Armand's engagement proposal (things work fast in these old movies), but only to make Clifford jealous. Her nefarious plan works, the engagement with Armand is called off, and the engagement with Clifford is called on.

Standup guy Armand appears to take being dumped in one of the dirtiest ways possible relatively well. He's sad, but he tells Claire he'll always love her. Behind closed doors, he takes the down and dirty dumping less well, and when he discovers the ancient Cambodian telepathic zombification trick, standup guy Armand decides his days of being a standup guy are over. It's revenge time, MFers. He's going to zombie up nearly everyone, except for an older mentor figure and Claire, and he's going to snatch Claire back from that damn limey Clifford whether Claire likes it or not, with the help of his zombie horde. (She likes it not.) Damn, Armand. You didn't have to go so hard, but you did.

As I said earlier, the first half of the movie is mostly exposition scenes, with lots of standing (and occasional sitting at desks). It's a bit of a snooze, though we get some accidental art-film ellipses from the absence of several plot-developing connecting scenes that were clearly cut to get this movie on a double feature bill. There was likely even more exposition in this damn thing in its complete, uncut form.

Starting with the scene where Armand sneakily follows a Cambodian man through a waist-deep body of water to a hidden temple, the movie really kicks in, and the second half is pretty enjoyable. Armand turns from milquetoast goody two shoes to megalomaniac, and he wears this transformation well. Halperin sneakily reuses the closeup on Bela Lugosi's eyes from his previous White Zombie whenever Armand goes into telepathic mode (always fun to see), and the exciting conclusion lives up to its title.

White Zombie and Supernatural have much more atmosphere and style, and Revolt of the Zombies is clearly more a job of work for Halperin, but it has its moments. I can't completely dismiss it, though I'd only recommend it to the diehards who need to see everything.