Revenge of the Zombies [The Corpse Vanished] *** (1943, John Carradine, Gale Storm, Robert Lowery, Veda Ann Borg, Bob Steele, Mantan Moreland) – Classic Movie Review 8927

‘DEAD MEN CAN’T DIE… but live to follow a mad-man’s will!’

Director Steve Sekely’s 1943 low-budget poverty-row double-feature zombie horror B-movie Revenge of the Zombies [The Corpse Vanished] tells a tale of manic monster madness when, down on the Bayoux, a Louisiana crazed renegade scientist with the splendid if rather unsubtle name of Dr Max Heinrich Von Altermann (John Carradine) experiments on people and creates an army of Nazi zombies down in the cellar. He is also attempting to find a life-giving potion after turning his wife Lila (Veda Ann Borg)’s corpse into a zombie. But the late Lila challenges her husband for control of the zombie horde.

Revenge of the Zombies [The Corpse Vanished] is intriguing and entertaining, if not perhaps as manic as you hope it should be with this delirious premise, and it is unfortunately rather limited by what appears to have been the tiniest of tiny budgets, though, even so, it is atmospheric in places, with some sequences, with the lab and the swamp graveyard sets effective.

Carradine’s rousing performance as Dr Max Heinrich von Altermann is more or less the whole show. Horrible broad comedy from Mantan Moreland as Jeff damages it by being the wrong tone, plunging it into a zombie comedy. But, nevertheless, it is still an amusing and tolerable attempt to cash in on the success of I Walked with a Zombie. Mauritz Hugo Scott Warrington and Robert Lowery plays his hired detective Larry Adams, who arrive at an old Louisiana swamp mansion to meet Warrington’s brother-in-law, Dr Von Altermann after the death of Warrington’s sister Lila.

And there is even a Second World War wartime relevance too. Dr Von Altermann is shown as a Nazi creating zombies for the armies of the Third Reich. They are the perfect troops. They don’t need feeding and they won’t die from bullets. Zombies, however, are of course always relevant. How did you lose the war, daddy? Oh, it was zombies! It may be the first appearance of Nazi zombies in the movies.

Steve Sekely was credited as Istvan Szekely.

Also in the cast are Gale Storm, Bob Steele, Barry Macollum, Madame Sul-Te-Wan, James Baskett, Sybill Lewis, Robert Cherry and Franklyn Farnum.

Revenge of the Zombies [The Corpse Vanished] is directed by Steve Sekely [Istvan Szekely], runs 61 minutes, is made by Monogram Pictures Corporation, is released by Monogram Pictures (1943) (US) and Associated British Film Distributors (1943) (UK) (theatrical) (retitled as The Corpse Vanished), is written (original screenplay) by Edmond Kelso and Van Norcross, is shot by Mack Stengler, is produced by Lindsley Parsons, is scored by Edward J Kay and is designed by Dave Milton.

© Derek Winnert 2019 Classic Movie Review 8927

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