This movie was just plain delightful! I didn't imagine myself saying those words at any point during this process and by now you may realize that I have the world's worst taste in movies. Give me the benefit of the doubt though. I'm a bit of a sucker for slapstick and this movie had Bela Lugosi doing slapstick with a small monkey. Hilarious! We're quickly coming to the end of the 1940's zombie movies and I think this one really tops them off. After a half decade of really awful, horribly rated zombie movies, Hollywood squeezed in a a few more, including a spoof, before taking a long break from the genre that would last into the early 50's.
Zombies on Broadway opens with a very cheerful scene in a soon to open night club "The Zombie Hut", with dancing girls and gangsters onlooking as ragtime music plays in the background. During the 40's, gangsters made believable bad guys because prohibition had been repealed in the early 30's leaving gangs to seek out other sources of revenue. Much of this business would be very likely to happen in the back rooms of nightclubs like The Zombie Hut. Enter the main characters Jerry (Wally Brown) and Mike (Alan Carney) who have come up with a fabulous publicity stunt to have a real zombie at opening night. They then introduce to the gangsters their "real zombie" who is a very recognizable actor in gray makeup. Not buying it for a second, the gangsters threaten Jerry and Mike and send them out to find a real zombie...or else...
The movie then starts to play like a combination of I Walked With a Zombie and Ghost Breakers because of the setting, actors, and hilarity that the two get into on their quest to find a real zombie. They head to San Sebastian (RKO's go to zombie destination) to meet Dr. Renault (Bela Lugosi) who is working to create a zombie similar to the local voodoo zombies. Once they arrive on the island, they're greeted by a local playing a song on a banjo that is exactly the same as I Walked With a Zombie, same actor, same message of eventual doom and all. None of the locals will acknowledge the fact that there are zombies but, much to their luck, a pretty young singer promises to help them find one if they'll take her back to the states. All the while, Dr. Renault, with the zombie making hobby, sets out to turn them all into zombies! It was completely inexplicable how he even knew they were there.
Jerry and Mike, who'd been teamed up in 5 other RKO films to mimic the comedy of Abbot and Costello, get into all sort of shenanigans as they, and their lady friend, enter the jungle to find a zombie. Unfortunately they're being followed by one of Dr. Renault's zombie slaves who successfully splits them up and kidnaps the girl. Thankfully, that funny little monkey I mentioned earlier, is there to save the day. Not too soon though, Mike gets the short end of the stick and becomes Dr. Renault's unwilling test subject and is turned into a zombie. It was nice of him to take the fall for the girl though. They eventually escape and, in a scene similar to Shaun of the Dead, the now foursome, monkey included, need to get past a group of zombies before they can catch their ship. They act like zombies so they're not spotted and the monkey, with his arms out and eyes wide open, is the very best part of the movie.
Speaking of wide eyes, the actor that played the zombie in I Walked with a Zombie, Darby Jones, is in this movie as well, wide eyes and all. I hadn't noticed it before but the wide eyes are completely fake (see picture above). They finally make it back to the states with their real zombie who is unfortunately Mike. The climax has to get squeezed into the last minutes of movie which could have been done a lot better. It seemed like the only reason to have that last 5 minutes was to say there were actually zombies on Broadway. Up to that point I kept wondering what the title was all about. All ends well for the group of slapstick gangsters, God forbid we have a zombie movie that ends with zombies still in existence!
Needless to say, there wasn't much scary happening in this movie but it wasn't really a horror. Though, the same can be said of Zombieland and I couldn't make it all the way through that one in the theater. RKO, like the genre, was hitting hard times and was about to call it quits forever. All in all, they made many B horrors and just 2 zombie movies. One of which is still considered among the best of all time. Its too bad because I'd like to have seen how an RKO movie would turn out today. Well, heres to you, RKO, for giving us the zombie movie spoof! As for Zombies on Broadway, I highly recommend you watch this one for yourself. Not many people would agree with me, but its one of the best so far.
Stats for Zombies on Broadway...
Style of zombie: Classic
Threat to humans: only when commanded
Dead or alive: alive
How they become zombies: authentic voodoo and potions of a Mad Doctor
Other: first zombie movie to show people pretending to be zombies, first Zombie movie spoof
How to kill them: any way a human can be killed
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