Directed by:
Jacques TourneurCinematography:
J. Roy HuntComposer:
Roy WebbCast:
James Ellison, Frances Dee, Tom Conway, Edith Barrett, James Bell, Christine Gordon, Theresa Harris, Sir Lancelot, Darby Jones, Jeni Le Gon, Richard Abrams (more)VOD (1)
Plots(1)
Producer Val Lewton and director Jacques Tourneur elevated the horror film to new heights of poetic abstraction with this entrancing journey into the realm between life and death. When she takes a job caring for a comatose woman on a Caribbean island, a young nurse (Frances Dee) finds herself plunged into a mysterious world where the ghosts of slavery haunt the present and witch doctors have the power to summon the living dead. Sugarcane swaying in a moonlit field, the hypnotic beat of voodoo drums, the relentless pull toward death—the otherworldly atmosphere of this bold reimagining of "Jane Eyre" is as close as studio-era Hollywood ever came to pure dream-state surrealism. (Criterion)
(more)Reviews (1)
A melancholic (non)genre movie with the most unsatisfying zombie ever in the unmistakable style of Darby Jones who proves the rule that “strength lies in simplicity". The unique atmosphere of all-embracing insecurity on an exotic, sweltering island, the occult background and playing with the viewers’ curiosity “and what if, after all..." (all the more with a glass of Caribbean rum in hand) is simply priceless. Especially when it comes to the screenwriter’s guarantee in the shape of Siodmak behind the typewriter and fine artist of black and white canvas, Tourneur, behind the camera.
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