Movies: Zombies of Mora-Tau/Werewolf

Another DVD double-feature, this time two productions from Sam Katzman, a prolific producer who coined the phrase 'beatnik', and whom I imagine looking as though he stepped out of the pages of the Untermensch.

According to wikipedia, Zombies of Mora-Tau was written by a blacklisted screenwriter, but don't expect social commentary. It took a talented ass like George Romero to make zombie flicks respectable. This is a trashy, 1950s 'voodoo' picture about diamond hunters who fight zombies protecting diamonds somewhere on the 'voodoo coast' of Africa. Considering there are three locations in the entire movie -- a forested roadside, a boat and a house, 'the voodoo coast' is probably Burbank. The wise granny says to kill the zombies the diamonds 'must be destroyed', as though they had a volcano handy, and then at the end she just drops them in a shallow lagoon -- causing the zombies to disappear. A typical 50s B movie, it features big, loose-fitting suits, a square-jawed slab of meat as the lead, and a slattern (the captain's wife) who pushes the Hays Code with tight, tight sweaters.

The Werewolf is much better. A Tony Shalhoub look-alike gets stranded in a tiny Western mountain town with no memory of who he is. During a shakedown by a local thug, he changes into the 'wolfman', kills his attacker, and flees into the woods. Although the cover promises he 'transforms before your terrified eyes', you get typical quick dissolves as he becomes progressively hairier. One brilliant addition is the creature drools prolifically. As in nearly every horror movie since King Kong, the monster is sympathetic and his persecution is relentless. The Shalhoub dude stumbles into a bear-trap, is chased through the woods by torch-bearing locals, and at the end, runs up against a bulldozer. The whole affair lasts less than 70 minutes.