WHITE ZOMBIE turns 92 today

On this day--4 August--in 1932, zombie cinema officially began with the Halperin brothers' WHITE ZOMBIE. Bela Lugosi, hot off the success of DRACULA, stars as evil voodoo master Murder Legendre, doing exactly the sort of evil stuff you'd expect a voodoo master named "Murder" to do. WHITE ZOMBIE, the first feature-length zombie pictures, was an independent production, at a time when the Hollywood studio system dominated movie production and managed to upstage many of its upbudget rivals. It's one of the most beautiful horror movies of an era particularly noted for its beautiful horrors, and spins a macabre screen poetry that most of its contemporaries couldn't touch.