Dead Men Walk (USA, 1943)

"You creatures of the light, how can you say with absolute certainty what does or does not dwell in the limitless ocean of the night? Are the dark and shrouded legions of evil not but figments of the imagination because you and your puny conceit say that they cannot exist?" 
The introductory narration read by an uncredited

Forrest Taylor (29 Dec 1883 – 19 Feb 1965)

   

Not the best of the many semi-unknown and semi-forgotten public domain horror movie out there, but as almost always true with films of its ilk, it has its points of interest and enjoyability. 

A typically low budget PRC second feature, Dead Men Walk is the second of four horror movies* the British-born George Zucco (11 Jan 1886 – 27 May 1960) was to make with legendary hack Sam Newfield (6 Dec 1899 – 10 Nov 1964), one of the most productive directors in film history, and the brother of PRC's director, Sigmund Newfield (3 May 1896 – 21 Mar 1979).** In this movie, Zucco plays a rare duel role as both the movie's good guy, Dr Lloyd Clayton, and the movie's bad guy, Dr. Elwyn Clayton, and does a relatively good job at making them notably separate entities.

* Dead Men Walk was preceded by The Mad Monster (1942 / trailer) and was followed by The Black Raven (1943 / full movie) and The Flying Serpent (1946 / trailer), the last of which is claimed by some as the inspiration behind Larry Cohen's superior cult horror movie, Q: The Winged Serpent (1983). Zucco himself was known, in the 1940s, to take every role offered, which is perhaps why he so quickly became embedded in B-films and programmers.
** The sibling relationship surely assisted Sam's prodigious output at PRC, where he also directed under the names Sherman Scott and Peter Stewart. Dead Men Walk is one of 18 movies he directed in 1943, his second most productive year. (The previous year, 1942, he made 19 movies.) Of his numerous films, here at a wasted life, to date, we have only reviewed The Monster Maker (1944), but more will surely follow eventually. As homage, Fred Olan Ray often uses Newfield's pseudonyms on his own films. 

A trailer to

Dead Men Walk:

Shot in six days, the "original screenplay" of Dead Men Walk was supplied Fred Myton (15 Nov 1885 – 6 Jun 1955),* who, like Sam Newfield, was a PRC and Poverty Row denizen. He didn't look very far when looking for inspiration for this second-rate vampire movie, and basically went back to the most popular source: Bram Stoker's Dracula, if not Tod Browning's film version from 1931 (trailer), tweaking and dumping and adding things for the then contemporary 1940s setting Dead Men Walk is set in. Thus, although much is different from the source(s), so much is reminiscent that it becomes hard-pressed not call the script a "derivative screenplay". It doesn't help any, either, that Zolarr, the faithful servant of the movie's vampire, is played by no one less than the legendary Dwight Frye (22 Feb 1899 – 7 Nov 1943),** who played Renfield, Dracula's loyal servant in Browning's film. He's fun, he's good, but his presence also magnifies the movie's roots...

* Myton's most famous movie is undoubtedly the Newfield-directed Terror of Tiny Town (1938 / full film), but his scriptwriting credits include notable films like Harlem of the Prairie (1937 / full film), Nabonga (1944 / full film) and Hitler: Beast of Berlin (1939 / full film). Of the four films Zucco made with Newfield, Myton scripted this one and both The Black Raven and The Mad Monster.
** Dwight Iliff Frye, nee Fry, died of a heart attack in Hollywood while riding a the bus home after seeing a double feature of A Lady Takes a Chance (1943 / full film) and Sherlock Holmes Faces Death (1943 / full film), roughly six months after the release of this movie, which features his last role in a horror movie. Aside from his turn as Renfield, Frye is fondly remembered for playing the hunchbacked Fritz in Frankenstein (1931 / trailer) and Pretorious's loyal right-hand Karl in Bride of Frankenstein (1935 / trailer). Other roles of note include the murderous Wilmer Cook in Roy Del Ruth's inferior The Maltese Falcon (1931) and the decidedly odd Herman in the entertaining The Vampire Bat (1933), not to mention that of Dr Thompson, one of his most prominent roles, in the oddly disregarded Crimes of Dr Crespi (1935 / full film).

In Dead Men Walk, the vampire, Dr. Elwyn Clayton, enters his vampiredom by choice and black magic. An evil man, we learn quickly that his death was not an accident, but was at the hands of his brother, Dr Lloyd Clayton, possibly in self-defense, possibly not. Elwyn comes back, gaining greater strength with each drained victim, taunting his brother along the way, and finally deciding to get full revenge by making Gayle Clayton (Mary Carlisle [3 Feb 1914 – 1 Aug 2018], of One Frightened Night [1935 / full film], in her final film role), Dr Llyod's niece,* a vampire and his eternal mate.

* One hopes that an unnamed third sibling once existed, for if not, Gayle, being the good Dr Lloyd's niece, would have to be the bad Dr Elwyn's daughter... But then, once upon a time, it was not unknown for people to claim "Incest is Best"! 

Can the good doctor stop his evil vampire brother? Will Gayle, who is slowly wasting away, die and be reborn a vampire? Will her fiancée, Dr Bentley (played by the almost proto method-actor Nedrick Young* [23 Mar 1914 – 16 Sept 1968]), ever realize that Dr Llyod's rantings about vampires are not rantings but true before the crazed and angry townspeople, who have come to think the doctor a murderer, lynch the doctor? And what role will the movie's Cassandra, the frumpy and addled Kate (Fern Emmett** [22 Mar 1896 – 3 Sept 1946] of Assassin of Youth [1937 / trailer]), have in the film's resolution? And why do both Dr Lloyd and Dr. Elwyn, supposedly born and bred in small town America, speak with such obvious English accents? 

* Nedrick Young, a man of conviction, saw his acting career stymied by the House Committee on Un-American Activities (HCUA). He is notable in the film noir classic Gun Crazy (1950 / trailer) and uncredited in The House of Wax (1953 / trailer). As Ned Young, he wrote the screenplay for the cult classic Decoy (1946 / trailer), supplied the story for Jailhouse Rock (1957 / trailer), and was nominated for an Oscar for his work on the screenplay for Inherit the Wind (1960 / trailer). As Nathan E. Douglas, he won an Oscar for cowriting The Defiant Ones (1958 / trailer).
** You might not recognize her, but in her day Fern Emmett, a true "Plain Jane", was a busy and popular character actress, usually playing the town gossip, landlady, or farmer's wife. Between 1930 and her death in 1946, she appeared in 212 films — including The Vampire Bat (1933), The Monster and the Girl (1941 / main title), The Mummy's Tomb (1942, with Turhan Bey), Captive Wild Women (1943 / trailer), and Pillow of Death (1945). Captive Wild Women, BTW, feature's John Carradine (5 Feb 1906 – 27 Nov 1988) in his first on-screen leading role, not to mention the Babe of Yesteryear, the possibly "passing" Acquanetta (17 Jul 1921 – 16 Aug 2004), who doesn't utter a single line of dialogue throughout that movie. 

Dead Men Walk is an odd cookie, one that gives the viewer the feeling that in the hands of a better director, and with a slightly more thought-out script, it could have been a good movie instead of a barely passable one. Newfield is hardly a visually exciting director, and his most common cinematic trick of opening at a distance and slowly dollying forward gets boring rather quickly. Whether due to age or poor cinematography, the movie is often so dark that things are impossible to fully see, and seldom do any of the visuals evince any true moodiness or dread.

The movie also suffers from major pacing problems and is a bit of a slog at times, despite its programmer length, and the script has some true head-scratching aspects. The "upstanding" Dr Lloyd, for example, is a conscious murderer: he killed his brother prior to the start of the movie simply because his brother is "evil". Also, even after Dr Lloyd learns of the power of the cross, he never bothers to weaponize himself with one, even when he leaves for the "big" final showdown with his vampire brother. Why is Zolarr so loyal, and who or what is the god that Elwyn suddenly worships at the end, an event that is basically injected into the movie so as to work lit candles into the events. Why don't any of Elwyn's other victims go vampire? Why does Dr Lloyd always agitate at night, instead of during the day, when his evil bro would be sleeping, and powerless? And why doesn't Elwyn use any of his supernatural powers during the final showdown, instead remaining in solid form to be held tight by his brother as the raging fire grows...

For that, the acting is generally good, with Zucco standing out, obviously having fun at playing dichotomous brothers, even occasionally imbuing the evil Elwyn with a certain level of fun campiness. The most interesting characters, Dwight Flye's Zolarr and Fern Emmett's doom-spewing but vampire-wise Kate, are sorely underused, but it is interesting to watch how quickly mob suspicion can turn to lynch-mob madness. Likewise, the contemporary denial of the possibility of unnatural evil works well within the story and setting. 

In general, in all aspects but the acting, which in itself isn't really good enough to help the movie, Dead Men Walking is sunk by its own mediocrity. There are truly better poverty row horror movies than this one out there. It is in no way a forgotten minor-classic or even truly good horror movie, and only remains watchable because of its dedicated cast and, above all, its nostalgia factor. Fun enough, Dead Men Walking is hardly imperative viewing. But then again, you probably won't really regret watching it, should you be a fan of poverty row horror.

 

 

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