WHITE ZOMBIE Starring Bela Lugosi Screens at Schlafly Bottleworks February 2nd

“I kissed her as she lay there in the coffin; and her lips were cold.”

WHITE ZOMBIE (1932) Starring Bela Lugosi  screens Thursday February 2nd at 7:00pm at Schlafly Bottleworks (7260 Southwest Avenue Maplewood, MO 63143). 

Now I know where Eddie Munster got his widow’s peak! He must have watched WHITE ZOMBIE as a toddler and decided to emulate his Uncle Dracula who remained behind in Transylvania while Grandpa, Herman and Lily moved to America. Actually, Bela Lugosi isn’t Dracula in the 1932 chiller WHITE ZOMBIE, but he might as well be. He’s a voodoo master who has taken his enemies lives over, turned them into zombies and made them his slaves. When he is contacted by a man who is coveting somebody else’s wife, Lugosi simply turns her (Madge Bellamy) into one of the living dead by waving her scarf over an open flame. She keels over, is buried and given one of the most somber funerals ever on screen. Soon, the body is dug up, and Bellamy (looking very much like a silent movie heroine even though this is a talkie!) sits quietly as the hero desperately tries to get over her apparent death, discovering the truth almost too late.

A spooky vulture follows Lugosi wherever he goes, and the faces of these dead zombies will instill themselves in your memory as their sinister close-ups continue with truly creepy music. Somber photography as well as slow editing and pacing make this seem like something that the Germans had done with THE CABINET OF DR. CALIGARI and NOSFERATU while Universal’s Gothic thrillers definitely had their own unique style. There’s something to be said for the independent studios. While obviously made on a lower budget than those at Universal, this is almost even more memorable because of the artistic triumph that the film’s creative team didn’t even realize they had done. The ending is one of the most chilling in history and may leave you with nightmares! Don’t miss WHITE ZOMBIE when it screens Thursday February 2nd at Schlafly Bottleworks (7260 Southwest Avenue Maplewood, MO 63143) as part of the ‘A’ Film Series

A Facebook invite for the event can be found HERE

https://www.facebook.com/events/410468055960383/

$6  for the screening. A yummy variety of food from Schlafly’s kitchen is available as are plenty of pints of their famous home-brewed suds.

“Culture Shock” is the name of a film series here in St. Louis that is the cornerstone project of a social enterprise that is an ongoing source of support for Helping Kids Together(http://www.helpingkidstogether.com/) a St. Louis based social enterprise dedicated to building cultural diversity and social awareness among young people through the arts and active living.

The films featured for “Culture Shock” demonstrate an artistic representation of culture shock materialized through mixed genre and budgets spanning music, film and theater. Through ‘A Film Series’ working relationship with Schlafly Bottleworks, they seek to provide film lovers with an offbeat mix of dinner and a movie opportunities.