I Walked with a Zombie | April 21, 1943

 

I Walked with a Zombie is a 1943 American horror film directed by Jacques Tourneur and produced by Val Lewton for RKO Pictures. It stars James Ellison, Frances Dee, and Tom Conway, and follows the story of a Canadian nurse who travels to a Caribbean sugar plantation to care for the ailing wife of the plantation owner. She witnesses a voodoo ceremony and encounters the possibility of meeting a walking zombie. The screenplay by Curt Siodmak and Adele Lewin is based on the article of the same name by Inez Wallace and partially reinterprets the narrative of Charlotte Brontë's 1847 novel Jane Eyre.

The film premiered in New York on April 21, 1943, and was released to a wider audience later that month. The film has been analyzed for its portrayal of themes such as slavery, racial discrimination, and beliefs related to Afro-Caribbean voodoo and African diaspora religions. While it received mixed reviews upon release, retrospective evaluations have been more positive.

On a snowy day in Ottawa, young nurse Betty Connell interviews for a position to care for the wife of Paul Holland, the owner of a sugar plantation on the Caribbean island of Saint Sebastian. Although she has heard little about the patient, Betty accepts the job, looking forward to the warmer climate and laughing off a question about her belief in witchcraft.

The carriage driver taking Betty to Paul’s home, Fort Holland, tells her that the Afro-Caribbean population of Saint Sebastian are descendants of slaves brought by Paul’s ancestors. At her first dinner, Betty meets Wesley Rand, Paul’s half-brother and employee. Wesley is affable but clearly dislikes Paul. That night, Betty encounters Jessica, a patient wandering the grounds of Fort Holland, and is initially frightened by the mute and emotionless woman. Dr. Maxwell later informs Betty that Jessica has lost the will to speak or act after her spinal cord was irreversibly damaged by tropical fever.

Betty learns from a calypso singer that Paul had prevented Jessica from running away with Wesley just before she fell ill. The problems surrounding Jessica have led Wesley to drink, and the simmering tension between him and Paul often reaches a boiling point. Paul apologizes to Betty for bringing her to Saint Sebastian and admits he feels responsible for Jessica's condition. In love with Paul, Betty resolves to fix Jessica and make him happy, agreeing to a risky insulin shock treatment. When this fails, Paul’s servant Alma persuades Betty to take Jessica to the Houmfort (a voodoo temple) to be treated by a Houngan (voodoo priest).

After a man in black performs a ritual dance with a small knife, Betty lines up at the Houmfort to request that the spirit Damballa cure Jessica. Instead, she is shocked to be dragged into a hut where she sees Paul and Wesley’s mother, Mrs. Rand, who works with Dr. Maxwell. Mrs. Rand reveals that, as the Houngan knows, the voodoo spirit speaks through her to instruct the villagers to follow her medical and sanitary recommendations. Meanwhile, Jessica attracts the attention of the man in black, who stabs her in the arm, killing her. As she bleeds not at all, whispers of "zombie" circulate among the onlookers, and Mrs. Rand tells Betty to take Jessica back to Fort Holland. Paul, angry, meets them but softens when he learns Betty tried to help, telling her he no longer loves his wife.