The Films of Val Lewton
1942-1946
How much does a producer shape the films he works on? I used to find that question ridiculous. The producer? Doesn’t he just pay? Well, to be frank: nope. It’s true that many producers let the directors they work with have control over the films, but sometimes it is the producer who is the auteur, and then the director hardly matters.
Case in point: Val Lewton. He is famous for nine horror films made between 1942 and 1946. All of these films feel as if they were written and directed by the same people—but they weren’t. What they do have in common, however, is Lewton as producer. Horror B-movies were big business in the forties—just look at the never-ending parade Universal Studios put out during that time! But, while he worked for these short years in the same field, Lewton had a very different idea of what such films could be.
Val Lewton horror films are not really monster features or ghost stories. They refuse to show you the very things today’s horror auteurs revel in showing. Instead, they use sound and imagery and the camera to create stories about what humans truly fear: the unknown in themselves and others. They can only barely be called horror films. They are simply great films about the unknown made on shockingly low budgets. In other words, this is my kind of horror cinema!
The way B-movie studios worked was that the businessmen in charge would hand down salacious titles to their staff, who had to write and film movies to fit those silly titles. Lewton’s true mastery may have been in subverting his superiors’ expectations so completely while delivering a top-notch film using their ludicrous title. It must have been great fun for Lewton and his writers to brainstorm nuanced and realistic thrillers from randomly-deployed phrases!
I’ll take you through all nine films, moving from my favorite to my least favorite (which are suitable bookends).
Cat People (1942)
I adore this film, and you can read my thoughts on it by using the search bar at the top of the page. The real tension comes from not knowing what is happening. Is Irena truly cursed by her Serbian village when she moves to the States and marries Oliver? She’s sure convinced. Legend tells of “cat people” who turn into panthers and kill their lovers after physical consummation. The film says it only takes a kiss, but it’s clearly a metaphor for original sin and carnal abandon. But, just like Irena, we don’t know if there is any truth to this superstition. And so, Lewton makes the enemy marital intimacy, one of the biggest unknowns out there for a good Christian girl like Irena. But is Oliver tempted by his friend Alice, who doesn’t share Irena’s fear of sexuality? It’s a killer film, and it has a few downright amazing scenes. (Sadly, it was remade forty years later with the opposite of Lewton’s approach: show everything, from sex to gore, again and again and again. Sigh. Don’t get the eighties version!)
The Leopard Man (1943)
The suits were clearly hoping for something that would act as a sort of sequel to the massive success of Cat People. Lewton gave them something more terrifying. In his story, the titular man is simply a guy who owns a leopard. The leopard escapes and begins to kill…or does it? Again, we never see the cat attacking anyone. And yet, this is Lewton’s most frightening movie because we do hear some victims being slaughtered. In true Lewton fashion, there are all sorts of fascinating three-dimensional characters and side plots, and the whole thing works as an elaborate metaphor. The actresses Margo (one name only) and Jean Brooks are superb as glamorous showbiz rivals who put a different meaning to the term catfight.
The Ghost Ship (1943)
Russel Wade’s Tom joins a ship’s crew in a role of leadership. But does Richard Dix’s Captain Stone have it out for him…and the whole crew? (You see, I trust, the theme of the unknown by now.) And if the head of the ship actually is insane, what are the duties of the officers and crew? It’s a tense, thrilling journey as Tom and the audience ask these questions. Not one ghost shows up.
Isle of the Dead (1945)
These titles are amazing, right? Doubly so that Lewton and Company can turn them into compelling dramas. Authority is once again a major theme as a small group of people trapped on a plague-riddled island fight over hierarchy and whether or not one of them is a supernatural agent behind the sickness killing them. There are no easy answers. And, on the mainland, a devastating war is underway. Could one plot be a microcosm for the other? Things go too far when Mrs. St. Aubyn is found unresponsive with her young nurse standing over her. Edgar Allan Poe would be proud of the story Lewton’s team cooks up, wrestling equally with the problem of evil and more immediate terrors.
Bedlam (1946)
Boris Karloff runs an asylum in 18th-century London. Need I say more? Petty games among the rich have dire consequences when (did you doubt it?) a sane woman is locked up as revenge for a social slight. But her journey of change in Bedlam is not what you might expect. Unless you simply expect it to be unsettling. It is that. But the real question is, “Do Quakers really use ‘thee’ and ‘thou,’ and why can’t they seem to keep them straight?” Our square-jawed stonemason hero seems to always use ‘thee’ incorrectly…but what do I know? (I know.)
I Walked With a Zombie (1943)
The studio heads must have thought that they’d nailed Lewton down to schlock with this title…but the movie became one of his most respected films, even with it. Would you believe me if I told you it’s a spin on Jane Eyre? If not, there are plenty of other critics who will tell you the same thing. The crucial difference is that this version takes place in the Caribbean instead of England, in a clever reversal. Get ready for Voodoo Brontë! (What next? Wuthering Frights?)
The Seventh Victim (1943)
For once, a nice vague title! But Lewton still pulls the rug out from under it. Future Oscar-winner Kim Hunter makes her film debut as Mary, whose older sister Jacqueline is the envy and desire of all she meets. She’s also missing. Could it have something to do with the “cult of devil worshipers” who never seem to do any worshiping and uphold a very strict vow of nonviolence? (What?) Well, would it spoil it if I told you that it does…but that they’re a red herring for the real evil: Jacqueline’s inner demons? There are some great moments here—and some unexplained side plots—and it all seems like a dress rehearsal for Rosemary’s Baby.
The Body Snatcher (1945)
No pod people in this one—just a good old-fashioned grave robber played by frequent Lewton actor Boris Karloff. This was (I am almost positive) the last film for Karloff and his Universal monster rival, Béla Lugosi. (Well, until Lugosi met a bright young director named Ed Wood….) This film is in the next-to-last spot mostly because of the period setting and somewhat conventional plot. It’s still a good film, especially as it reaches its climax.
Curse of the Cat People (1944)
When The Leopard Man didn’t get the results they wanted (I surmise), the brass went straight for a callback title that would guarantee them a sequel to Cat People. It turns out that even Val Lewton can’t make a good sequel to a movie with a definite ending and no loose ends. But he tries. It’s an odd film, and it’s the only Lewton joint I don’t like. But maybe that’s just because I love the original so much.