Christopher Lee hosts this look at mummies and zombies, which was badly transferred to EP-mode video. After some gab about the curse of King Tut's tomb, we're off to Universal and Hammer Studios for a history of the mummy movie and the actors who weathered the bulky costume and hours of make-up application for the thankless role.
The actors include Boris Karloff in the original 1932 MUMMY, Lon Chaney, Jr. (seen in his three Universal mummy appearances, plus in the 1959 Mexican film LA CASE DEL TERROR and even on the Route 66 TV show with Karloff), John Carradine and our host Christopher Lee (who talks about dislocating his shoulder, getting powder burns and cut up by glass doing his own stunts in the 1959 Hammer version...what a trooper!). We also get clips or trailers from THE GHOUL, THE MUMMY'S HAND, ABBOTT AND COSTELLO MEET THE MUMMY, THE MUMMY'S SHROUD, CURSE OF THE MUMMY'S TOMB, BLOOD FROM THE MUMMY'S TOMB, PHAROAH'S CURSE, WRESTLING WOMEN VS. THE AZTEC MUMMY and others.
Clips from THE SNAKE PEOPLE (1968) bring us into the second half about zombies. Again there's a brief history of Haitian voodoo and the zombie film...starting with the original living-dead flick WHITE ZOMBIE with Bela Lugosi (his son claims his late father even directed a great deal of the film). Then we get voodoo zombies (I WALKED WITH A ZOMBIE), space zombies (ZOMBIES OF THE STRATOSPHERE), nuclear powered zombies (CREATURE WITH THE ATOM BRAIN), underwater zombies (ZOMBIES OF MORA TAU), the original rotting corpse zombies (PLAGUE OF THE ZOMBIES), cannibalistic zombies (NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD), blaxploitation zombies (ZOMBIES OF SUGAR HILL) and zombies on a train (HORROR EXPRESS). Also included are REVOLT OF THE ZOMBIES, THE MAD GHOUL, INVISIBLE INVADERS ("Charged with million-volt excitement!"), THE LAST MAN ON EARTH, THE FOUR SKULLS OF JONATHAN DRAKE, HORROR EXPRESS and THE OBLONG BOX. RETURN OF THE LIVING DEAD is the most recent feature covered.
Interviews include Sarah Karloff, Peggy Moran, Turhan Bey, Hugh Hefner, producer Michael T. Gavin, Michael Carreras, Robert Wise, John Agar, Richard Denning, Bernard Gordon, Anthony Hinds and Linnea Quigley, plus the voices of Karloff, Carradine and George A. Romero.
