Murders in the Zoo (1933)

Wow! Such a good movie.

I am only giving this movie a 1 for the great cast, though I can't imagine what any of them were thinking. This movie was horrible

Mostly, the movie is committed to the value of a good time.

This movie tries so hard to be funny, yet it falls flat every time. Just another example of recycled ideas repackaged with women in an attempt to appeal to a certain audience.

The opening scene from "Murders in the Zoo" is quite extreme for 1933 audiences . I shalln't say what happens but you can't miss it!Lionel Atwill steals the show once again as the sadistic, cunning and evil proprietor of various dangerous animals that he plans to sell to a zoo. Little does anyone realise that he shall use his animals for other means........You only have to observe the expression of Lionel Atwill to know he is a somewhat dodgy customer.This gem was unfairly ignored for years but is very good on its own merits.

A rather strange movie - because everyone plays it straight except Charlie Ruggles, who acts as if he is in a slapstick comedy! He plays a marketing man for a municipal zoo who is deathly afraid of animals, and he made me chuckle once or twice, but a little of him goes a long way. The film is thinly plotted, but it contains some fascinating animal footage, and Lionel Atwill is perversely pleasurable to watch as the villain; he is murderously mad with jealousy and desire for his unfaithful wife (Kathleen Burke). It's roles like this one that have made him one of the most important predecessors of horror icons such as Vincent Price. **1/2 out of 4.

This rarely-seen film is astonishingly gruesome for the time in which it was made, especially when compared to the other popular horror films of the time, like Dracula, which merely hinted at depravity and had all the violence occur off screen. Not so with MURDERS IN THE ZOO, a film which opens with a man having his lips sewn together for a minor misdemeanour, a stark moment designed to shock an audience hungry for blood. I'll bet that the opening moments got a few people fainting in the aisles, after all, they probably never expected anything like it.Today the film is worth seeing not just for the shocks, but for the characterisation too. Gorman, the central character, is a husband whose insane jealousy of any man his wife flirts with leads him to coldly murder all involved. Lionel Atwill plays Gorman with just the right glossy sheen of respectability, hiding all the oozing evilness underneath with ease. Atwill gives a wonderful performance, really adding strength to the character, when he might just as well have been an over-the-top maniac. Just watch Gorman entertaining dinner guests above the table while underneath it he stabs venom into a rival's leg, killing him. I would say that this film shows Atwill at his best, a man whose coldly calculating mind is finally outwitted by a triumph of science, an anti-toxin which returns one of his victims from the dead.The use of a zoo as a setting is an interesting one, and allows for plenty of footage of lions and snakes to pad out the running time. Although there is a low body count, the deaths are inventive, with Atwill planning them intrinsically to make them look like accidents. The supporting cast is a good one, with Kathleen Burke (the panther woman from ISLAND OF LOST SOULS) making a striking heroine, and Charles Ruggles manages to be amusing, although I could have done without his non-stop comic relief. I know that most of these early films had wisecracking reporters prowling around, but this comedy goes on and on throughout the film, balancing uneasily with the grisly murders occurring - in fact, it almost seems like it should belong in a different film.Another plus is the extremely short (sixty minute) running time, which keeps things flowing along smoothly and never lets up with the action. The film is at it's best when shocking the audience, either with the aforementioned mouth-stitching or the bit where Gorman drops his wife into a pit full of crocodiles which proceed to gobble her up (other films would have cut away at this point, but not this one). Atwill's terrific performance is just the icing on the cake in this neat story of a madman's short reign of terror.

Opening up in Africa with the murder of a zoologist's wife's lover, this frightening thriller doesn't use monsters, mad scientists or ancient mummy's to provide the chills, but nature itself. Lionel Atwill is his delightfully villianess self as the zoologist who uses the deadly green mamba, a giant anaconda like snake, to do his dirty work, and back in the states, as evidence begins to point to him, more bizarre murders occur. Charlie Ruggles brings the tone down from frights to laughs as a man whose skin crawls anytime he's around anything other than a human being. Even milk-craving baby bears and a friendly chimp have him on edge. There's some truly horrifying moments here, including one clever disposal of a body, and a finale that is up there with the final shot of "Freaks" in the art of the macabre. Kathleen Burke (as Atwill's wife), Randolph Scott and Gail Patrick offer fine support, but this is Atwill's film all the way.