Black Moon (1934)

It's no definitive masterpiece but it's damn close.

Am I Missing Something?

Excellent characters with emotional depth. My wife, daughter and granddaughter all enjoyed it...and me, too! Very good movie! You won't be disappointed.

It is an exhilarating, distressing, funny and profound film, with one of the more memorable film scores in years,

I didn't know what to expect with this film but it turned out to be a rather creepy and sinister story. A woman who was raised on the West Indies island of San Christopher longs to return as an adult to confront the demons of her past, as her parents were both killed by natives on the island. Her husband and uncle who live on the island both warn against the idea, but Juanita Lane (Dorothy Burgess) sets off for San Christopher with her daughter (Cora Sue Collins) and attendant Gail Hamilton (Fay Wray) in tow.The most troublesome aspect of the story to me had to do with Juanita's casting aside of her husband and daughter as she gets caught up in the voodoo rituals of San Christopher, to the extent that the island villagers elevate her status to one of a high priestess. In a scene where a male high priest is about to sacrifice a native black woman, Juanita's husband Steve (Jack Holt) intervenes by shooting the man, but to finish the ceremony, Juanita picks up the machete and completes the sacrifice! The fact that the scene wasn't graphically shown in no way lessens the impact of the imagery.A similar scene gets to play out in the latter part of the story, but this time it's Juanita's daughter who becomes the object of the island sacrifice. The script probably should have done a better job of defining the motivation for such a horrific idea, all the viewer is left with is the impression that Juanita must be terribly insane. As the cacophony of native drums mesmerizes Juanita with their hypnotic effect, Steve Lane arrives just in time to shoot his own wife to save his daughter's life. The most unbelievable aspect in both instances was the lack of reaction by the chanting villagers. You would think they'd be the slightest bit upset by the interruption of their ritual celebration.Though I've seen Jack Holt previously in a couple of B Westerns, this was my first look at him in a leading role. He's not very charismatic in this portrayal, and he doesn't appear to have much chemistry with wife Juanita or his assistant Gail. Though it's more than apparent that Miss Hamilton carries a torch for the older man, it never really appears that Steve Lane is on the same wavelength, even if the story's resolution has all the main participants returning home as a newly reorganized family. You just had to wonder how they were going to put this horrible event behind them.

Certainly this is an oddball film, worth watching perhaps for a few laughs, but I must have watched another movie than the one that most reviewers here are talking about. First of all, if you're saying that this was ahead of its time, you're just showing your ignorance. It's not a precursor to the Val Lewton films of the 40s, it's a rehash of the bad racist jungle epics of the 1920s. There were tons of these movies, and the only thing that really makes this film notable is the fact that Fay Wray is in it, and that it allows the husband (a visibly embarrassed Jack Holt) to get away with killing his wife (Dorothy Burgess) in order to prevent her murdering their daughter in a voodoo ritual.Sounds pretty exciting, right? It's really not. The photography and direction are dull, there's no real magic nor any monsters, and the story is just a trifle designed to shock middle-class theater patrons of the early 1930s. It is full of racist imagery and characters, and even the ostensibly noble black character (Clarence Muse), whose presence perhaps was intended to make the film seem less racist, just manages to make things even worse.Dramatically, the film suffers from a transparent plot, and the lack of any real villain outside of Burgess' bored housewife on a voodoo binge. The black characters are treated as too infantile to do anything without the direction of either their priest or the white woman they inexplicably worship. Whenever a dangerous situation looms, Holt simply fires his gun at whoever is causing the danger and the situation is immediately defused. If only he had fired his pistol at the screenwriter.

Until only a few months ago, I had never even heard of this one – despite the involvement of director Roy William Neill (THE BLACK ROOM [1935]) and the era's foremost "Scream Queen" Fay Wray! Interestingly, it supplies the logical bridge between the distinctive Gothic and psychological backdrops of the two most notable early voodoo-related films – namely WHITE ZOMBIE (1932) and I WALKED WITH A ZOMBIE (1943). The atmosphere here is similarly thick, without the need to resort to an actual prowling or possessed creature: indeed, having the lady concerned – very well played by Dorothy Burgess – actively believe in the power of voodoo (that is, until she sees the error of her ways on being asked to perform the ultimate sacrifice!), provides the biggest chill in this case! Incidentally, the two central female characters (with Wray being, naturally, the wide-eyed heroine) not only create the requisite contrast but make up for the rather uninteresting male lead – burly Jack Holt! Perhaps not a classic of the genre, then, but a perfect example of "a film that has fallen through the cracks"; in fact, the copy I acquired is a hazy VHS-sourced recording of an old TCM screening.

I'm not sure, but Black Moon may be the first horror film to be set in the West Indies and focus on voodoo. Of course, it would be the Val Lewton/Jacques Tourneur film I Walked With a Zombie that would go on to become the best known early example; but Black Moon is still a worthy effort. The plot focuses on a woman born in the West Indies. She left at the age of two when her parents were sacrificed in a voodoo ritual, but apparently she is under some curse and decides to return to the island. She takes along her husband, nanny, daughter and his secretary and upon returning to the island, is elevated to the level of a God by the locals; which leads to danger for her family. The film was obviously made on a low budget as it all looks very cheap throughout. This improves once the film reaches the West Indies as the location shoots take some of the focus off the cheap looking sets seen earlier on in the film. The film is very slow burning and takes a while to get going, but once it does it's constantly interesting. Director Roy William Neill (who would of course go on to become best known for his Sherlock Holmes films) does well at implementing the atmosphere needed to ensure that the film is successful. It has to be said that there isn't a great deal of tension in the early parts of the film; but this is made up for by the ending which is strong. Overall, I wouldn't quite say that this film is a classic; but it will certainly be of interest for fans of thirties horror.