TEENAGE ZOMBIES (1959)
Director: Jerry Warren
Retromedia

In shlockmeister Jerry Warren's obligated contribution to the 50s teenage monster movie craze, a boat with two young guys and two young girls sales from an area of cheery ice cream parlors to a spooky isolated island. It is there that they run into "mad scientist" Katherine Victor who is planning on taking over America with a nerve gas formula that transforms people into zombies. Dressing more like Zsa Zsa Gabor than Dr. Frankenstein, she neighborly welcomes the teens into her domesticated kitchen, enticing them with soda pop and sandwiches from her well-stocked fridge.

Within her home lies a laboratory where she conducts her experiments, and the captured teens are her next victims (previously, the formula had only been used on convicts and drunks). Ivan (Chuck Niles)--a hunched brute with messy hair and dark circles under his eyes--guards them, but when some friends come looking for them, the teens manage to escape and confront Victor and some villainous agents in a fight scene that looks like a game of "Twister" gone wild!

TEENAGE ZOMBIES is often considered one of the worst horror films ever made. The claustrophobic sets--the ice cream parlor, the general's headquarters (complete with large map), the police station, and Victor's lab--all look like they were shot in someone's house, and it's enough to make Eddie Wood blush. The film is loaded with stock music, the acting is appalling, and this time Warren doesn't have the advantage(?) of padding the film with Mexican-lensed nonsense. A sluggish gorilla (prominently featured in the film's advertising) is also thrown in for good measure, but has little to do except eliminate the film's heavies.

Basically, bad movie lovers (myself included) will find something fascinating enough to induce repeated viewings; all others will just deem it junk. All I can say is that the shot with Ivan the brute staggering down the stairs is truly an eerie sight, and when Warren "remade" the film as FRANKENSTEIN ISLAND some 25 years later, he made TEENAGE ZOMBIES look like a cinematic masterpiece in comparison!

In 2000, Beverly Wilshire released a cheapo DVD of TEENAGE ZOMBIES, culled from a transfer with lots of problems--burn holes, jumps in dialog, scratches, and an altogether dark and undefined image. Retromedia's official DVD release puts that transfer to shame and will definitely not disappoint. There are still some lines and scratches present, but the transfer uses a sharp, bright and nicely contrasted 35mm film print, and the audio is very clear, perfectly rendering the overbearing stock music and inept dialog.

Retromedia has thankfully went to the trouble of conducting video interviews with stars Katherine Victor and Chuck Niles (the Victor interview is actually lensed by Gary Graver!). Victor (an actress whose film appearances are almost exclusive to Warren) talks about starring in the film, as well as working with the B director, giving a funny anecdote about him yelling at "major" stars to demonstrate his authority (I could just picture Jerry screaming at Cameron Mitchell and John Carradine!). She seems to believe (and it's probably true) that appearing in Warren productions damaged her career (though she's not bitter about it), and later went into animation work.

After his acting days, Chuck Niles embarked on a career as a jazz radio announcer, and he's still doing it today (Niles is seen interviewed at Station KLON in Los Angeles). Niles cheerfully reflects on acting for Warren and gives insight to his "style" of filming. He also reveals that TEENAGE ZOMBIES was shot in late 1956 at Larchmont Studios in California. You'd hardly recognize him today out of character, but the actor does an amusing recreation of his zombie character at the interview's conclusion!

Also included is a rarely seen trailer for TEENAGE ZOMBIES under the title ("Teenage Torture"), and you can just imagine how many times this was re-released and re-titled for drive-in screens during the 60s. There's also an amusing introduction from Fred Olen Ray and his wife Miss Kim, sitting in a van parked at an imaginary drive-in theater. (George R. Reis)

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