Kongo and Cats

KONGO-MGM-1932-Don’t miss this whacked, pre-code remake of the Chaney/Browning silent film WEST OF ZANZIBAR! Walter Huston is Deadlegs Flint, the ruthless crippled white “god” who uses superstition and violence to rule over his jungle domain. Flint lives for only one thing. The day he can have his revenge on the man (C. Henry Gordon) who stole his wife and maimed him.



As part of his plan he degrades the girl (Virginia Gregg in a great performance) he believes is his enemy’s daughter. Her savior turns out to be a doctor turned drug addict (Conrad Nagel)! You can probably guess what happens.



KONGO is full of racist dialogue, manic acting and strange situations that are alluded to more than shown. Lupe Velez, Forrester Harvey and Mitchell Lewis play the lost souls under Flint’s thrall. Look for Ming The Merciless himself Charles Middleton in a small un-billed role.



Director William Cowen creates some wild scenes involving jungle ritual burning. He directed a Hollywood version of Oliver Twist the next year!



And believe it or not Huston is even more twisted than Chaney was!



Screenwriter Leon Gordon worked on FREAKS for Tod Browning the same year!


















CAT GIRL-Anglo Amalgamated-1957 -This is a pretty neglected CAT PEOPLE inspired English production featuring the underrated Barbara Shelley as a newly married woman who goes back to her childhood home to inherit her weird uncle’s estate. Unk has a pet leopard and a roomful of stuffed felines. However, he warns her that part of his inheritance is his curse.

It’s never actually explained how the curse came about or why exactly her family is cursed but it seems that she kinda does a mind meld with the pet leopard and she can make it kill people. She starts with her philandering husband. A psychiatrist (who she’s in love with) tries to convince her it’s all in her mind. In one scene while she’s confined to a rubber room she imagines herself to be a cat that looks like a human size mouse from "Zoobilee Zoo" or something! She then goes after the shrink’s wife. Shelley is great in the title role but the rest of the cast is pretty bland.

Director Alfred Shaughnessy later wrote THE FLESH AND BLOOD SHOW. American screenwriter Lou Rusoff wrote THE SHE CREATURE, DAY THE WORLD ENDED, IT CONQUERED THE WORLD and other AIP movies. Thanks for reading!