Ameriatch
One of the best films i have seen
Janae Milner
Easily the biggest piece of Right wing non sense propaganda I ever saw.
Marva-nova
Amazing worth wacthing. So good. Biased but well made with many good points.
Mike_Noga
When rogue sunspot activity grants the chimps at the zoo hyper-intelligence, they quickly rebel against their human captors, forcing the humans to ride tricycles while wearing ill-fitting bell boy outfits and smoking cheap cigars while mocking the humans' pale, unswollen buttocks. In an attempt to befriend the chimps, the humans refer to them as mere "monkeys" which sends the chimps into a face eating frenzy that transforms the zoo a cotton candy coated abattoir!Okay, maybe not. This is actually a lean and mean tale of obsession and revenge. I don't want to spoil it for you by giving away any details except to say that this type of story, the pathologically jealous husband who views his wife as property, and the brave wife trying to escape him, has been told many times over.This version however, is stripped down and raw, and the zoo setting gives it a slightly bizarre twist, just enough to jar you yet not so much it detracts from the emotional impact of the story. The acting is good on all sides with Atwill especially frightening as a man both driven and intelligent enough to exact a horrible fate on anyone he even suspects of crossing him. The opening scene is actually pretty disturbing and but does it's job well in that it lets the viewer know exactly how far Atwill will go to impose his retribution.
Scott LeBrun
The pre-"Code" horror flick "Murders in the Zoo" is noteworthy for being quite potent for its time. If only some of the comedy relief were eliminated and the horror quotient punched up even more, it really could have been something special. As it is, it's enjoyable but may not be intense enough for the modern viewer. It's highlighted by a wonderfully deranged performance by genre icon Lionel Atwill, here playing Eric Gorman, a zoologist who's pathologically jealous of his hot young wife Evelyn (Kathleen Burke of "Island of Lost Souls"), who admittedly is not exactly faithful to him. He's well aware that his animals make for handy murder weapons, so he employs them whenever he wants to eliminate a man from Evelyns' life.Three sequences stand out here as being appropriately intense. The film establishes a tone immediately; it begins as Eric sews a mans' mouth shut! Another involves a victim tossed into an alligator pit. And the finale sees many animals escape their cages, and the skirmishes between the big cats are all too convincing. A huge snake gets to do its thing before this is all over.Capably directed by A. Edward Sutherland, "Murders in the Zoo" does waste some time with its principal comic character, a drunken press agent played by top-billed Charles Ruggles. Ruggles is amiable enough, but isn't funny enough to warrant that much screen time. Otherwise, it's just zippy enough to clock in at a mere 63 minutes. The supporting cast helps keep it watchable: Gail Patrick, Randolph Scott, future Connecticut governor John Lodge, Harry Beresford, Samuel S. Hinds, and Edward McWade. The cinematography is by the celebrated Ernest Haller ("Gone with the Wind", "Rebel Without a Cause", etc.).Overall, a fun film worth a look for genre fans and completists.Seven out of 10.
dougdoepke
Wacko scientist Atwill returns from jungle with a load of wild animals for zoo and a load of mad at rivals for his wife.About the time the revenge-minded Atwill runs his hand over the shapely Burke's resisting chest, a kinky gleam in his eye, we know we're in pre-Code territory. And catch that big cat brawl at the end, like nothing else I've seen and a good thing I haven't, since who knows what they did to get those cats into such a frenzy. Yes indeed, behind the unimaginative title lies half a wacked-out horror movie that could only have come from a time when Hollywood was still unzippered. The other half parachuted in from some strange planet where Charlie Ruggles gets laughs. Here his lame schtick only suggests he's nuttier than Atwill and that the python got the wrong man. My guess is the producers looked at the no-name credits, talked to comedy director Sutherland, and added the better-known Ruggles to top the cast list. Too bad a James Whale or a Tod Browning wasn't in charge.The horror half, on the other hand, is genuinely creepy. Catch that dress-up banquet—all the nice ladies and gentlemen feasting while the big cats in the background have their own feasting ideas. Or the sadistic Atwill getting turned-on by who knows what. And isn't it a good thing there're no sewing machines in the jungle. Now, if someone could just replace Atwill's weird pocket-contents with ordinary things like dimes and quarters, party guests would stop keeling over and zoos would be a lot safer.Then too, someone behind the camera knows an artistic set-up when he sees it. These pop up now and again, so the horror gets something of an extra visual dimension. And I really like the big-eyed Burke. She's kind of a Myrna Loy look-alike, but with angular features even more exotic. Too bad she left the business so soon. And too bad the movie's only half a horror classic, though, come to think of it, the Ruggles half is a horror classic of a different, more distressing kind. Anyway, the 60-minutes appears to inhabit its own weird bi-polar universe, so don't miss it.
dbborroughs
Who said the old horror movie weren't graphic, this baby begins with Lionel Atwill sewing a man's mouth closed before feeding him to the animals and going on from there. Great classic horror film thats been picked apart over the years for other films but its never really been done as good as this. The plot is simple, Atwill runs the zoo and uses the animals to dispose of people who annoy him or try to get too close to the women he loves. Its dark and creepy stuff that sends shivers up and down your spine, not so much for what it shows, which isn't much, but for what it doesn't. If you want the perfect mixture of terror of the eyes and terror of the mind this is it. Perfectly paced and played it does what it does and gets off. I can't recommend this film enough. Its great (even if its a tad creaky)
