Editorials
The Man Behind the Shadows: The Horrors of Val Lewton
It’s easy to cite dozens upon dozens of directors, icons, and even writers that shaped the genre over the decades when looking back at the evolution of horror cinema and its history. But very few producers manage to achieve horror stardom in quite the same way, save for a notable handful of pioneers whose vital work in the genre became too vast to go unnoticed. That’s the case with Val Lewton, a legendary producer who developed a reputation for creating A-movie horror on a B-movie budget by leaning into implied and suggestive horror amidst heavily shadowed landscapes.
The Russian-born father of low budget horror started as a writer at MGM’s publicity office before becoming the right-hand man to famed Hollywood mogul David O. Selznick (Rebecca, King Kong). In 1942, Lewton was hired by RKO Pictures to run a unit dedicated to horror; the studio needed money fast after the commercial failure of Orson Welles’ Citizen Kane and hoped to emulate Universal Pictures’ success with their monster movies. Assembling a group of filmmakers that he’d worked with before, Lewton was given a fraction of Universal’s budget to achieve similar success. That suited Lewton just fine as he felt imagination was the key. He built his films around dread, unsettling atmosphere, and fear of the unseen.
Lewton guided every facet of the movies he made, no matter the director. It was his vision on screen, and he wrote a shooting script for every feature, often using a pen name or working in an uncredited capacity. Lewton guided his directors behind the scenes on ways to build suspense. All of which is why he’s credited for creating the blueprint for the modern jump scare referred to as the Lewton Bus (from Cat People), and known for transforming minuscule budgets into high-art horror. During Lewton’s reign, RKO’s output delivered psychological-based terror, haunting ambiance, progressive commentaries, sexual menace or tension, and, of course, stunning use of darkness and shadows.
When RKO head and Lewton supporter Charles Koerner died in 1946, it put the studio through an upheaval that resulted in Lewton’s ousting. It marked the decline in Lewton’s health; he suffered a minor heart attack shortly after. Through his connections and the merits of a screenplay he wrote, Lewton did find subsequent work at Paramount, where he produced a couple of non-genre features, but the filmmaker suffered an additional series of heart attacks that cut his life short at the age of 46.
In his time at RKO, Lewton produced eleven features- nine of them horror- over just four years. That insane workload, especially with how incredibly hands-on he was with each movie, no doubt attributed to his heart health. A tragic end to a crucial pioneer in the early advent of horror in the sound-era of film, Lewton left an indelible mark.
While any of Lewton’s horror films are worth checking out, here are four movies to get you started.
Cat People
The most well-known of Lewton’s films happens to be the first horror film produced for RKO. It’s also the best entry point. RKO gave Lewton a budget of $150,000 and gave him creative control to handle the rest. He enlisted Jacques Tourneur to direct and Mark Robson to edit. The plot sees Serbian-born fashion illustrator Irena (Simone Simon) struggling with repressed sexuality once she falls for handsome engineer Oliver (Kent Reed). They meet-cute then get married, but Irena refuses to consummate their marriage as she fears physical intimacy will transform her into a predatory cat of Serbian legend. A betrayal and jealousy may indeed trigger the curse anyway. With such a small budget, Tourneur couldn’t precisely create a cat person, so he relied on cinematographer Nicholas Musuraca and stylish lighting to create suspense and fear from implied menace lurking in the shadows. The scene in which Irena stalks her rival Alice (Jane Randolph) on the darkened empty street birthed the Lewton Bus jump scare, but the iconic pool scene that sees Alice tormented by a predator in the dark also stands out.
I Walked with a Zombie
For Lewton’s next production, RKO provided him with a title; I Walked with a Zombie. He instructed his writers to research Haitian voodoo practices and look to Charlotte Brontë’s Jane Eyre for structure purposes. Tourneur and Robson both carried over in director and editor capacity, respectively. In the film, Young Canadian nurse Betsy (Frances Dee) relays how she once walked with a zombie, recounting the tale of her job caring for the wife of a sugar plantation owner on a Caribbean island. The wife, naturally, has been acting very strangely. Voodoo zombies factor into this atmospheric gem in a big way, of course. There’s a dreamlike quality about I Walked with a Zombie, and it was progressive for its time for the somber portrayal of slaves.
The Seventh Victim
The Seventh Victim isn’t as overtly rooted in horror as Lewton’s other films, but it is one of his absolute best. Director Mark Robson begins this noir film like a classic dark mystery; a young woman learns her older sister has gone missing and hasn’t paid her tuition in months. She departs her boarding school and begins her search, meeting several characters along the way that’ll aid and hinder her investigation. Robson weaves in horror ever so slowly, building toward a nihilistic finish as the older sister is revealed to have gotten mixed up in a Satanic cult. This is the film that sparked criticism from a studio exec unhappy that Lewton’s films lacked a message, and Lewton famously retorted, “I’m sorry, but we do have a message, and our message is that death is good.” Outside of its reputation for blending noir and horror and its bleak ending, The Seventh Victim also boldly introduced a Satanic cult among the city’s social elite, way ahead of Rosemary’s Baby.
The Body Snatcher
Loosely based on Robert Louis Stevenson’s “The Body Snatcher” short story, Lewton helped adapt for the screen under the pen name Carlos Keith. Set in Edinburgh, Scotland, in 1831, a ruthless doctor and his young prize student find themselves continually harassed by their murderous supplier of illegal cadavers. Directed by Robert Wise (The Haunting, The Curse of the Cat People), The Body Snatcher stars Universal Studios’ horror icons, Boris Karloff and Bela Lugosi. It turns the tale of famous Scotland serial killers William Burke and William Hare into a fictional account of graverobbing and grisly murder with its own distinct set of characters. The Body Snatcher continues the streak of elevating a meager budget to deliver something haunting and gorgeous. Still, it’s most notable for being the first of three collaborations between Karloff and Lewton. It’s also the best, in terms of Karloff’s masterful performances.
Editorials
Before ‘The Blair Witch Project’, ‘Alien Autopsy’ Showed How Real Found Footage Could Feel
The line separating artist from con man is a lot thinner than you might initially believe. While I think we can all agree that lying for the sake of profit is actively malicious behavior, isn’t it also true that the faux documentary aspect of The Blair Witch Project is half the reason why that film became such a cultural phenomenon? After all, if there’s one thing filmmakers have in common with stage magicians, it’s that misleading and misdirecting audiences is simply part of the job.
That’s why I’ve developed a habit of mostly ignoring the moral quandaries behind many of film and television’s biggest “hoaxes” in favor of appreciating the narrative elements that drive productions like Mermaids: The Body Found and even Animal Planet’s highly underrated The Cannibal in the Jungle. However, if there’s a definitive case of a highly publicized broadcast fooling the world into taking it seriously, it has to be Fox’s infamous 1995 TV special Alien Autopsy: Fact or Fiction.
It’s been over three decades since that eerie footage first haunted television screens right at the peak of the ’90s ufology craze, and in that time, the video has taken on a life of its own. From countless parodies and references in everything from The X-Files to Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater (as well as John Dower’s recently released tell-all documentary The Alien Autopsy Scandal, which I’d highly recommend to genre fans everywhere), there’s no denying the legacy of the Alien Autopsy video. However, I rarely see the tape discussed as what it truly is: a highly convincing found footage film directed by a passionate stage magician and brought to life by masterful practical effects work.
That’s why I’d like to invite readers to join me on a deep dive into one of the most infamous broadcasts of all time in an attempt to reevaluate the footage as a fascinating narrative experience rather than a complete hoax.
The TV Special That Convinced Millions It Was Real
Ray Santilli next to Extraterrestrial replica in ‘The Alien Autopsy Scandal’
For starters, regardless of whether or not you believe that there was in fact an extraterrestrial crash in Roswell during the summer of 1947 and that some form of autopsy was performed on the victims, the producers behind the black & white recordings, Ray Santilli and Gary Shoefield, insist that their video was a “restoration.” Though I’d argue that the proper word is “remake”of genuine footage that was too damaged to air on television. That’s why the duo went on to recruit filmmaker and eccentric magician Spyros Melaris and sculptor/monster designer John Humphreys to bring their version of the autopsy to life and sell it to the highest bidder.
This is where the story of the Alien Autopsy as a narrative experience really begins. Melaris claims that his approach to the faux recording consisted of striving for extreme period accuracy in both shooting equipment and setting while also planting subtle details that would initially seem like mistakes but could later be revealed to actually fit the time period. That being said, the filmmaker was under the impression that the short would be released for free as a PR stunt, with the team later producing and selling an informative documentary chronicling exactly how the footage was faked and commenting on how easy it is to manipulate public perception with a good old-fashioned magic trick.
This obviously isn’t how things went down, and that’s likely the reason why Melaris has since distanced himself from everyone else involved with the project. Yet, no amount of behind-the-scenes drama can undermine the genuine effort that went into making the short as impressive as it is. From the sourcing of real animal organs from a local butcher to make the organic part of the creature more lifelike to the highly detailed sculpt that made use of a hollowed-out underlayer that could be filled with fake blood and assorted viscera, there’s a reason why so many Hollywood specialists are still impressed with the artistry on display here.
Of course, the believability is only half the story, as I think that the best part of the autopsy is how Melaris builds on the existing tension by obscuring certain details and often embracing the chaos of what a real examination of extraterrestrial life could feel like. The camera often goes out of focus at just the right time to make certain effects hit even harder, and we can only speculate as to what the hazmat-suited doctors are gesticulating about during the operation. There’s a real air of mystery to the whole thing that almost makes it feel like a cosmically terrifying, cursed film containing forbidden knowledge that civilians were never meant to see.
So when Fox’s Fact or Fiction brings in the specialists to comment on the film and its otherworldly subject, it’s no surprise that we end up with one of the most memorable mockumentaries of all time – albeit one where the participants are unaware that the footage they’re commenting on is basically a large-scale practical joke. A joke that the network was obviously in on, as many participants claim that the TV special cut out significant portions where guests point out that they believe the footage to be an elaborate hoax.
The Lasting Impact of the Hoax Turned Cultural Event
Regardless, I remember going to bed terrified after watching reruns of the special and thinking about the respected pathologist who claimed that the body was almost certainly inhuman, with even effects maestro Stan Winston commenting on how difficult it would be to recreate some of these visuals through practical puppetry. That’s not even mentioning Jonathan Frakes’ dramatic hyping up of the disturbing imagery as if he was talking about the tape from The Ring, with his spooky demeanor here likely being responsible for his later role as the host of Beyond Belief: Fact or Fiction a few years later.
Personally, I’d argue that the Alien Autopsy phenomenon had just as much of an impact on me as a horror fan as The Blair Witch Project, a film that was almost certainly influenced by the success of this immensely popular hoax (to the point where they even produced their own TV special commenting on Heather’s found footage). Even if Fox didn’t intend to produce a narrative feature about the aftermath of the Roswell crash, the end product still holds up remarkably well as a highly entertaining mockumentary exploring the idea that we may not be alone in the universe.
While neither Santilli nor the rest of the production team has ever commented on this, I also think it’s very likely that the idea of a faux Alien Autopsy could have been influenced by Dean Alioto’s The McPherson Tape/UFO Abduction. I’ve already written about how this granddaddy of found footage was co-opted by rogue ufologists who began selling bootlegs of the tape at conventions as if it were real evidence of a close encounter, so it’s not that much of a stretch to imagine that Santilli and company could have heard about this phenomenon and been inspired to come up with their own highly profitable hoax.
At the end of the day, it’s unlikely that the Alien Autopsy film is recreating any real footage from Roswell, but I can still appreciate the short and the accompanying television event as a standalone horror story that still influences the way we see found footage to this very day.
After all, the possibility that something could be real is often much scarier than finding out for sure – and that’s why I think Alien Autopsy: Fact or Fiction is still worth revisiting three decades down the line.
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