I Was a Zombie for the F.B.I. (1982)

 

Director: Marius Penczner

Screenplay: Marius Penczner and John Gillick

Cast: Larry Raspberry as Ace Evans; John Gillick as Bart Brazzo; James Raspberry as Rex Armstrong

A Night of a Thousand Horror (Movies)

 

Note: The following is based on the 2005 re-edit version of this film. This does not reflect a review of the original version, which is referrenced in the below entry.

 

One slip up, and we air condition her skull.

A fifties sci-fi parody, I Was a Zombie for the F.B.I. is somehow a film I had never heard of but has a compelling enough back story, alongside its onscreen content, that left me surprised it never crossed my path. Director and co-writer Marius Penczner made this film with a budget of $27,000, with money won from an Emmy winning short film of his, and the help of Memphis-area film students¹, as a Tennessee regional production, which (in the cut I am talking of) is a huge addition to what they succeeded with. Likely the reason this film never came up in my readings is how scarce its original screenings were, only shown in 1985 on the "Night Flight" cable program, a cable program originally on cable TV network USA Network which showed full length and short films alongside music videos. Varying between cult films, short films by the likes of the Quay Brothers, music videos, experimental cinema, and collaborations and specials with the likes of KISS to a video profile of Aretha Franklin’s career, Night Flight was with hindsight admirable in its goals, continuing into the nineties and being revived into the 2010s.

The fact this film was only screened back in 1985 means it was not easy to see unless you were watching Night Flight as a regular viewer, with the only close thing to an actual release coming in 2005 with a DVD release¹, one notably (and with this review based on this version) some revisions that were made to the material by the director. Shot in monochrome, this begins with two prisoners, brothers, being taken to their punishment on an airplane only for a UFO to knock the plane they are in out of the air. In mind to multiple cuts – this 2005 version with a new score and cut down from its original running time - it is cool as a no-nonsense take on the b-movie, with a tongue in its cheek about the tribute but taking itself seriously with a zip from the get-go. There is a sense of humour to this as this is around a conspiracy involving rival cola drink plants, when a health cola plant nearby the crash site is where the survivors of the plane crash, the prisoners, and the aliens behind their escape are hatching a shady plan involving taking over another plant for Uni-Cola. This heist with hostages by the brothers is used as a cover to begin a brainwashing plan on humanity. It is not an accurate attempt at a fifties b-movie - no back screen projection, no Criswell monologues or wobbly tombstones - nor an attempt at campiness, only that it has what costumes, vehicles and sets the production are carefully chosen in an ambitious way to get the right tone for this tribute.

Many of the sets themselves, like the jail the brothers end up in, are real locations which have to be commended in being able to secure them for the production, and unlike some films of the past this nods to, least for 2005 cut, there is a lack of pointless padding. Mesa of Lost Women (1953) this is not, with endless dialogue with no engagement to it, and that was shorter next to I Was... is considerably. Following its tale of secret cola formulas and aliens hiding among us, armed with deadly white sci-fi billiard balls of pain and memory erasure, with only a pair of G-Men and one female journalist to stop them, this has no fat on its form which feels pointless in having. There is a Body Snatchers vibe and brain stealing cola, zombification the result with this strangely not the only film from the eighties obsessed with cola stealing one's mind. Surf II (1984), with Eddie Deezen creating Buzz Cola to turn surfers into zombies, inexplicably shares a bonding moment as two films parodying older decades of cinema, that one inspired by early sixties beach films, and the dangers of sugary soda.

A sense of personality here - such as an argument whether people keep whiskey in their car glove compartment or not - really helps, even throwing in a stop motion monster for good measure as a cherry on top, with the funny knowledge this same creature returned, as Marius Penczner directed the music video for ZZ Top’s TV Dinners, where the beast made a cameo¹. Controversially, with no context for the original version, the re-edit does not jar badly at all with this film, which could have botched this badly and felt like trying to bolt on an entire aesthetic, of 2000s technological for film making, onto a production a time long after the materials were filmed with its own technological aesthetics. The music suits perfectly, there is not a moment within the film without feeling threadbare, and the inter-titles placing chapters on this tale, clearly to help explain context, are to be appreciated or can just be ignored without being too much a distraction.

As micro budget films go, this one can raise its head high in the knowledge that it is an accomplished one in the circumstances of this area of cinema. It also has the least expected recommendation that Bob Dylan of all people saw the film and wished he had starred in it¹. This quote is said to come from an article interviewing in Spin Magazine Volume One, number 8 from December 1985¹. Called Don't Ask Me Nothin' About Nothin' I Might Just Tell You The Truth: Bob Dylan Revisited, the article, which is split in two in the magazine², does not talk about this fabled list of films he wished he was in. It does however come from Interview magazine, a magazine first published in 1969, and comes from a February 1986 interview with writer Scott Cohen, where this film is mentioned alongside The Devil and Miss Jones (1941), the original 1959 Ben-Hur, and Raintree County (1957), a romantic western set during the American Civil War starring Montgomery Clift and among others Elizabeth Taylor. For weird details like this, especially when confirmed, I am surprise I Was a Zombie for the F.B.I. never crossed my path. It is a niche production, one which might not be as action packed or outright cheesy for some people's tastes. In huge admiration of its achievements, this does deserve a reappraisal.

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1) The film's streamable version on NightFlight Plus.com, which includes info on the production.

2) Spin Magazine Volume One, number 8 from December 1985, which has the Don't Ask Me Nothin' About Nothin' I Might Just Tell You The Truth article, preserved on Archive.org.

3) New Again: Bob Dylan, Interview Magazine's re-visit on this original February 1986 review, using Scott Cohen's original writing.