"King of the Zombies" is a prime example of Hollywood's blatant racial stereo typing of black actors and actresses in the 30's and 40s.<br /><br /> The story is a typical "B" movie plot. A secret service man or something like that (John Archer), his valet (Mantan Moreland) and a pilot (Dick Purcell) are searching for Admiral Wainwright (Guy Usler) who has disappeared over an isolated island in the Caribbean. Their plane loses radio contact and is forced to crash land on, you guessed it, that very same island. They then find a creepy mansion inhabited by Dr. Sangre (Henry Victor) and several zombie like creatures. Turns out the evil doctor is a Nazi spy trying to learn military secrets from the admiral. Joan Woodbury is the heroine of the piece. And we're not quite sure where the zombies (all black of course) come from. Are they hypnotized or the result of some voodoo magic? Who really cares?<br /><br /> The racial overtones are very obvious in this picture. When sleeping quarters are being assigned, Moreland is told that he cannot stay in the upstairs bedrooms but has to sleep in the servant's quarters off of the kitchen. The dialogue between Moreland (who steals the picture by the way) and the fetching Marguerite Whitten as the maid, Samantha are pure Hollywood. There's plenty of wide eyed "feet do yo' stuff" reactions as well as, the usual "yassir massa" types of speeches. It is appalling to see such fine talented people degraded like this. Moreland, to his credit, made the best of a bad situation and forged a lengthy career out of playing the banjo-eyed scared out of his wits friend of many "B" movie heroes.<br /><br /> It is also curious why Victor was cast as the chief villain in a Bela Lugosi type role when Lugosi himself was probably available at the time. Both he and Boris Karloff were making "B" movie quickies for Monogram at the time.<br /><br />