Murder Legendre
White Zombie character
Lugosi as Murder Legendre
First appearanceWhite Zombie
Created byVictor Halperin
Portrayed byBela Lugosi
In-universe information
Gendermale
Occupationvoodoo doctor
sugar mill owner
Spousenone
Relativesnone
NationalityHaitian
StatusDeceased

Murder Legendre (also stylised "Murder" Legendre[1][2]) is a fictional character and the antagonist of the 1932 black-and-white horror film White Zombie where he was portrayed by actor Bela Lugosi.[3][4] A malevolent voodoo and zombie master with telepathic powers,[5] this character is remembered as one of the actor's most striking performances[6] and has been the subject of various interpretations.

Description

Murder Legendre was born in Haiti somewhere in the 1890s-1900s. At a young age he met Ledot, a witch doctor who taught him all the skills of voodoo and witchcraft.[7] After mastering them all, Murder becomes a vodou master himself.[8] He used his voodoo powers to turn Ledot into a zombie, he then turned many of his enemies into zombies and made them all work as slaves in his sugar mill.[9][10]

The action of White Zombie is set in Haiti in 1932. Much of the plot revolves around Legendre, Beaumont, another plantation master, and a newly arrived couple, Neil and his fiancée Madeleine,[11] and how Legendre turns her into a "braindead" zombie.[12][13][14]

The character of Legendre is in general identified as white. But some authors identify him as black. In her essay on White Zombie and the Creole, Gillian Phillips insists that Legendre's ethnicity is ambiguous and that he embodies both sides of Haitian history.[8] Although his name suggests French roots,[15] Legendre is also presented as a foreign personality of indeterminate origin, who resents the way all sides of the society of the island have treated him.[16]

He is presented as a necromancer,[8] a sorcerer,[17] a voodoo master[18] or a zombie master[19]

One of his most defining feature is his "sardonically evil smirk",[20] his hypnotic gaze and "long" hands, as well as a forked beard, the result of make-up work by Jack Pierce.[21]

Inspiration

According to author and adventurer William Seabrook in his 1929 novel The Magic Island, a voodoo priestess he met, Maman Celie, briefly inspired Legendre who also is a voodoo priest and witch doctor.[22] In the first chapter of the book, Seabrook describes an innocent Haitian girl being sacrificed and in another, a group of zombies working at a sugar mill.[23]

Analysis

Film historian Gary Don Rhodes mentions in his book about White Zombie that Legendre's Haitian nationality, occupation as a voodoo doctor, and appearance link him closely to Satanism, especially Mephistopheles or Satan himself, while Dr. Bruner would represent Christ.[24] Rhodes also mentions that when Beaumont allows Legendre to drug Madeleine, he literally sells his soul to the devil, especially when Legendre drugs him later on to turn him into a zombie as well. Legendre's sugar mill and castle are built and worked on by his mind-controlled zombies, showcasing the slavery also used to built Mephistopheles's castle, even it is said by Rhodes that Legendre himself prays to the devil with his zombie voodoo rituals.[25][26]

Lugosi's performance

The character's malevolence was compared to Lugosi's Dracula.[17] Various commentators consider the performance to be Lugosi's most notable performance after Dracula.[27]

In his book about horror film, however, Bryan Seen, who describes him in another book as the "epitome of evil",[28] finds that the character is too unidimensional to allow Lugosi to fully show his talent.[29]

Legacy

StarAce toys made a 1/6 inch toy model and figure of Murder Legendre based on Bela Lugosi's likeness, which comes equipped with his raven.[30] Other figures representing Legendre have been issued.[31]

The character, who, according to Mark Clark in his books about acting in horror cinema, remains "endlessly fascinating",[32] is also central to a 2017 novel prequel to the film: Memoirs of Murder: A Prequel to the 1932 Classic, White Zombie by Brad A. Braddock, that contains a fictional "personal diary of Murder Legendre himself".[33]

See also

References

  1. ↑ Weinstock, Jeffrey Andrew (2016-04-01). The Ashgate Encyclopedia of Literary and Cinematic Monsters. Routledge. ISBN 978-1-317-04426-0.
  2. ↑ Carton, Christopher (2022-07-20). The Ultimate Book of Movie Monsters. White Owl. ISBN 978-1-3990-9685-0.
  3. ↑ Scott, Niall (2007-01-01). Monsters and the Monstrous: Myths and Metaphors of Enduring Evil. BRILL. doi:10.1163/9789401204811_005. ISBN 978-94-012-0481-1.
  4. ↑ Senn, Bryan. Drums of Terror: Voodoo in the Cinema. Midnight Marquee & BearManor Media.
  5. ↑ Rhodes, Gary D.; Guffey, Robert. Bela Lugosi and the Monogram Nine. BearManor Media.
  6. ↑ Pulliam, June Michele; Fonseca, Anthony J. (2014-06-19). Encyclopedia of the Zombie: The Walking Dead in Popular Culture and Myth. Bloomsbury Publishing USA. ISBN 978-1-4408-0389-5.
  7. ↑ Recker, Laurel (2018-09-11). Miller, Joshua; Rogers, Gayle (eds.). "Zombie Palimpsests: Translating US Occupation in White Zombie". Modernism/Modernity Print Plus. 3 (3). doi:10.26597/mod.0068. S2CID 194941361.
  8. 1 2 3 Boluk, Stephanie; Lenz, Wylie (2011-07-25). Generation Zombie: Essays on the Living Dead in Modern Culture. McFarland. ISBN 978-0-7864-8673-1.
  9. ↑ Garland, Christopher (2015-05-27). "Hollywood's Haiti: Allegory, Crisis, and Intervention in The Serpent and the Rainbow and White Zombie". Contemporary French and Francophone Studies. 19 (3): 273–283. doi:10.1080/17409292.2015.1028791. ISSN 1740-9292. S2CID 191367465.
  10. ↑ Spencer-Hall, Alicia (2017). "The horror of orthodoxy: Christina Mirabilis, thirteenth-century 'zombie' saint". Postmedieval: A Journal of Medieval Cultural Studies. 8 (3): 352–375. doi:10.1057/pmed.2016.19. ISSN 2040-5960. S2CID 256512290.
  11. ↑ McGee, Adam M. (2012). "Haitian Vodou and Voodoo: Imagined Religion and Popular Culture". Studies in Religion/Sciences Religieuses. 41 (2): 231–256. doi:10.1177/0008429812441311. ISSN 0008-4298.
  12. ↑ Kee, Chera (2014-10-02). "Good Girls Don't Date Dead Boys: Toying with Miscegenation in Zombie Films". Journal of Popular Film and Television. 42 (4): 176–185. doi:10.1080/01956051.2014.881772. ISSN 0195-6051. S2CID 191489962.
  13. ↑ Peters, Michael A.; Besley, Tina (2023-09-05). Educational Philosophy and Post-Apocalyptical Survival: An Educational Philosophy and Theory Reader Volume XIV (1 ed.). London: Routledge. doi:10.4324/9781003453895. ISBN 978-1-003-45389-5. S2CID 261568927.
  14. ↑ Pokornowski, Steven (2013). "Insecure Lives: Zombies, Global Health, and the Totalitarianism of Generalization". Literature and Medicine. 31 (2): 216–234. doi:10.1353/lm.2013.0017. ISSN 1080-6571. PMID 24620649. S2CID 28096329.
  15. ↑ Barentsen, Gord (2020-10-12). A Language Spoken in Tongues: Essays in the Transcultural Gothic. BRILL. ISBN 978-90-04-39941-9.
  16. ↑ Moreman, Christopher M.; Rushton, Cory James (2011-08-31). Race, Oppression and the Zombie: Essays on Cross-Cultural Appropriations of the Caribbean Tradition. McFarland. ISBN 978-0-7864-8800-1.
  17. 1 2 Rasmussen, Randy (2006-03-10). Children of the Night: The Six Archetypal Characters of Classic Horror Films. McFarland. ISBN 978-0-7864-2725-3.
  18. ↑ Pulliam, June Michele; Fonseca, Anthony J. (2014-06-19). Encyclopedia of the Zombie: The Walking Dead in Popular Culture and Myth. Bloomsbury Publishing USA. ISBN 978-1-4408-0389-5.
  19. ↑ Jr, Raymond Valinoti. Hollywood's Pre-Code Horrors 1931-1934. BearManor Media.
  20. ↑ Senn, Bryan. Drums of Terror: Voodoo in the Cinema. Midnight Marquee & BearManor Media.
  21. ↑ Grant, Barry Keith (2022-03-24). 100 American Horror Films. Bloomsbury Publishing. ISBN 978-1-83902-144-2.
  22. ↑ Lambert, Heather (2022-06-25). "Murder Legendre's Dead: How White Zombie Challenges Critical Influence and Reinforces Racial Anxieties". Hungarian Journal of English and American Studies. 28 (1). doi:10.30608/HJEAS/2022/28/1/8. ISSN 2732-0421.
  23. ↑ The Magic Island. p. The Smithsonian Library. Retrieved December 17, 2023.
  24. ↑ Kemp, Taylor (2021-01-14). "The Legend of Legendre". Medium. Retrieved 2024-01-03.
  25. ↑ Analysing White Zombie. 14 January 2021. p. Taylor-Kemp.Medium. Retrieved December 17, 2023.
  26. ↑ White Zombie: Anatomy of a Horror Film. McFarland, Gary D. Rhodes. 3 September 2015. p. Google Books. ISBN 9781476604916. Retrieved December 17, 2023.
  27. ↑ Hughes, William; Punter, David; Smith, Andrew (2015-10-08). The Encyclopedia of the Gothic. John Wiley & Sons. ISBN 978-1-119-21046-7.
  28. ↑ Senn, Bryan. Drums of Terror: Voodoo in the Cinema. Midnight Marquee & BearManor Media.
  29. ↑ Senn, Bryan (2015-09-03). Golden Horrors: An Illustrated Critical Filmography of Terror Cinema, 1931-1939. McFarland. ISBN 978-1-4766-1089-4.
  30. ↑ Murder Legendre Toy. p. Space Figuren. Retrieved December 17, 2023.
  31. ↑ Tuna, Thomas (2022-01-25). "Bela Lugosi's 'White Zombie' Role Gets Action Figure". Horror News Network. Retrieved 2024-01-03.
  32. ↑ Clark, Mark (2003-12-31). Smirk, Sneer and Scream: Great Acting in Horror Cinema. McFarland. ISBN 978-0-7864-2682-9.
  33. ↑ Braddock, Brad A. (2017-03-23). Memoirs of Murder: A Prequel to the 1932 Classic, White Zombie. Black Rose Writing. ISBN 978-1-61296-843-8.

Bibliography

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