Uriah43 The year is 1894 and somewhere off the coast of Africa a crew from the ship "Susan B" raids an ancient temple and seizes a cask full of diamonds. A violent quarrel then erupts within the crew leaving around 10 of them—to include the captain—dead. However, when the crew tries to leave, the dead crew members return and kill them. The "Susan B" is sunk and the diamonds are left in her cargo hold. Many years later an American ship arrives and her captain, "George Harrison" is intent upon getting his hands on the diamonds. With him is his wife, "Mona" (Allison Hayes) and a skilled diver named "Jeff Clark" (Gregg Palmer). What they don't fully realize is that this treasure is guarded by zombies who have been resurrected by a type of voodoo. Neither do they realize just how incredibly strong the zombies are until one of them captures a pretty blonde named "Jan Peters" (Autumn Russell) and Jeff almost dies in the attempt to free her. Still, greed is a powerful force and it gets the best of them as this group continues to try to get this treasure even though 4 or 5 other European groups have died in the attempt over the past 50 years or so. Now, people who aren't accustomed to "old-style zombies" may not like or appreciate this film too much. After all, it's in black and white and the zombies are nothing like what we currently see in the movies today. They don't bite and infect anyone with a virus. And there are no graphic scenes. Additionally, the acting wasn't that great either. But this was what horror films looked like back in the 50's and while it isn't necessarily "scary" by today's standards, it does have some suspense and creepiness all the same. Again though, this film may not appeal to everyone. But I enjoyed it and I rate it as slightly above average all the same.

Curt Miller For all of the critics who rated the film less than 5 stars, well... It is a campy example of 50's B movie making. It isn't supposed to be anything more than that! To its credit, the film has some atmospheric moments. The sets are pretty good and the acting is better than bad. Mona (Allison Hayes) steals the show with her good looks and crazy persona. There are not a lot of production flubs given the low budget. This film compares favorably with other B efforts of the 50's. Check out Allison in the 50 foot woman flick. This was her most famous science fiction role. My advice: watch 'Zombies' it and enjoy it for what it is...!

sddavis63 This is most definitely a B-Grade horror movie in almost every way. For that reason, it's a little bit of a surprise that the basic story isn't all that bad - ridiculous, but not bad. A group of American divers arrive off the coast of Africa to search for a ship that sunk many years before carrying a treasure of valuable diamonds. Once there, they discover that the wreck and diamonds are being protected by the original crew of the sunken ship - who are now among the undead! There was no real explanation offered as to why the diamonds are so important to the undead. It's not like they're going to be walking into the local shopping mall and going on a spree! But they are important - I guess it's a kind of "if we can't enjoy them, no one can" kind of attitude. These are typical, old fashioned zombies. They're just undead. They're not flesh eaters, walking around devouring people. That image of zombies, as far as I know, came from "Night of the Living Dead" in 1968. These guys are just dead - or, rather, undead. Or ... Well, you get the point. They're tormented souls who have no escape from their tormented life - not even in death. Five previous expeditions from around the world have come here to find the diamonds, and all of the members of all of the expeditions have been done away with by these undead guardians of the diamonds and been immediately buried so as to prevent them from also walking the earth. Can this new bunch survive? And find the diamonds? I suppose the story's OK for a B-Grade movie. The movie, however, fails on the authenticity meter, at least to me. First, this is supposed to be set in deepest, darkest Africa. It's established that the nearest police and even the nearest doctor are hours away. There's nothing here; no place to go for help - except for the extremely large and comfortable mansion like home that Grandma Peters (Marjorie Eaton) lives in, that comes complete with servants and chauffeur and a pretty fancy car. Yeah. The roads are a little bumpy. But that's about the only inconvenience to living in this extremely remote corner of the world (I mean, aside from the undead who wander around incessantly, which would be a bit inconvenient at times I suppose.)I also chuckled at both Mona (Allison Hayes) - the wife of the expedition's leader - and Jan (Autumn Russell) - who's the granddaughter who makes Grandma Peters a grandma. Why do I chuckle? Well, again, in this remote corner of deepest, darkest Africa, these attractive women (as an aside, Jan's more attractive than Mona, by the way) seem to spend most of their time wearing fancy dresses or evening gowns and running around in high heels. In deepest, darkest Africa (even outside the inexplicably comfortable mansion) where such things strike me as something of an inconvenience.One other thing. Since fire really bothers these undead, why not pour gallons of gasoline into the mausoleum (which also inexplicably exists in deepest, darkest Africa where nobody but Grandma Peters seems to live) where they spend their free time (which the undead must have a lot of) basically just lying in their coffins and set the whole thing on fire, rather than just using fire to make them back off? Seems to me that might have solved the whole problem. Of course, it would have ended the movie too quickly if anyone had been sharp enough to have that thought.As it is, this is only a little over an hour in length, and while there are a few silly elements (such as described above) the basic story's not bad. It's quite watchable, even if it isn't a masterpiece. (4/10)

funkyfry There's nothing particularly remarkable about "Zombies of Mora-Tau", but it isn't the worst way to pass about an hour of your life. Fans of Eddie Cahn will see the resemblance to his voodoo-themed "Four Skulls of Johnathan Drake" which are a strong contrast to his more modern (and influential) zombie/apocalypse films "Invisible Invaders" and "Creature with the Atom Brain." This places this film in the older tradition of zombie movies, some kind of descendant of "White Zombie" and "I Walked with a Zombie" (both of which are superior to the film in question). The zombies in this film are reanimated sailors who must guard a cursed treasure (remind anyone of any recent mega-hits?). They look pretty silly in their striped shirts; it doesn't look like anyone even thought to make them look a bit aged or anything like that.The film's best asset is Allison Hayes and the scenes involving her character, including the memorable scene where she's clearly a zombie but nobody wants to believe it, so they lead her back to the house and surround her with candles at the old lady's (Marjorie Eaton) insistence. Shades of the old vampire movies and their garlic cloves here. Hayes is lovely and her acting adequate. None of the other leads are particularly memorable.There are a few scenes that will draw unintentional laughter from a modern audience but not all that many. Probably the atmosphere in the film was intense enough to scare some young kids who saw it in the '50s. We have scenes of graveyards and so forth – I think it's quite a nice effect when the old lady shows the group all those graves and when asked who they are for says "they're yours." But I can hardly imagine any person older than 5 who would be scared by this film in the 20th Century because it really doesn't even try that hard. Once you get to the scenes with the underwater treasure search you realize this is, like "Invisible Invaders", more of an action/adventure film than a horror film.It's not nearly as inept as some posters here have said, but it's clearly a movie that didn't have high ambitions. Within the scope of its own goals I would say it is reasonably successful.