''Night of the Zombies'' (alternate title: ''Battalion of the Living Dead'') is a 1981 American

zombie A zombie (Haitian French: , ht, zonbi) is a mythological undead corporeal revenant created through the reanimation of a corpse. Zombies are most commonly found in horror and fantasy genre works. The term comes from Haitian folklore, in whic ...

horror

war film War film is a film genre concerned with warfare, typically about naval, air, or land battles, with combat scenes central to the drama. It has been strongly associated with the 20th century. The fateful nature of battle scenes means that war fi ...

directed by Joel M. Reed. The film was produced by Lorin E. Price. The film was distributed on VHS by InterGlobal Video Promotions Ltd.Night of the Zombie VHS packaging, barcode 0 62896014189.

Plot

During

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

, a

United States Army The United States Army (USA) is the land service branch of the United States Armed Forces. It is one of the eight U.S. uniformed services, and is designated as the Army of the United States in the U.S. Constitution.Article II, section 2, cla ...

chemical warfare Chemical warfare (CW) involves using the toxic properties of chemical substances as weapons. This type of warfare is distinct from nuclear warfare, biological warfare and radiological warfare, which together make up CBRN, the military acronym ...

battalion was rumored to have done battle against a Nazi

Schutzstaffel The ''Schutzstaffel'' (SS; also stylized as ''ᛋᛋ'' with Armanen runes; ; "Protection Squadron") was a major paramilitary organization under Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party in Nazi Germany, and later throughout German-occupied Europe d ...

(SS) unit somewhere in the

Bavarian Alps The Bavarian Alps (german: Bayerische Alpen) is a collective name for several mountain ranges of the Northern Limestone Alps within the German state of Bavaria. Geography The term in its wider sense refers to that part of the Eastern Alps that ...

. The two

missing in action Missing in action (MIA) is a casualty classification assigned to combatants, military chaplains, combat medics, and prisoners of war who are reported missing during wartime or ceasefire. They may have been killed, wounded, captured, ex ...

units were never heard from again. After thirty years, investigators searching for the soldiers' missing bodies look into rumors of soldiers that have turned into zombies.Internet Movie Database, https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0082815/. When several of the investigators are found dead, the

Central Intelligence Agency The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA ), known informally as the Agency and historically as the Company, is a civilian foreign intelligence service of the federal government of the United States, officially tasked with gathering, processing, ...

sends Special Agent Nick Monroe (James Gillis) in search of deserters from the missing Chemical Warfare unit. A top-secret

nerve gas Nerve agents, sometimes also called nerve gases, are a class of organic chemicals that disrupt the mechanisms by which nerves transfer messages to organs. The disruption is caused by the blocking of acetylcholinesterase (AChE), an enzyme that ...

is discovered that has kept a battalion of flesh-eating World War II soldiers alive for decades. The nerve gas is known by the name ''Gamma 693'', and was created to keep wounded soldiers alive, until they could be taken to a medical unit. Special Agent Nick Monroe uncovers a plot for world domination.

Cast

Jamie Gillis Jamie Gillis (born Jamey Ira Gurman; April 20, 1943 – February 19, 2010) was an American pornographic actor, director and member of the AVN Hall of Fame. He was married to the porn actress Serena. Early life Gillis was born Jamey Ira Gurman i ...

as Nick Monroe * Ryan Hilliard as Dr. Clarence Proud * Ron Armstrong as Police Capt. Fleck * Shoshana Ascher as a Prostitute * Dick Carballo as Bearded Man at Bar * Richard deFaut as Sgt. Freedman * Alphonso DeNoble as Krieg – Camera-store Proprietor * Samantha Grey as Susan Proud * Juni Kulis as GRO Officer Schuller * Robert Laconi as Bob Laconi

Production

Many scenes shot for the film were filmed in the home, and on the property of porn director Shaun Costello. The German city locations were filmed in

Munich Munich ( ; german: München ; bar, Minga ) is the capital and most populous city of the States of Germany, German state of Bavaria. With a population of 1,558,395 inhabitants as of 31 July 2020, it is the List of cities in Germany by popu ...

Bavaria Bavaria ( ; ), officially the Free State of Bavaria (german: Freistaat Bayern, link=no ), is a state in the south-east of Germany. With an area of , Bavaria is the largest German state by land area, comprising roughly a fifth of the total lan ...

West Germany West Germany is the colloquial term used to indicate the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG; german: Bundesrepublik Deutschland , BRD) between its formation on 23 May 1949 and the German reunification through the accession of East Germany on 3 O ...

. Other shots were filmed in

New York New York most commonly refers to: * New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York * New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States New York may also refer to: Film and television * '' ...

. Filming for this film was done despite production problems relating to budget and permit authorization. This low-budget, much-released horror film first saw the light as ''Gamma 693'' in 1979, was resuscitated as ''Night of the Wehrmacht Zombies'' in 1981, and rose again in 1983 as ''Night of the Zombies''. The film was also released under the titles ''Curse of the Ghoul Battalions,'' ''Die Nacht Der Zombies'', ''Sister of Death'', ''Battalion of the Living Dead,'' ''Zombie War Games'' and ''The Chilling''.Book of the Dead: The Complete History of Zombie Cinema by Jamie Russell, FAB (2005) page 229.

Release

The film was released in theaters on June 1, 1981. The film was later released on VHS tape in Toronto, Canada by InterGlobal Video Promotions Ltd.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Night of the Zombies 1981 films 1981 horror films 1980s war films Nazi zombie films American zombie films Films about chemical war and weapons Films about the Central Intelligence Agency Films about the United States Army Films directed by Joel M. Reed Films set in the Alps Films set in Bavaria Films shot in Munich Films shot in New York (state) Western Front of World War II films Horror war films 1980s English-language films 1980s American films