Though somewhat forgotten, this film harnesses stock footage with a rather clear-eyed view of the cost of war and a pervasive eeriness that eclipses its dated special effects.

This film marks the slow-building shift toward a more “raceless” zombie figure, discarding the symbolically Black trappings of Haiti and voodoo.

While other zombie films of the era were more preoccupied with the “atomic” zombie—a manifestation of scientific overreach rather than a mystical being—Cahn’s film contains prescient imagery to which several later zombie films may trace their lineage.