Voodoo Island (1957)

Why so much hype?

Great Film overall

Excellent, Without a doubt!!

Exactly the movie you think it is, but not the movie you want it to be.

Writer, TV host and debunker Phillip Knight (Boris Karloff) is hired to investigate a South Pacific island where people have mysteriously disappeared. He takes along a bunch of obnoxious stereotypical characters. When he gets there he discovers zombies, man-eating trees and hostile natives.Slow and VERY boring movie. The movie is more than half over before they even GET to the island! There's endless talking and tramping about a jungle, stupid looking "man-eating" trees and a totally unnecessary love story shoehorned in. The dialogue is terrible and the story goes nowhere. The only good parts of the movie are good acting by Karloff and Elisha Cook, hunky Rhodes Reason is good to look at, there's a good music score by Les Baxter and, in a surprise subplot, Claire (Jean Engstrom) is clearly a lesbian and hits on the one other woman in the expedition (Beverly Tyler)! Still it doesn't make this worth sitting through.

Having previously just watched director Reginald Le Borg's The Black Sleep which featured Basil Rathbone, Akim Tamiroff, John Carradine, Lon Chaney, Jr., Tor Johnson, and in his last active film role, Bela Lugosi, I decided to watch his next movie which starred another horror movie icon: Boris Karloff. He plays Philip Knight, a television personality who regularly debunks certain myths on his show. He now is on assignment to do the same for a hotel magnate after one of four explorers of the title island-a Mitchell (Glenn Dixon)-comes back with a fixed stunned look. Coming along are Knight's secretary-Sarah Adams (Beverly Tyler), Barney Finch (Murvyn Vye), Matthew Gunn (Rhodes Reason), Claire Winter (Jean Engstrom), and Martin Schuyler (Elisha Cook, Jr.). I'll stop there and just say not much happens until the last 15 minutes. In fact, the most shocking thing that occurs involves a native pre-teen girl and one of the big plants. Of the performers, Karloff and somewhat Cook come off best though many of the others do well with the less-than-stellar material they're given. Still, like I said, the movie has its moments like this Karloff line that pretty sums up the near-universal appeal of horror films: "The public loves to be scared. Excites the imagination. Makes them believe in the existence of things unreal."

"Zombies and chomping plants greet an expedition led by a debunker of the occult." That's the description of VOODOO ISLAND given by TCM and it hits the mark. But the only real reason for watching is the presence of BORIS KARLOFF as the debunker. Others in the cast do little to help the project, but include BEVERLY TYLER as a frigid assistant to Karloff and RHODES REASON as the stalwart leader of the group. His romance with Tyler gets off to a bad start but heats up before the final reel.The special effects are unintentionally funny, especially a scene where one of the young ladies is attacked by a carnivorous plant. Les Baxter's score is a major asset though, accenting whatever danger is indicated by the script.But overall, the film is a distinct letdown for anyone expecting a good zombie movie. Most of the action takes place in bright sunlight amid sets that look like leftovers from Fantasy Island.Summing up: Karloff admirers won't mind watching him here, but no one is likely to be impressed by the lame storyline.

***SPOILERS***Not really getting off the ground and scaring the audience "Voodoo Island" just goes from one scene to another until it finally ends, without really explaining all the weird things in it.With three out of four men of a survey team lost on this uncharted island in the Pacific another team is sent to find out what exactly happened to them. The only survivor of the group Mitchell,Glen Dixon, is more dead then alive with a wild look in his eyes, that he never closes, that has everyone on the set calling him "Winky".Lead by TV personality Phillip Knight, Boris Karloff, the group lands on a nearby island to rent a boat and equipment to check out the mysterious atoll. Martin Schuyler, Elisha Cook, who owns the island is a bit taken that anyone will want anything to do with it. The group of people looking for the missing surveyors work for this big hotel magnate Howard Carlton, Owen Cunningham, who's interested in building a five star hotel there.So far so good as far as "Voodoo Island" goes but when Knight and his team including boat captain Gunn, Rhodes Reason, get on shore the movie just seems to go nowhere. Mitchell who was brought along suddenly came to life and made a brake for it. Dropping dead, this time for real, Mitchell is found by the pier with a voodoo doll that was made to look like him. Right there and then the rescue team should have realized what their in for especially when there was also found a Mawanga Bag, some kind of Voodoo artifact, indicating that their all targeted for death if they ever reach the island.Even though we have a number of flesh eating plants and some sinister Polynesian-looking natives who's chief, Fredrich Von Ledebur, looks strangely European there's nothing in the movie that really scares you. Even when the plants go into action attacking and killing Cliar (Jean Engstrom), one of the rescue team member, the scene is about as funny or believable as the scene with Bela Lugosi and the rubber octopus in "Bride of the Monster"! We do have a strange love triangle, which is about the most interesting thing in the film, between the macho boat captain Gunn and photographer Sarah Adams, Beverly Tyler, and the soon to be departed Clair. Clair an out of the closet lesbian really gets to hit it on with Sarah and at the same time sticks it to Gunn, being the macho man that he thinks he is, who also wants to get into her pants. I have a feeling that the movie makers had Clair killed off so early in the film to avoid anyone watching from figuring out, this in the innocent USA of 1957, what exactly Clair was not only up to but who, a lesbian, she really was. Getting Clair out of the picture also made it possible for Gunn to finally get romantic with the, what seemed to me, stuck-up on men Sarah Adams. Sarah actually was getting real hot and heavy with Clair and was anything but defensive to Macho Man Gunns advances until Clair was finally dispatched from the scene.The movie plods along with the team finally reaching, after being captured by the locals, this native village and getting the lowdown from the natives chief and witch doctor Friedich Von Ledebur to what's going on. Von Ledebur has been running the place for the last fifty years and wants no one from the outside world to interfere with his operation. Being sick and tired of the excesses and corruption of the civilized world Von Ledebur just wants to live in peace, with his natives, which is why he has anyone, like Mitchell and the missing survivors, who enter his kingdom either turned into zombies or eaten by his plants.There's still the greedy and materialistic Schuyler and Finch (Marvyn Vye), who's hotel magnate Cunninghmans advance man, to be taken care of with Fnch getting by far the worst of it. Schuyler is at least put to his eternal rest by jumping into the river and being eaten by the flesh-devouring plants. Finch's fate is far more saver; he's turned into, by chief Von Ledebur, a card-carrying member of the walking dead!