A rich industrialist’s plan to build an island resort runs into trouble when the only member of his survey team to return is in a zombie-like state. Not wanting superstition to ruin his project, he calls in skeptical journalist Phillip Knight (Boris Karloff) to lead a team back to the island. Knight insists on taking along his emotionally distant assistant Sarah Adams (Beverly Tyler) and the zombie. The industrialist sticks him with his own assistant Barney Finch (Murvyn Vye), lesbian designer Clair Winter (Jean Engstrom), nervous islander Martin Schuyler (Elisha Cook), and grumpy captain Matthew Gunn (Rhodes Reason). As this is a ’50s era horror film, many things go fatally wrong, though nothing particularly frightening. Before they are done, Knight and company have encountered strange weather, mysterious deaths, carnivorous plants, voodoo dolls, and natives who are led by a white guy who we’re supposed to believe is oriental.
Voodoo Island is one of those movies that I don’t understand. Not the plot. OK, I don’t understand the plot either, but it’s the filmmaker’s actions that have me baffled. If I’d gone to the trouble to assemble a superior cast (Cook was in The Maltese Falcon, Reason is a strong male presence, Tyler is hot, and Karloff is a legend) and bought some nice film stock and paid to have it properly developed (the directing is lackluster with far too many static shots, but the film looks good), then I’d have put some effort into the screenplay. I can’t believe they started filming with a finished script. Things happen that are never explained and often aren’t relevant to the rest of the movie (the mysterious bad weather). Characters have overly flexible personalities, with much dialog appearing ad-libbed. I hope it was ad-libbed anyway. Then there is the method of zombie creation. I won’t give it away for anyone who wants a surprise (a very bad surprise), but it is not the kind of thing that appears in a movie where any thought was given to the story. The genre wobbles about as well. In a voodoo movie, why are there man-eating prehistoric plants? And why do those plants look like they are being inflated with a bicycle pump?
I put this movie on my zombie list because it has a pair of zombies, but don’t expect any zombie action. All these zombies do is shuffle, and they aren’t very good at that.
Voodoo Island may be of interest to a limited audience as a curiosity. Karloff is always a pleasure to watch (and listen to). This is one of his lesser pictures, but even bad Karloff is better than what most actors can manage. More than for Karloff”s appearance, Voodoo Island is remembered as one of the first films with a blatantly lesbian character. It’s all the more important because there’s no attempt to make some deep statement about sexuality or use her as a metaphor. Clair Winter just happens to be a lesbian. She isn’t judged for it, nor is it a major plot point. That fact is far more interesting than the movie.