Movie Review: Voodoo Island (1957)

Synopsis: Television personality Phillip Knight has made a living debunking various myths and superstitions for his audience. This leads to him being hired by a hotel owner wanting Knight to disprove rumors of Voodoo on the remote island he intends to build a resort on. Knight remains a skeptic even as an employee is turned into a zombie and other strange things happen around him.

Who's in it? The movie stars Boris Karloff, Beverly Tyler, Murvyn Vye, Rhodes Reason and Elisha Cook, Jr. It also has an uncredited appearance by Adam West in his movie debut. 


Review: I came across Voodoo Island on Amazon Prime a few weeks ago but hadn't watched it because, despite starring one of my favorite horror movie actors, I had a lot of doubts about it. However, I decided to finally give it a chance this morning and, after seeing it, will admit it was slightly better than expected albeit nothing overly special either.

I did find I liked the premise of the movie, with Knight (Karloff) trying to disprove the Voodoo rumors rather than (like too many movies) immediately accept everything as fact. This skepticism, along with many of the other things that happen early on having possible non-magical explanations, did at least leave a door open as far as a surprise twist and made the reactions to some of the later events more believable.

My biggest problem with this movie though is the execution. For a 76-minute horror movie, there really isn't a whole lot that happens, at least not until the last 15 minutes or so. In fact (and I didn't actually time this), I think they might have spent almost as time trying to figure out what was wrong with the radio as they did exploring the supposedly cursed island the movie is named after. Frankly, I almost turned it off during the radio scene because hearing them repeat the same phrase over and over again was getting kind of irritating first thing in the morning.

I also found it a bit amusing that Knight's assistant, Sarah Adams (Tyler) was being played off as being too much of a tomboy at times, even going as far as her being told by another woman how she needed to change her hair, makeup and eyebrows. Yeah, I'm sorry, I just didn't see it. In real life, she would have been fighting off those love-starved island guys regardless of how she dressed and how "old" her hairstyle was.

Final Opinion: The movie does have some good things going for it as far as the plot goes but the filmmakers spent way too much time on the build-up and not enough time trying to frighten people. The end result is a horror movie that is about as scary as the Voodoo episode of Gilligan's Island.

My Grade: C

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Here are some reviews of other movies from 1957:

Movie Review: 3:10 to Yuma (1957)

Movie Review: Voodoo Woman (1957)

Movie Review: The Unholy Wife (1957)

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