Isle of the Snake People (1971)

When "Captain Labesch" (Rafael Bertrand) arrives on a remote island under French colonial rule he is determined to put an end to the barbaric practices involved in voodoo rituals. With him is a naive young woman named "Anabella Vandenberg" (Julissa) who wants to rid the world of alcohol. To aid her in this mission she has come to the island to enlist the help of her rich uncle "Carl van Molder" (Boris Karloff) who owns a large plantation further inland. But what neither Captain Labesch nor Anabella realize is just how powerful the people who practice voodoo really are and that they are quite willing to use whatever means are at their disposal to continue their blood-thirsty rites. Anyway, rather than detailing the entire story and possibly spoiling the movie for those who haven't seen it I will just say that this turned out to be a bit better than I expected. Admittedly, the action was a bit bland but the overall story was decent enough and the dancing of Yolanda Montes (as the voodoo priestess "Kalea") certainly didn't hurt the film in any way. Now, that is not to say that this movie is great by any means. But I didn't think it was that bad either. That said, I give it an average rating.

It is entirely worth watching for the performance of Santanón, a Mexican dwarf actor who is the voodoo priest. Capering about with a maniacal grin, in a top hat and bizarre costume, whipping the dancing girls, invoking Papa Labas (or one of those voodoo gods), his performance is riveting. I kept rewinding the film to watch him. I'm still not sure if it was a good performance, but it was a performance unlike any I've seen before and oddly convincing. The actor seemed to be having a great time with it, and were the whole movie his, it'd be one of my favorite cult films.Unfortunately, there's a bunch of other stuff wasting time in this film, a ridiculous police department plot, a temperance gal and her colonialist uncle (Karloff, forgettable), and too much that's non- voodoo ritual.

This thing deserves a better reputation. True, it has its down side. The photographic technique isn't the best. Quickly panning in and out, jerking the camera around, these are things I think directors do when they don't know what else to do. Lack of imagination excused by low budget. Aside from that it has lots of pluses. Karloff is good, as always. The rest of the cast play their parts very well. Two in particular come across perfectly and so help make this a good flick. Carlos (Charles) East does well as Wilhem, making the character very natural and hence believable. But, my opinion, the best player of them all? Yolanda Montes, billed as Tongolele, as Kalea. With her sex appeal and that budding "Bride of Frankenstien" hairdo shes dead on as the Voodoo priestess. And with sex appeal in mind, I noticed a pronounced current of underlying sexuality that flows nowhere. But things like that help pull 'em in when you show the promos. This isn't a bad movie. For a B flick its OK.

What a waste of perfectly good celluloid. There are times when I thought this was a comedy. The dwarf's scenes are really campy. I wish he had had a little more to do. Visually, it's a whole lot of silly images going nowhere. The girl is pretty in a sort of maternal way. The natives are attractive and dance well. Voodoo people are very hard on chickens, always have been. Other than finding out what is going on, we aren't very privy to what is going on. Once the young woman arrives, we know that if there is going to be a sacrifice, she's going to be it. She is disappointing in that she comes on so strong at the beginning and then lets go of her whole temperance thing. We have the buffoonish police captain whom no one takes seriously. Anyway, there are some cool snakes, a few dances, some drums. Instead of this, watch some of those old Lugosi movies and their ilk. They really created the zombie which we have grown to love.