FORMAT: DVD (REWATCH)
ORIGINAL REVIEW:
(As published in by book, Bloody Book of Horror)
Whenever a hot dame stops into creepy George Zucco’s gas station, he calls ahead to simpleton John Carradine to put up a fake detour sign further on down the road. When she stops, Carradine kidnaps her and takes her to his boss, Bela Lugosi. You see, Bela has been keeping his dead wife hanging around the house for twenty years and uses the hot women he kidnaps to bring her back to life through voodoo rituals. A Hollywood screenwriter comes looking for the latest kidnap victim and winds up getting plenty of ideas for his latest picture.
Bela, sporting a serious goatee, is a lot of fun to watch. Even though the budget was obviously low, he is totally invested here. Like his role in Dracula, he keeps a harem full of women in flimsy negligees and looks deep into their eyes in scary close-ups. Carradine and Zucco are a hoot too. The scenes of Zucco wearing a hilarious tribal headdress while Carradine plays the bongos are priceless.
Voodoo Man was a Monogram cheapie produced by Sam Katzman. Since it features a hero that’s a Hollywood screenwriter, we get some pretty funny in-jokes along the way. (He calls his boss “SK”.) In the end, he turns his experiences into a screenplay. When the producer asks him who should star in the film, he quips, “Why don’t you get Bela Lugosi? It’s right up his alley!”
Brilliant.
The film is only an hour long, so it moves along at a snappy pace. Directed by William “One Shot” Beaudine, Voodoo Man is much more atmospheric than the typical Monogram horror flick. Although it's not as nutty as The Devil Bat or as fun as The Corpse Vanishes, it is an enormously entertaining Lugosi romp. If you’re as big of a Lugosi fan as I am, you never under any circumstance pass up a chance to see Bela in a goatee hypnotizing women and fiddling around with mad scientist lab equipment.
One interesting thing about Voodoo Man is that it almost feels like the inspiration for Manos: The Hands of Fate. There is a scene where Carradine tries to hit on one of “The Master’s” brides, just like Torgo. Lugosi even wears a cloak that has a hand pattern sewed onto it!
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