I Eat Your Skin (1971) User Reviews

I Eat Your Lunch

[Steve_Nyland · 4/10 · 19 January 2010]

Pretty slick little number here, a way low budget zombie voodoo potboiler filmed on the quick in Florida at the height of the early James Bond craze. Expect lots of palm trees, swept back wayfarer sunglasses, a big brassy orchestra with twangy guitars + bongo drums, boozy bimbos swooning by the pool, and some sort of novel mode of transportation, in this case an airplane that is destroyed in the movie's biggest laugh.

The film concerns itself with a swinging playboy writer who is dispatched to darkest Key West to get to the bottom of some wacky voodoo cult and meets a couple of decent looking dames between stops for cocktails. The natives use a powerful narcotic which transforms them into the living dead and explains the jungle being just a mess after all this time. The damndest thing is that Carey Grant would have felt right at home in this movie, even with the ping pong ball zombie monster makeup.

The movie is awful for sure but it works in some miraculous way, partly due to the fact that it was aware it was an awful movie employing awful actors, using awful cinematography, awful music, and awful script, etc. The good news is that everybody participating was apparently briefed before hand lest any sort of sweeping performances or actual cinematic artfulness sneak past the dime store tiki torches, wet bars, and matching salt + pepper shakers. Some good one liners though, I guess that's harmless enough to allow without tempting anybody to take it too seriously. Then again with a title like that, who can?

It's kitsch, bounding with energy and some decent smarmy humor that will either get on your nerves or catch you with a belly laugh when you aren't expecting one. I like another reader's comment when writing that they had enjoyed this film more than the three A list big budget event films they rented at a Blockbuster: PRECISELY! Yes, that's the spirit! They were able to relax and just watch this god awful no-name movie for what it was -- rather than being primed to have the world saved or the universe explained by Leonardo di Caprio -- and ended up having a pretty good time. Caught them by surprise probably. You can buy it on DVD for a dollar, probably less, and keep it for your very own. Try it.

4/10

The hands of Haast.

[brilund · 4/10 · 28 May 2019]

On all the scenes with the very hairy arms and hands feeding and handling the venonous snakes were filmed at the Miami Serpentarium, those hands belonged to the late William Haast, I'm surprised that wasn't mentioned in the Trivia section. I believe that Mr Haast passed away at over 100 years old in spite of dozens of venomous bites that would have killed an Elephant.

Odd Zombie Film - But Not All That Bad

[Rainey-Dawn · 4/10 · 16 October 2016]

What can I say about this one? It's odd - it uses snake venom modified to create the zombies. The natives believe in human sacrifice but it has to be a blonde virgin female. The movie really is nothing new as far as your average classic zombie movies go but adds its own twist like most all of them do - and it's kind of an odd one.

If you like the older style of zombie films then this one is just "ok" to watch - it's nothing special but not a complete snooze to watch either. Another slightly less than a middle of the road production.

I like the dancers in the film, in fact the scenes of the voodoo priest and his group are the best parts of this film to me. The rest of the film is meh! The acting is lacking but tolerable to watch. And the story, again, is just so-so. Watchable zombie film.

4/10

I love this flick.

[moycon · 3 August 2004]

Del Tenney's I Eat Your Skin was filmed in Florida in 1964, under the working title Zombies. Alot of films were made at this time to cash in on the James Bond craze, Like this one. The opening and closing scenes are filmed at Miami's Fountainbleu Hotel, the same hotel where a few scenes of Goldfinger take place. This movie was originally titled Voodoo Blood Bath, but Tenney couldn't find a distributor and didn't have another feature to release along with it for a drive-in double feature. The movie sat on the shelf for years until, in 1971, producer Jerry Gross began searching for a film to release along with his I Drink Your Blood. Gross bought the rights for Tenney's film and retitled it. All of this explains why there is no skin eating in I Eat Your Skin.

I've seen this movie at least a dozen times. This is definately one of those, so bad it's good spook movies. The makeup effects, although cheap, are at the least memorable and not just grease-paint. The acting is also memorable, if only because it's so bad. The Uber macho-ism of lead character Tom Harris (played by a mostly shirtless William Joyce) will make you laugh out loud. I cannot recommend this movie enough. I was more entertained by this flick than the last 3 big budgeted movies I rented from Blockbusters!

Zombies From Snake Venom, Who'd A Thunk It?

[bkoganbing · 2/10 · 3 July 2011]

I Eat Your Skin finds novelist William Joyce eating up his advance money without turning out any pages of his next potboiler novel. So his publisher Dan Stapleton says he knows of a great Caribbean island where the natives do do their voodoo real well and Joyce might get some local color there. So Joyce heads off with Stapleton and Stapleton's brassy wife Betty Hyatt Linton to an island where Walter Coy is doing some Dr. Moreau like experiments on the natives as the guest of plantation owner and medical doctor Robert Stanton and his daughter Heather Hewitt.

This all starts as looking for a cure for cancer using snake venom and who in the world suggested that line of research? Pretty soon these grotesque looking zombies get real restless and everyone has to abandon the island if they can.

Some nice calypso music is the best thing that I Eat Your Skin has going for it. It's bad, but it's deliciously campy bad and some folks have a taste for that sort of thing.

Not quite as horrible as the title would suggest....though it IS horrible!

[planktonrules · 2/10 · 7 August 2008]

Some folks fly to a small island in the Caribbean. Once they arrive, they find that there are murderous zombies roaming about as well as locals who are all members of a voodoo cult. In addition, there's a cancer researcher who is doing work with irradiated snake venom who seems a bit oblivious to the fact that the locals are into human sacrifice. Sounds like a nice place, huh?!

This is one of many horribly low budget horror films I have seen in my lifetime and the biggest thing that sets it apart is the title. After all, the release title "I EAT YOUR SKIN" sounds amazingly exploitative and sick. However, despite a promoter changing its title, the film itself is amazingly conventional--and it's just another grade-Z schlock horror film--complete with bad acting, camera work, makeup, and the works! While it's very bad, it isn't quite bad enough to be fun to watch and make fun of the film. No,...it's just bad!

A bit of enjoyable schlock from Del Tenney

[Red-Barracuda · 5/10 · 14 June 2015]

This film was originally made in 1964 under the title 'Zombies', yet it was never actually released and remained this way until 1971 when producer Jerry Gross picked it up and retitled it to 'I Eat Your Skin' to make it into a neat double-bill pairing with I Drink Your Blood (1970). Needless to say, the new title bears absolutely no relevance to the actual content of the film. While this is certainly a low budget and clunky film, it really is nowhere near bad enough to have remained on a shelf for so many years. In fact, it has some good things about it and is an interesting early example of the zombie film.

It's set on a tropical island in the Caribbean where a travelling writer happens upon zombies.

The undead themselves are quite distinctive looking, even if the make-up is of the bargain basement variety. But at least the film-makers have made an effort, rather than go with no make-up at all. Anyway, these creatures roam the island causing perturbation and despair, one of them even lops a poor unfortunate's head off with a machete. This gore moment is in keeping with the content of the two other films its director Del Tenney also made in 1964, namely The Curse of the Living Corpse and The Horror of Party Beach, both of which contained moments of schlocky bloody violence. All three were probably surfing on the wave created by the previous year's first splatter movie Blood Feast (1963), although admittedly Tenney's black and white movies were much less gory but nevertheless were coming from a similar place for sure. On the whole, I Eat Your Skin is an entertaining enough bit of horror nonsense.

Zombies and a Damsel In Distress

[Uriah43 · 5/10 · 3 January 2013]

Filmed in black and white with a very low budget this movie obviously won't suit everyone's taste. Personally, I enjoyed it because it wasn't trying to be one of those "so bad it's good" zombie movies that seem to crop up just about everywhere these days. In this particular film, "Dr Biladeau" (Robert Stanton) is looking for a cure for cancer and he chooses to set up his lab on "Voodoo Island" which is located somewhere in the Caribbean. Meanwhile, a novelist named "Tom Harris" (William Joyce) is in search of new ideas for his next book and is convinced by his agent "Duncan Fairchild" (Dan Stapleton) to accompany him and his wife "Carol Fairchild" to this island. When they arrive a zombie attempts to kill Tom Harris but is chased away just in the nick of time. Later, zombies also try to capture a beautiful blonde virgin named "Jeannie Biladeau" (Heather Hewitt) for a sacrifice in a voodoo ceremony. At any rate, with a plot like that does it really matter that the special effects are bad or the script was awful? Hey, it's a campy late-50's horror movie with zombies and a damsel in distress. What's not to like? Just be advised that these zombies are the "pre-Romero" sort who don't eat human flesh. Although, why anyone would think they would is another question altogether.

Skin a ma rinky dinky dink

[Hitchcoc · 3/10 · 19 December 2006]

In an obtuse way, it was a bit entertaining. There's this island where the brave pilot goes for whatever reason. On the island are bug eyed zombies and people practicing voodoo. There is a potential cure for cancer that has gone amiss. The natives need a young blonde to sacrifice in order to get their skin cured. No dermatologists on the island. The whole thing is preposterous. There is a lot of dancing and gyrating, which seems to happen quite a bit in zombie movies. These scientists have this modern laboratory in the middle of all this, and the blonde girl's father is in the middle of the whole thing. Zombies wander all over the place, attack and kill. There's one scene where a man is decapitated, and because he seems to be Hispanic or some kind of islander, it's as if someone broke their bicycle. They don't even bother with his body. He is mentioned once later, but it doesn't matter. He was expendable. The main character, who his with him, doesn't even look down at him. Oh, yes, there is no skin eating going on, making this a bad skin eating movie.

DEL TENNEY, PEOPLE--What did you expect?

[cpetr13 · 5/10 · 23 December 2005]

I don't think this movie is anywhere near as abysmal as most people think it is, when viewed in context of its time. William Joyce may be a sleazy, bare-chested, pompous ass, but that never stopped 007. And certainly the women in this film are no more irritating or useless than most "bond girls". Sorry if you're a fan of Bond movies but any franchise that so criminally wastes performers like Diana Rigg and Donald Pleasance doesn't rank high in my estimation.

The plot is pretty standard and typical drive-in fare. It must be noted that this appeared with its "twin (I Drink Your Blood) not just in drive ins but in a few "all-night spook shows", which were a combination of cheap thrills and laughs, and for this venue the movie was perfect.

Ultimately, the flaws being noted for this movie reflect the influence of the director, not the cast.

Quite bad, yet surprisingly likable (how do they do it!)

[Idiot-Deluxe · 2/10 · 7 May 2019]

Zombie also known as "I Eat Your Skin" is a low-budget, black and white, not-so-spectacular zombie-trudge from the mid-60's and though this movie bad in more ways than not, it's also quite entertaining at the same time, in fact much more so then it has a right to, so it's not all bad.

Things get started at the hotel in Miami that you see in the beginning of Goldfinger, where our handsome square-jawed hero (a romance novelist by trade) is entertaining bikini babes by the pool when suddenly an irate husband, quite humorously, interrupts their party. Exit hotel. Then after a short cab ride and a long flight we crash-land on the exotic shores of Voodoo Island! The cast of characters include the hero/romance novelist, some old guy (a literary agent or publisher or whatever) his blonde bimbo wife, a pair of toy dogs and the pilot. From this point on the movie is a trade-off between tropical settings, cheap sets and some of the lamest and tamest zombies ever put to screen and you know what - it's really all just fun and games.

What of the plot? The plot is very cleverly interwoven and tells an intricate tale, in fact it's so clever the whole film has a very pronounced Scooby-Doo'ish quality to it, from beginning to end they both boast a very similar feel and overall sensibility, plus it has that characteristic level of complexity that we're all so familiar with. "Oh! So heeeeee was the bad guy all along!". But it's not all bad, I like Scooby, maybe that's why this is so fun and likable. Also it must be said that there is some great calypso music to be heard here and the action scenes (if that's what you want to call them) are punctuated by a very effective combination of fuzz-tone guitar and primitive percussion, easily the best aspect of Zombie and I wish I had it on CD.

After watching it twice I can say that Zombie does modestly exceed my expectations in some respects, there's the aforementioned quality of it's music, plus it's cinematography is better than one would expect from something as obscure and forgotten as this. Also the films greyscale looks spot-on and is beautifully preserved in almost every shot which again is impressive considering the fact that this is just a crappy low-budget black and white movie from the 60's. And another thing, the sets, although they are indeed cheap looking they aren't anywhere near as bad as what you'd see, in say for instance an Ed Wood movie. No, this isn't quite on an Ed Wood level of badness, it's one step above and for that I'm grateful. I could say more, but I won't. Watch it. Have fun.

Conclusion: If there's on thing that everyone can agree upon it's the fact that Zombie is one laughably goofy movie. So bad movies CAN be good, in a way.....

Lastly, I couldn't recommend more highly that you see the Rifftrax version of Zombie - as it's funnier yet.

I REALIZE YOU ARE JUST TRYING TO HELP

[nogodnomasters · 10/10 · 8 May 2019]

This is a major league cheese fest. I am not sure where the title comes from, it has nothing to do with the plot. If you read the by-line for the film, it is a spoiler. We actually don't find out exactly what is going on until the dying breath of Dr. Bentley (Walter Coy). Oops. Tom Harris (William Joyce) writes women's romance novels which sound all the same. He manages a slap stick escape from an irate husband as his agent (Dan Stapleton) whisks him away to "Voodoo Island" where he can get ideas for his next novel. The agent's wife (Betty Hyatt Linton) is stereotypical New Yorker with a heavy accent. It is a treat every time she talks.

We know who the zombie leader is, because he wears a top hat, smokes a cigar, and is called "Papa." This gem was written, produced, and directed by Del Tenney who may have been influenced by his own film, "The Horror of Party Beach."

I found this to be an enjoyable cult film.

Neat little jungle adventure with added zombies (and they look really cool)

[Leofwine_draca · 6/10 · 11 March 2017]

I EAT YOUR SKIN is a neat little zombie film, shot in 1964 (so we get the old-fashioned zombies here, not the Romero type) but not released until seven years later. The title makes it sound like a video nasty but in fact it's a largely tame black and white jungle adventure movie with much in common with the films made in the 1940s.

The plot sees a group of characters heading into the deepest jungle (actually a Floridian island) and soon discovering that the place is awash with zombies that have been created by a misguided scientist's experiments. The film has a definite swinging sixties vibe to it with a playboy hero and lots of good-natured flirtation and dialogue between the characters.

The zombies themselves are really cool-looking with some great make up. They look like they're suffering from bad psoriasis with bug eyes to boot and scenes of them stalking their victims through the jungle have a genuine frisson of excitement to them. It's not a gory film at all, even though there's a brief beheading, and at times it gets bogged down in stock native ritual padding. Otherwise it's a fun little effort and one for the fans.

Leave it on the shelf

[Zeegrade · 2/10 · 30 January 2009]

William Joyce is Tom Harris a womanizing writer that travels to Voodoo Island, no hint there, to investigate a forgotten tribe who sacrifice virgins for the sake of the inflicted. This is standard sixties drive-in fare and the quality shows. The screen jumps frames like a kangaroo on steroids and some of the sound is choppy and at times inaudible. Unfortunately the sound quality remains for the lines spoken by Coral (Betty Hyatt Linton) using the most gratingly annoying voice I've heard in a film. The voodoo zombies are laughably awful and the plot surrounding their creation even worse.

I eat your skin can be summed up for me in one scene. Tom Harris and his companion are swimming up to a boat that is guarded by an evil henchman with a rifle. It doesn't seem to matter that they are making more noise than a comet hitting the earth with all of the splashing they make. Dumb henchman looks over the side of the boat out of curiosity and Tom grabs him and pulls the poor dope into the water. Next, he throws the RIFLE, into the water as well. As he and his companion climb into the boat Tom begins rummaging through equipment on the boat grabbing a flare gun to which his partner asks, "What are you going to do with that?". Tom shrugs his shoulders and replies "It's better than nothing" as the waterlogged rifle hits the riverbed. I'm going to guess this film was greatly ignored as part of the double feature and bodily orifices were vastly explored due to bored filmgoers.

Not too bad

[thecarczar · 30 November 2006]

I bought the "Elvira" version of this movie.The zombies with eyes that looked like fried sunny side up eggs were hilarious.They didn't have to spend too much on make up or clothing either.There is plenty of action combined with bad acting.The tantalizing and brief skinny dipping female in the early part made it fun to watch.Pretty racy for 1964.I also like the old airplane on the beach.What was an old horror movie with out an airplane.?The girls are pretty and they place a lot of importance on finding a blond virgin.The cheesiness of it is what makes it worth the time.I would recommend this one.Especially if you are a Baby Boomer who was raised on these stinkers.It helps if you like Elvira too.

????????

[Andy Sandfoss · 1/10 · 20 January 2000]

I never could really figure out what was supposed to be going on in this amiable little dust bunny of a film. I was glad to note in the IMDb description that the scientist was a cancer researcher. Now I know.....

I have a soft spot in my heart for this one, though I can't bring myself to rate it higher than a 1. Its utter lack of convincing characters, coupled with its lack of a coherent plot, wrecks the movie from the get-go, but who cares? I'm tempted to mark it down as a twisted black comedy. It leaves me laughing, at any rate.

i see a stinker

[vampi1960 · 1/10 · 19 August 2006]

i eat your skin(aka;voodoo blood bath)is a stinker from del Tenney who also gave us horror of party beach and curse of the living corpse. its a pitiful atomic zombie film,the zombies walk around with eyes that resemble fried eggs.the movie was released in 1971 but made in the late 1960's.on a double bill with i drink your blood.movie distributer jerry gross made that double feature happen.i eat your skin has zombies in it but they don't eat anyones skin,but they do kill.if you like so bad its good movies you won't like i eat your skin,i actually first seen this on creature features in the 70's as zombie,not to be confused by the Lucio fulci film of the same name.i eat your skin will make you sick, wasting about 80 minutes on a sinker with a cast of unknowns.William Joyce and heather Hewitt.what a mess of a movie.maybe if it was in color it would've been a little better.but i eat your skin stinks on ice.bloody awfull.1 out of 10.

Seriously bad movie...

[dwpollar · 1/10 · 5 July 2014]

1st watched 6/29/2014 -- 1 out of 10(Dir-Del Tenney): Seriously bad movie about a mad doctor inhabiting an island called Voodoo Island initially trying to use venom to cure cancer but, of course, he starts using it on the natives and they start having a bad reaction(like they turn into zombies). And of course, the voodoo group on the island wants to sacrifice blond virgins ??, and the daughter of one of the doctors just happens to be one. A hunky athletic-type writer, played by William Joyce, is asked to go to this island to break out of his writing funk -- the publisher thinking he'll get inspired by the rumors about what's going on there. The "I can do everything" hunk upon arrival decides to try and rescue everyone and make everything right as well as write his novel. There are re-used sets, acknowledgments at the beginning of the movie to the companies who did product placements, and a lame title that doesn't really pertain to anything except to shock the audience. The makeup on the zombies is bad and there is a re-used plot borrowed from movies like "The Island of Dr. Moreau" complete with a bad guy who comes across way too nice at the beginning only to quickly become evil. It's fun once in a while to watch movies like this to wonder how it actually got made, and if the makers really had any intentions to do anything worthwhile or not. At least there are a few chuckles and the hopes that this will be covered on "Mystery Science Theatre 3000" for better chuckles but other than that this movie is pretty worthless.

Not much skin eating in this one.

[Aaron1375 · 3/10 · 4 June 2020]

This film was originally titled Zombie, but had its name changed to, I Eat Your Skin so it would pair better with I Drink Your Blood. Suffice to say, the zombies present in this film are the voodoo controlled zombies and not the flesh/brain eating variety; thus, we have what I consider to be the boring zombie. The one that meanders around, not looking for skin to eat, but rather it meanders around to do its master's bidding. I prefer the Romero zombies that stumble around wanting to take a chomp out of ya as do most people as these voodoo zombies are often just not nearly as fun.

The story has a guy sitting poolside, impressing the ladies with a story from one of the novels he has written. Apparently, his publisher comes and wants him to go with him to an island, to perhaps get inspiration for his next book. The island's name...Voodoo Island! Well, they land on this island that has no runway, which makes the fact they brought a plane a bit baffling. Once on the island, the author spies an attractive blonde and a zombie! He goes to her rescue, but then goes to a local who gets decapitated by the zombie! Something is going on and the person who invited them to the island does not seem to be willing to let the guests in on it!

It might of been a pretty good film if the zombies were the flesh eating type overrunning the island, but alas, these type were not around yet when this film was made. So instead of getting lots of attacks, instead, we get ceremonies being performed that last forever and dinner parties for us to witness and a blossoming romance between the author and the local girl on the island. There are a couple of attack scenes, but nothing all that great.

So, the film has no skin eating, but a few zombies, but less the living dead and more like the slow witted servant type. They do have a bit of a distinct look to them as their skin is flayed or something and they have big eyes. They can withstand gunfire too, but a good punch to the face still knocks em out for a bit. Suffice to say, you will be wanting Romero zombies as you watch this and you will wonder what is up with the blond woman named Carl!

ZZZZZZZZZ......... (=8.

[MooCowMo · 1/10 · 14 September 1999]

Dreadful zombie bore-a-thon from Del Tenney, the man who brought the world Horror of Party Beach. A group of irritating, obnoxious people land on Voodoo Island, where they get attacked by natives covered with dried oatmeal. Painted plastic bits with holes in the center serve as laughably over-sized eyes for the zombies, who lurch around the jungle aimlessly. This flaccid feature only comes to life when the voodoo children git down and boogie - unfortunately there is quite a lot of that. Apparently some dimbulb scientist is injecting radioactive snake venom into the natives, making them into zombies (of course!), who then try to get and sacrifice his passive, useless daughter. Square-jawed Peter Bentley, our chauvinistic, sleazy hero, manages to save the day and live to ogle more women.

Re-released in 1971 as I eat Your Skin, it was tied to the equally poor I Drink Your Blood as a drive-in double-feature all over the country, where they both bombed. This movie features one of the most irritating female characters in movie history with Coral, an obnoxious boozy-floozy yenta with fiercly bleached hair and two yappy poodles. Try not to grind your teeth every time she opens her stupid mouth. Because every character in the film is either a jerk or twit, it's hard not to root for the pasty-faced, goggly-eyed zombies, who are unfortunately too slow and too stupid to be of much use. MooCow says keep these Zombies in the grave where they belong! :=8P

I Was Promised Skin Eating

[evanston_dad · 2/10 · 27 October 2010]

Sadly, no skin is eaten in "I Eat Your Skin," but that's still a much better title for this low budget stinkeroo than its alternate, "Zombies."

Filmed for what looks to be about five dollars, "Skin" tells the tale of a playboy writer who's whisked away by his agent to a jungle island where stories of strange going on abound, in the hopes that the writer will be inspired to compose his next bestseller. Once there, they find...you guessed it....freaked out zombies made so by some sort of scientific experiments being conducted by the wealthy man who lives on the island and serves as host to the writer and his posse.

The handsome but completely unknown (to me at least) actor William Joyce plays the writer and delivers some beefcake eye candy to the ladies in a couple of shirtless scenes. But there's not much of a compelling reason for the rest of us to watch, unless it's to make fun of a bad movie.

And oy vay does this movie do nothing for 1960s civil rights. All of the black people in the movie are either oogie-boogie savages, zombies, or zombie accomplices. Martin Luther King, please look the other way.

Grade: D

Boring black zombies without eyelids

[macabro357 · 2/10 · 3 August 2003]

Standard formula fare that was double-billed in the drive-ins with I DRINK YOUR BLOOD, this one isn't nearly as gross as it's title suggests. I do like the opening tune by Lon Norman & his Orchestra. It sorta reminds me of the tiki lounge music Les Baxter was famous for.

Plane carrying a writer and his mentor/publisher and his wife land on an island in order to investigate accounts of zombies and voodoo sacrifices. There are black zombies running around with rotting faces and their eyelids half eaten away, leaving their eyeballs exposed. It's pretty funny-looking.

It seems someone is creating an indestructible zombie army using a formula invented by a professor (that's being held captive on the island, along with his daughter), so they can take over the earth.

Wow! What an original plot! (sic)

(laughs)

The print the Alpha Video DVD uses is pretty bad, along with this horribly predictable film that doesn't have much going for it beyond the exotic Coral Gables scenery.

Even K. Gordon Murray films have more going for them than this one, folks.

3 out of 10 and that's being generous

Excellent music and ugly zombies. Super vintage gross-outs!

[Akzidenz_Grotesk · 10/10 · 19 December 2006]

A great late-night horror flick with action and comedy. I got it on DVD from a St. Claire 3-Disc collection called "The Living Dead".

It's a better than average directed (for a B-movie) tale with a swinging Voodoo-Lounge soundtrack, ghoulish zombies galore and a charismatic "wolf" lead character played brilliantly by the late William Joyce.

Some interesting trivia I've learned: Bill Joyce and the female lead, Heather Hewitt, had unwittingly done a scene in the water during a real life "multiple-large-sharks-spotted" scare. Director Del Tenney never told them about it when he later learned of it.

Interesting look at the cocktail culture in 1960s Miami in this one.

This movie's release-date title is "I Eat your Skin" which is a masterpiece of naming. I give it 10 stars for vintage kicks and William Joyce's cool persona! Must've been a fun actor be around.

Tasty Cinematic Junk Food

[ferbs54 · 6/10 · 18 April 2011]

Pop quiz: Which film from 1964, after a brief sequence set in the tropics and some jazzy opening credits, segues into a bird's-eye view of the pool area at the Hotel Fontainebleau, and our handsome leading man cavorting with some bikinied babes? If your answer is "Goldfinger," well, a gold star for you, I suppose, but the film I was actually referring to here in an infinitely lesser affair, Del Tenney's "I Eat Your Skin." As revealed in my bible, "The Psychotronic Encyclopedia of Film," this picture actually first saw the light of day in 1971, after going unreleased for seven years. Apparently, producer Jerry Gross needed a film to pair with his rabid-hippies classic "I Drink Your Blood," and so purchased Tenney's picture (which had previously been titled "Voodoo Blood Bath," more appropriately) and gave it a complementary moniker. Then came the poster for the double feature with the legendary caption "2 great blood-horrors to rip out your guts"! Anyway, as has been noted elsewhere, there is no eating of skin in the Tenney film whatsoever. In it, hunky-dude playboy/writer Tom Harris (played with granite-jawed machismo by William Joyce, a poor man's Sterling Hayden) is given the assignment of going to Voodoo Island in the Caribbean to do research for his next novel, and so hightails it there with his drunken agent and the agent's kooky broad of a wife. And what do they find on the island? A madman attempting to take over the world, a scientist seeking a cure for cancer by utilizing radioactive cobra venom (!), a beautiful blond hottie for Harris to seduce and conquer, a voodoo-practicing tribe, and oh...an army of rather nasty zombies!

These zombies, it should be mentioned here, are not of the George A. Romero variety; indeed, these fast-moving creatures, with horribly scabrous skin and eyes like sunny-side up eggs, would rather lop off your head with a machete than take a bite out of it. Still, they are a memorably frightening-looking bunch. Tenney's film, cheaply made as it is and shot, for the most part, in Coral Gables, FL, exudes a pulpy, Saturday matinée charm that this viewer finds kind of irresistible. The picture has any number of striking images (I love the shot of the zombie advancing toward the camera with a crate marked "Explosives") and a fairly suspenseful windup, one whose debt to another Bond film, 1962's "Dr. No," seems fairly apparent. Tenney, who not only directed this picture but also wrote and produced it, is now a very solid three for three with me; his "Horror of Party Beach" (also from 1964) and "Curse of the Living Corpse" (1963) were both also loads of fun. I don't wish to make too strong a case for "I Eat Your Skin"--the film is undeniably cinematic junk food, and as far from "art" as can be imagined--but offhand, I cannot think of a picture that would be better to watch with your favorite 12-year-old nephew. And surprise of surprises: THIS DVD, from the usually undependable folks at Alpha Video, actually looks pretty decent!

Zombies

[Scarecrow-88 · 3/10 · 14 September 2008]

Professional author, Tom Harris(William Joyce), quite the ladies' man, is commissioned by his aggravatingly persistent editor, Duncan Fairchild(Dan Stapleton), to write a piece on an island supposedly containing voodoo and zombies. When there, he falls in love with the lovely, radiant Jeannie(Heather Hewitt), the daughter of Dr. Biladeau(Robert Stanton)who is working with associate Charles Bentley(Walter Coy)in creating a cure for "the world's deadliest disease". Harris soon discovers that the island is indeed populated with tribal villagers who practice voodoo(..their dances around a campfire are showcased three different types for long periods)and zombies with glop faces and bulb eyeballs. Harris soon realizes that the villagers plan to sacrifice Jeannie, and that the zombies are actually created scientifically as a result of the experimental procedures through a snake-venom procedure on island innocents by the doctors seeking a cure that seems out of reach. Also in danger are Harris' editor Duncan and his nagging, grating wife Coral(Betty Hyatt Linton, whose voice at high screech were like nails down a chalkboard for me)along for the adventure. Harris and company will not be getting off the island easily as the villagers and their zombies(..those turned into these ghouls are actually humans without the possession of choice or will, robots used as objects of destruction)are in hot pursuit. Someone, however, is secretly calling the shots, treated as a demi-god wearing tribal gear and paint on his face and head so that he's unrecognizable, speaking orders to his voodoo lieutenant who then sends the zombies on the attack, to either harm or capture.

Poverty-row at every respect, from the cast to the make-up effects. Harris is quite a symbol of machismo, shirt unbuttoned, exposing his chest, always punching somebody out that threatens him. The sets of the laboratory is completely naked of the usual machinery one is accustomed to(..even Ed Wood's "Bride of the Monster" had more mad-scientist props than this film has)and the island setting is barely used to any effect(..the film's centers on the voodoo parties and the place of refuge and relaxation for Harris and company;until their lives are endangered, that is). The zombies do get a chance to kill a few folks, but not in the ways fans are expecting(..this was before Romero would shock the world with zombies eating the flesh of the living). There's a weak beheading and a plane is blown to smithereens by a zombie carrying dynamite walking right into a spinning propeller. Harris is a tall, handsome actor with a certain stature who had the look of male heroes at this time. Flirting with the girls in bikinis at the opening, we get an idea of how male heroes were starting to emerge thanks to Sean Connery. "I Eat Your Skin" isn't a proper title, so I just refer to it as it was initially intended, "Zombies." It's too bad that the zombies in this picture lack in the scary or creepy department(..we actually see, through the use of dissolve, how a human changes into these things). Perhaps it's Del Tenney's failure at producing an atmosphere that generates such a result regarding the zombies seeming less eerie or chilling. My copy of the film suffered from poor quality, but seeing that this movie had such little entertainment value to offer(..it seems to bring enjoyment to the hearts of fans of camp)I wasn't that disappointed.