soulexpress On the Caribbean island of Korbai, the natives perform animal and human sacrifices under the mysterious voodoo priest, Damballah. When a new law-enforcement official, Captain Labesch (Rafael Bertrand), arrives, he is outraged that the police have turned a blind eye to the cult's murderous ways. Determined to bring about law and order, Labesch seeks the aid of Carl Van Molder (Boris Karloff), a wealthy and powerful landowner who advises the captain against interfering with native customs. When he ignores Van Molder's advice, policemen start turning up dead, killed by female zombies under the command of the sultry priestess Kalia (Tongolele) and a grinning, maniacal dwarf (Santonon) in sunglasses. There's also a romantic sub-plot involving Labesch's assistant, Lt. Wilhelm (Carlos East), and Van Molder's visiting niece, Annabella (Julissa), who is a proud member of the Anti-Saloon League.Karloff looks like death warmed over but is reasonably effective as the oily Van Molder. Tongolele drips with diabolical sensuality as the snake-handling voodoo priestess; the close-ups of her eyes are particularly stunning. The highly attractive Julissa is less than believable as the chaste and tee-totaling Annabella; her most effective scene is a fevered-dream sequence in which Annabella has lesbian sex with her doppelganger. Rafael Bernard chews the scenery as the self-righteous, tunnel-visioned Captain Labesch. Carlos East is barely there as the handsome, if hard-drinking, Lt. Wilhelm.The most striking performance is the dwarf Santonon's. Whether flogging an errant zombie, laughing insanely as he beheads a chicken, helping Kalia perform a ritual to manipulate Annabella's dreams, or bleeding to death after he is repeatedly slashed with a machete, Santonon fully owns each of his scenes. I can't say that his performance is good, but it damned sure stayed with me!SNAKE PEOPLE is by no means a great horror film, but I found it entertaining—even if it didn't take me long to figure out who Damballah was; even if the horrible dialogue sounds even worse when dubbed from Spanish to English; and even if the ending was too damned abrupt. The best scenes are mainly of the snake-dancers and the voodoo rituals.My favorite line of dialogue, courtesy of Annabella: "Modern science has proved that alcohol is responsible for 99.2% of all the world's sins!" (Yeah, the same way it proved that vaccines are responsible for autism.)

oulamies Yes, a slow, dead movie. The makers of this film messed up storytelling so bad, I can't even articulate what actually happened in it. I remember a weird laughing midget, I remember life-lasting dancing scenes with snakes, I remember old Boris Karloff mumbling something, I recall long staring shots, but not much anything in between. Some moments are visually quite pleasing, but damn, there's no point to anything. I have no idea who the characters are, what they want and why they want it. But I don't care about finding out any of that, because the character work and the long sleep-inducing shots of some rednecks trying to score with the stiff "zombie" women just paralyze me mentally.The idea of a voodoo zombie cult is awesome, but I don't know how they managed to go this dull with it. The zombies look like normal people just with a faint blue skin tone, and they're not creepy at all. Is Snake People supposed to be a horror movie? It sure as hell makes no effort trying to shock or creep you out in any way.I'm not against slow horror movies, as long as they have a good atmosphere and an interesting story. This film has nothing. Looking at a dead body is more vivid than watching this movie. I propose watching a better voodoo zombie movie, like "Plague of the Zombie" by Hammer.

crystalart Ever since I was a kid, Boris Karloff has personified horror for me.That's why I spend time on line looking for his films to watch.I stumbled on this one tonight and decided to give it 30 minutes. That's about how long it takes to decide if any movie is worth watching, I think.Turns out it was one of his last films, when he was quite ill.It's cheesy to the point of having a strong aroma.It's not so much horrible (scary) as it is a visual combination of semi-shocking images, for example, a midget cutting the head off a chicken.It's certainly not for everyone, but you know who you are.

The_Void I had a funny feeling that this film was going to be rubbish, and rather unsurprisingly; I was absolutely right. The Snake People is cheap and nasty; and not nasty in the good sense of the word, I mean nasty as in fiendishly boring and devoid of any reason for watching. The plot is highly unoriginal and focuses on something to do with voodoo and snakes. Many a good horror film has been based on a plot like this; but The Snake People makes no attempt to make the proceedings interesting, and consequently we end up with a dull, plodding film that made me wish I hadn't started watching it. Of course, the only reason this film is even remembered at all these days is down to the fact that it stars the late great Boris Karloff. Apparently, Karloff died before this was released and it's probably a good job too, as I'm sure the great horror master would not have been too fussed with how he's used here! Sometimes with crap films like this, you can expect some consolation from things like blood and nudity; but The Snake People doesn't even provide that small pittance. Overall, this is one of a (thankfully) small number of films that I really wish I hadn't bothered with - give this one a miss!