Hoodoo for Voodoo (2008)
Review by The Fiend of Grue
At a concert that a local radio station is throwing, called Hoodoo For Voodoo, three lucky people win a trip to New Orleans to party down at Mardi Gras. All three winners are allowed to bring one guest of their own and once in New Orleans, the vacationers attend what is being touted as an authentic voodoo ritual, but it’s really nothing more than a ploy to sell shirts to tourists and make money.
That night, some of the members of the voodoo fakers are murdered and the police aren’t able to come up with many leads but immediately suspect the vacationers since they were at the performance the night before. Not able to nail anything to them, the police leave and the relatively unaffected travelers continue to enjoy their trip but soon even more people begin to die and they are quickly thrust into a very real voodoo hell. Being perturbed by the fakers, a real voodoo priest ends up being the one doing the killings and soon he begins to use the innocent vacationers by putting them under his spell to do his bidding. One by one they fall victim to the evil priest in what just might be the perfect plan to succeed.
Hoodoo For Voodoo was shot in 2005, in New Orleans, right before Hurricane Katrina changed the entire landscape there. Director Steven Shea does a really good job at capturing the swampy vibe and feel of the town and manages to bring a authentic feeling of a voodoo presence to the screen. From the town’s old buildings, to the ancient graveyards, Steven Shea lensed the perfect surroundings for a tale of voodoo.
This film has a couple of brilliant cameos in store for the audience. A trio of scream queens show up in the form of Debbie Rochon as a ticket taker at the fake voodoo show, Linnea Quigley as the fake priestess and the newer scream beauty Tiffany Shepis as a lesbian performer for Linnea’s crew (and for all of you pervs out there, she has a smoking hot sex scene that is nearly X-rated!). Lloyd Kaufman also shows up as the character Crackhead Charlie, in a very short but sweet Mardi Gras cameo. The rest of the cast is full of no names who lack talent next to these seasoned veterans. They all do a decent job with none of them being horrible on screen, but next to Linnea Quigley – who gets the most screen time out of the veterans – they pale in comparison and come off as being a little more than green.
I realize there are monetary restrictions in low budget affairs such as this but you would think the sound in the film could at least be mixed evenly! The music was extremely loud, much higher in the mix than the dialog parts throughout the film, so I literally had to sit there with the volume controls and turn the sound up and down for the whole movie which became quite annoying. Whoever did the sound mix on this movie should be fired! Pronto!
Typically I don’t like ska music but I must say that the ska laced theme track to this movie caught my attention and is still stuck in my head. Really, the entire soundtrack was impressive with a nice blend of original music that fit well into the film.
Amateur? In many ways, yes, but this film could have an audience if distributed properly. There’s nothing surprising or groundbreaking here and the story is easy to decipher and figure out exactly where it’s going pretty much from the get go, but this was a fun movie nonetheless. There’s a charm to Hoodoo For Voodoo that makes it work and there are people out there that would enjoy this.
Check it out!
Available on Amazon
Watch the Hoodoo for Voodoo trailer:
Popularity: 4% [?]
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