I Eat Your Skin is a 1970 American Sci-Fi Horror Jungle Opera film.
Tom Harris is an author who hasn't submitted anything in several months. To get his creative juices flowing, his agent sends him to a Caribbean island known for voodoo and beautiful women. As Tom explores the island, he discovers something far more interesting. A voodoo cult is experimenting on the natives, scheming to make them into a zombie army to Take Over the World!
It's best known for being released as a double feature with I Drink Your Blood.
This film contains examples of:
- The '60s: The film was shot entirely in Florida in 1964 under the title Caribbean Adventure to disguise from potential investors the fact that it was a zombie film.
- Ambiguously Gay: Duncan, a man who dresses quite stylishly, speaks in a high pitched voice, and is close friends with Tom. Also, despite being affectionate towards his wife Coral and spoiling her with luxuries, at one point Duncan is hesitant to go to bed with his wife Coral as he preferred to just get drunk for that evening.
- And I Must Scream: The girl being sacrificed for the voodoo ritual in the film's opening seems to be aware of what is happening to her but is powerless to stop it.
- And Your Little Dog, Too!: Charles Bentley threatened to kill Janine unless Dr. August Biladeau continued to work on the zombies for him.
- Big Bad: Charles Bentley, master of the zombie hordes.
- Bitch Slap: Dr. Biladeau slaps his daughter Janine across the face as he orders her to leave the laboratory and the island at once.
- Book Ends: The film opens up with Tom telling the women gathered around him one of his novel stories at the swimming pool and ends with Tom doing the same thing before splashing around playfully in the swimming pool with his love interest Janine.
- Chekhov's Gun: The flare gun. Tom uses it to shoot one of the voodoo cultists as he and the group escape.
- Crazy Jealous Guy: Tom meets the angry husband of the woman he was kissing at the swimming pool and manages to escape him.
- Cure for Cancer: The zombies were created during an attempt to find this. As Dr. August Biladeau explains while dying, he was getting nowhere with the injections of the animals, so he started using the natives as human guinea pigs. But instead of getting closer to a cure for cancer, the bombarded snake venom was sending up a curious reaction into the body tissues — making the subject devoid of will. A human vegetable. Three natives died because of Dr. Biladeau's futile attempts. And when Dr. Bentley found the results of Dr. Biladeau's experiments, Bentley became obsessed with the idea of creating an army of the undead. And Dr. Bentley threatened to expose Dr. Biladeau to the authorities unless he helped him with his mad scheme.
- Damsel in Distress: Coral and Janine get kidnapped and held captive for a voodoo sacrifice ritual. Luckily, they get rescued by Tom and Duncan.
- Deadly Euphemism: Fernando warns Janine about Papa Neybo, saying he wants to make her "the goat without horns".
- Distracted by the Sexy: Tom is so busy looking at Janine skinny-dipping that he just barely notices one of the island zombies creeping close by.
- Deus Sex Machina: One of the reasons Tom sleeps with Janine is so that she wouldn't be sacrificed as a virgin for a voodoo ritual. Unfortunately, Janine still gets kidnapped and prepared for a sacrifice.
- Domestic Abuse: The husband inflicts physical abuse on his wife after catching her cheating with Tom and he tries to kill Tom too. All played for laughs.
- Event Title: The film mostly is centered on the ritual virgin sacrifices performed by the voodoo cultists on an island that crawling with zombies and a mad scientist.
- Fan Disservice: The film opens with an extended sequence of a bikini-clad woman dancing seductively and then subsequently being murdered for a voodoo ritual sacrifice.
- Fanservice Extra: All the bikini clad women gathered around Tom to listen to his stories.
- Gory Deadly Overkill Title of Fatal Death: The film's title I Eat Your Skin. Which is gory and malicious as it sounds given that it is about zombies and voodoo ritual sacrifices.
- Gory Discretion Shot: The camera cuts away to the opening title sequence as a voodoo cultists behead a girl being sacrificed for a voodoo ritual.
- He Knows Too Much: Fernando gets killed by the voodoo cultists after warning Tom and Janine about their evil plans.
- Hollywood Voodoo: The Big Bad puts on a mask and convinces the local natives to start a Human Sacrifice happy voodoo cult, with his zombies as their enforcers.
- Inappropriate Hunger: Upon crash landing, Coral asks Tom to find her a banana or a coconut or something. She says she gets hungry with excitement.
- It's Personal: A non-virginal like Janine being sacrificed for a voodoo ritual when the requirements specifically call for a virgin woman seems quite personal. Bentley attempting to kill Janine just to keep Dr. Biladeau working on his zombies proves to be this.
- Instant Seduction: Tom is able to seduce various women at the swimming pool, and one married woman into kissing him, just by telling one of his stories from his prized novels.
- Ms. Fanservice: Janine swimming nude in the island waters.
- Most Writers Are Writers: Tom Harris is a writer of adventure novels. In fact, he only got into the mess he did because his agent sent him to the island to gain inspiration for a new book.
- Nature Adores a Virgin: Once Tom learns of how the voodoo sacrifice rituals work and why would they want with Janine, he makes sure to take care of Janine's virgin problem to prevent her from being sacrificed.
- Non-Indicative Name: Nobody's skin gets eaten.
- No-Sell: Tom fires four bullets into one of the zombies to no effect.
- O.O.C. Is Serious Business: Tom and Janine notices how angry and hostile Dr. Biladeau is when he orders them to leave at once, and Janine notes that she's never seen her father act like this before.
- Off with His Head!: One zombie attacks Tom and decapitates the fisherman's head.
- Our Zombies Are Different: These are bug-eyed men mind-controlled by irradiated snake venom.
- Redemption Equals Death: Dr. Biladeau, creator of the zombies, saves Tom and his daughter from his boss, and helps blow the entire operation to Hell, but is mortally wounded in the process.
- Sexy Discretion Shot: The scene cuts away to the window curtains blowing as Tom and Janine have sex for the first time.
- Stepford Suburbia: As Coral and Duncan admire the tropical sunset on Voodoo Island, Tom warns them that not all is as lovely as it seems.
- Stuff Blowing Up: A zombie walks toward the plane carrying a box of dynamite, causing the plane to explode and killing Eduardo the pilot inside. Later, Dr. August Biladeau rigs the science experiment machinery in his laboratory to blow up the entire island and stop Charles Bentley's plan for world domination once and for all.
- Suspiciously Specific Denial:
- Dr. Charles Bentley denies any sort of unusual voodoo sacrifice activity going about on the island when confronted by Tom about it. But after Janine is attacked and nearly kidnapped by zombies, Bentley caves and reads to Tom a passage describing the island native's voodoo ritual sacrifices requiring a virgin and explain what is happening.
- Tom asks the housekeeper Juarita about voodoo drums and human sacrifice, but she is a member of the voodoo cult and feigns ignorance.
- Virgin in a White Dress: Janine is wearing a white nightgown as she loses her virginity to Tom.
- Virgin Power: A virgin woman is most requested for the voodoo sacrifice rituals. Janine is chosen for an upcoming human voodoo sacrifice due to her pure virginity and is hunted down and nearly kidnapped by zombies many times.
- Virgin Sacrifice: One of the most important requirements for the voodoo sacrifice rituals to work is having a virgin women be used for the sacrifice. Later, they specifically request a blonde virgin woman for the ritual to work i.e. Janine.
- Wham Shot: One of the voodoo ritual sacrifice cultists is stabbed and his mask falls off upon dying, revealing him to be Charles Bentley all along.
- What Happened to the Mouse?: Coral's prized pet poodles aren't seen again for the remainder of the film after the group takes residence in the island's cabin.
- Weaksauce Weakness: Bullets have no effect on the island zombies. However, fire can temporarily stun or incapacitate them.
