Complete Monster: Murder Legendre is an evil voodoo practitioner who runs his sugar plantation with the zombies who are corpses of former rivals or those who got in his way. When he becomes obsessed with the heroine Madeleine, Legendre ostensibly promises her admirer to help win her own by poisoning her and turning her into a zombie, before poisoning him as well and coldly rejecting his plea for help. When her fiancee shows up to save her, Legendre attempts to have him murdered, intending to claim Madeleine as a mindless shell of herself as he has done to so many others.
Vindicated by History: A little bit. When the film was originally released, critics universally loathed it (some calling it the worst movie of 1932), it only made decent money, and it was more or less forgotten after its first run had finished. It experienced a bit of a revival once it was released on video in the 80's, and it's now a minor Cult Classic (it did have a band named for it, after all!) and critics, though still disparaging the acting, tend to be more appreciative of its smart cinematography and spooky atmosphere.
