Rating: 
Summary: It's All About the Eye Candy
Review: I don't even know where to begin. Ok, let's see...the script is bad, the acting is bad, the quality is bad, the effects are bad, and the story is bad. BUT!! The movie is great and lots of fun. The fact that makes the movie good is that it doesn't try to be good...and the fact that it's all about the eye candy.Voodoo academy is about an exclusive religous academy where it's teacher, a priest, and his female assistant try to turn each of the students into voodoo dolls. In the process of this change, however, the rest of the sleeping boys (who all sleep in tight, white boxer briefs) have fits in their sleep and cannot control the urge to constantly touch themselves. It's all up to the new kid to find out what's going on and stop Satan from being allowed to rise once all the boys are turned. Let's just say the director knew who his audience was and played up to them :) These 6 beautiful men are shown off with the single purpose to titilate the audience. They all start off with the strict uniform of a jacket and tie, but as the dark stuff begins to happen their uniforms, shall we say, become a lot less restricted. The movie borders on soft-core pornography with an incredibly strong sense of homoeroticism. The director was definately aiming for this, and this was the main goal of the film. Put into the context of a horror film, it makes for great fun!
Rating:
Summary: It's All About the Eye Candy
Review: I don't even know where to begin. Ok, let's see...the script is bad, the acting is bad, the quality is bad, the effects are bad, and the story is bad. BUT!! The movie is great and lots of fun. The fact that makes the movie good is that it doesn't try to be good...and the fact that it's all about the eye candy. Voodoo academy is about an exclusive religous academy where it's teacher, a priest, and his female assistant try to turn each of the students into voodoo dolls. In the process of this change, however, the rest of the sleeping boys (who all sleep in tight, white boxer briefs) have fits in their sleep and cannot control the urge to constantly touch themselves. It's all up to the new kid to find out what's going on and stop Satan from being allowed to rise once all the boys are turned. Let's just say the director knew who his audience was and played up to them :) These 6 beautiful men are shown off with the single purpose to titilate the audience. They all start off with the strict uniform of a jacket and tie, but as the dark stuff begins to happen their uniforms, shall we say, become a lot less restricted. The movie borders on soft-core pornography with an incredibly strong sense of homoeroticism. The director was definately aiming for this, and this was the main goal of the film. Put into the context of a horror film, it makes for great fun!
Rating: 
Summary: Sign me up for the Voodoo Academy!
Review: I had heard about this movie from one of the guys at work. he said this was a "horror movie for the ladies". As a woman I was interested, took it home and watched it. And liked it! It takes place at a Bible college, where a young Christopher Sawyer (Decoteau alum Riley Smith) is the newest student. But like all good religous schools, things aren't what they seem. Will Sawyer perish at the hands of the demonic Ms. Bouvier or live to go to grad school? The movie is very much for us women. The director gave his audience some of the best looking 20 somethings I have ever seen in a film. And they can act. The DVD includes over twenty more minutes than the VHS and with the resored footage, the movie works. See it.
Rating: 
Summary: "Voodoo" suggests
Review: I happened on this title, started watching, and continued watching, mostly in disbelief. Voodoo Academy may be the archetype of a new genre. Ostensibly a "supernatural" tale of ritual evil in a strict religious boy's school, this film is actually a very soft-core (no sex) exercise in homoerotic suggestion, with a semblance of plot grafted on involving a "reverend," the goings-on in the confessional booth, the headmistress and her voodoo dolls, and the male-model looking students, who rub themselves sensuously in their sleep. Combining Calvin Klein ad models with bad Italian horror, with soft-core porn is a unique concept, as far as I know. But unique does not mean good--the acting is stilted at best, the effects poor, and the overall film somewhat tedious. Although there is no real horror in this film, there is humor, albeit subtle and limited to the absurdity of the plot and the dialog given to the actors. This high-concept film should have been pushed into total farce, instead of just suggesting farce. It could have been hilarious. It is not, and it is not good by any means, but it is weird enough that you may have never seen anything quite like it.
Rating:
Summary: I felt the VHS was missing alot....
Review: I have yet to see this on DVD, but I knew watching the VHS there was a ton of editing going on. Very, very HOmoerotic..Sure you please all the ladies..and any gay horror fan...hell, I'm straight and i didn't think it was all that bad and Idea for a movie. True, guys runinng around in their underwear does nothing for me..I like the idea of men being helpless!! Victim, and looked upon only for their bodies and faces...this is definetly an expoltation of the male figure. As well, a not too cheesy, but not too good horror movie....Watch is and buy it..it is worth it...
Rating: 
Summary: It was funny
Review: I liked this movie. The acting was down right horrible. It seems like they took a bunch of underwear models and gave them acting jobs. The direction is horrible. You can often spot the boom mic at the top of the screen. The plot is confusing. I guess this devil woman puts a spell on the boys at the school that makes them touch themselves during the night for some reason. Meanwhile she turns one of the boys into a voodoo doll to I guess make a zombie army. It all doesn't make sense but who cares? This movie is down right FUNNY! I hope the director wanted this to be a comedy because I had tears in my eyes. I felt like I was watching an episode of Saturday Night Live. The actors didn't even look like they were taking themselves seriously. And the best part of all is the ultra dull special features. You get to watch the making of this movie and the director gets to show off his knowledge on how to make a movie. It is then you understand how this film can be so bad. And then he tries to show off his knowledge of blue screens and CGI. The guy cracks me up. The crew working on this movie look like they've been hired off the street. They fumble around like they're not sure what to do or where to go. Voodoo Academy is a classic!
Rating:
Summary: I Never Thought...
Review: I never thought you could EVER have too many boys in underwear touching themselves in a movie, but I've seen porn plotlines that move faster than this movie. Great rental, but not worth owning. Oh, and one other little thing that bugged me. How many "Bible Schools" do you know of where ALL the boys are wearing designer underwear?
Rating:
Summary: Surprising
Review: I won't repeat what the other reviewers said, I'll just say that this one won me over as the first homoerotic schlock horror film I've seen (well male homoerotic, lesbian vampires show up every once in a while in a movie). At first I thought the Lead actress was absolutley horrible in the part but to be honest she grew on me. The guys are hot, not even slightly passing for straight and while the nocturnal rubdown scenes get kinda monotonous they're still pretty interesting.
Rating: 
Summary: Wasted money
Review: In 24 years, I've wasted a lot of money on a lot of different things, but the ... I spent on Voodoo Academy was the most completely wasted of all my mistakes. This is headed for resale immediately. I'll feel guilty dumping it on someone else but I'm gonna do it anyway. None of the characters in the film have any depth or purpose. Some die--who cares? None of the actors can read a line. The thin plot could have been forgiven if the pace were reasonable, but it drags on like an earthworm crossing a sidewalk. Editing was terrible. Some reviewers refer to "homoerotic scenes"--nonsense, there were no truly erotic scenes. If you still buy this, watch it with the sound off, it's much better that way. The hunks are more interesting if you can't hear them.
Rating:
Summary: Totally unexpected hunk-fest from Full Moon
Review: It isn't going to win awards for classy production values or groundbreaking scriptwork, but the thing that truly distinguishes writer-director David DeCoteau's "Voodoo Academy" (2000) from every other routine Full Moon production is its blatant, shameless, GLORIOUS homoeroticism. Of the nine people in the cast, eight of them are hunky young guys, all of whom are stripped down to their underwear at every trivial opportunity, inviting a brazenly voyeuristic appreciation of their youthful perfection. There's no full-on nudity, not even from behind (boo! hiss!), but virtually every scene is a triumph of male beauty over narrative artistry. Not that I'm complaining, you understand! The excuse for all this rampant pulchritude is a typically threadbare Full Moon concoction: An evil demoness (Debra Mayer at her campiest) lures six virginal - ahem! - theology students to her 'Bible Academy' under false pretences where she hopes to seduce them in turn and then transform them into living voodoo dolls before harnessing their powers and claiming dominion over the souls of the dead. As you can see, this is a movie in which beefcake takes precedence over plot, all the way down the line! Shot in four days early in 1999 but not actually completed and copyrighted until the following year, the film was originally released to home video in an R-rated version, minus 23 minutes of frankly astonishing material. The missing footage - without which this movie is nothing - includes two scenes involving half-naked guys having demonic wine rubbed over their torsos by a wicked priest (Chad Burris); quite a lot of footage of more half-naked guys suffering from 'erotic dreams' and writhing in their beds; and a jaw-dropping sequence inside a confessional where ultra-beautiful Ben Indra strips off his shirt and, er...gets creative with a crucifix (I'll say no more). Honestly, if your eyeballs haven't melted in their sockets by this point in the movie, then you're either straight or dead. Or both. All of the deleted footage, you'll be pleased to hear, has been restored to this unrated DVD (which runs 92m 18s), and while the movie itself may be amateurish and poorly written, DeCoteau really ought to be applauded for subverting traditional notions of 'exploitation' cinema, an area in which he's been toiling for many years. Hitherto, such movies have catered almost exclusively to a heterosexual male audience, treating an endless succession of beautiful young women like pre-packaged slices of disposable meat. True, "Voodoo Academy" simply switches genders and leers over its young male cast in much the same way, but at least it proves something which straight movie fans have known for decades: A pretty face and a good body can turn even the worst movie into something worthwhile, even valuable. So, notwithstanding DeCoteau's bizarre assertion that "Voodoo..." was intended predominantly for teenage girls (!!?), this is one of the few movies to bring an overtly gay sensibility into the mainstream arena. No hedging, no metaphors, and no excuses - it's up-front and in-your-face like nothing else since Alan Daniels' equally extraordinary "The Boys of Cellblock Q" (1992)! Oddly enough, despite all the homoerotic writhings and fumblings, none of the characters are identified as gay (except the priest), yet they just don't seem able to keep their clothes on for more than five minutes. And no, I'm STILL not complaining! Smartly edited by Tom Vater (who apparently took one look at the material and promptly fell in love with it), and competently photographed by Howard Wexler, the production just manages to avoid looking like a home movie. But it's the cast which carries the picture and, to their credit, they hurl themselves into the spirit of things with unrestrained gusto. However, given the two-day rehearsal period and rushed shooting schedule, the acting is inevitably no more than functional at best, though some of the actors (like the aforementioned Ben Indra, and the mega-buffed Huntley Ritter, whose torso-rubdown is really something to behold!) clearly have a natural talent. And while the movie was designed as a vehicle for lead Riley Smith (very attractive, but not necessarily the sexiest guy in the cast), it's really an ensemble piece. The only disappointment is Chad Burris as the priest - this is his only movie to date, and he's clearly not a professional actor. Or if he is, he hides it well. Predictably, the movie suffered a rocky ride to fruition. During the audio commentary which accompanies this DVD, DeCoteau reveals how he and Full Moon head honcho Charles Band faced opposition to the project from various outraged colleagues, one of whom was subsequently dropped from the company. He also mentions how a number of technical personnel were unusually quiet whilst filming some of the 'riskier' scenes, and while his comments are guarded, he seems justifiably upset by their attitudes. Frankly, if these guys had any qualms about the material, they should have signed-up for "Beach Bimbos in Heat" or whatever, and left THIS production to people who were more in tune with the director's ambitions. Make no mistake, "Voodoo Academy" is a bad movie, but it's also a uniquely daring experiment, one whose shameless excess is its true redeeming feature. Sure, it's superficial and exploitative, but so what? You think Tom Cruise became a star solely on the basis of his acting abilities? ... no! If he looked like Quasimodo, nobody would care about his dramatic talents. There's no shame in enjoying other people's beauty, even in movies as frivolous as this one. And while our reactions to different movies may be complex and unfathomable, if you enjoy something like "Voodoo Academy" for no other reason than the opportunity it provides viewers to gawp at sexy young guys in various stages of undress, then the film has succeeded on its own modest terms and requires no further justification. Are there any other gay filmmakers out there who recognize this principle and are prepared to confront it head-on, as Mr. DeCoteau has done? The film was intended for home video and shot primarily in 16mm, so the 4:3 image is a little grainy in places (DeCoteau bemoans the poor quality film stock during his commentary), but it's generally OK. The low-key audio is two-channel stereo, and the disc is coded for all regions. Extras include a raw audio track without music and effects in which the director can be heard issuing instructions during non-verbal scenes; a number of outtakes in which under-rehearsed actors stumble continuously over endless reams of dialogue; and more than two dozen trailers for other DeCoteau/Full Moon pictures, including one for "Voodoo Academy" itself. Memo to Mr. DeCoteau: Similar outrageous 'experiments' are keenly anticipated by this viewer, but next time try spending some money on a more adventurous narrative, and allocate more time to pre-production and principal photography. The frequent, gratuitous undressing of beefcake actors is always, welcome, of course! And if you could persuade Ben Indra to come back and do another scene like that eye-popping confessional sequence, some of us would be more than grateful. Thank you. I think I'll go and lie down now...
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