The Woman Eater, Hula Dancer in Great Peril

A very buxom, blonde, hula dancer!  A mad scientist inventing a serum to bring the dead back to life.  A monstrous man (...woman, actually) eating plant!  You gotta admit, this sounds a lot better than the newest Liam Neeson film.  1958's "The Woman Eater," from England, is our blog entry today.  Vera Day, as an out of work Hula dancer graces the silver screen in this one.  A mediocre dancer but great screamer and sweater model, Ms. Day plays the not-so-pure, but very vulnerable Sally and steals the show. 

As the film begins, Dr. Moran (George Coulouris) leads a deadly expedition into the Amazon.  He comes upon a native tribe, in the midst of sacrificing an Amazon babe (Marpessa Dawn).  The girl is fed to a "Black JuJu," which is their god, and a carniverous plant.  Dr. Moran brings the plant back to his mansion in the English countryside in order to fine tune a serum.  The natives explained to our mad scientist that a serum can be produced from the plant if it is given a diet of buxom, young women.  Now in England, Moran lures shapely, but naive, beauties to his laboratory and feeds them to the JuJu.  Susan (Sara Leighton) is the first girl he abducts.  Unfortunately, pretty women are missed by the pub crowd, and the police start investigating.  Moran's experiments are falling just short of bringing corpses back to this side of the sod, but luckily for science, an out of work Hula Dancer, Sally, shows up at his estate asking for work.

As the cops get closer to uncovering the disappearances of some English babes, Moran realizes he must act fast.  The JuJu has great taste in women, and apparently these vixens taste great.  Like most impressionable young Hula dancers, Sally is impulsive and falls in love with a grease monkey (mechanic).  The two plan to wed.  Tough luck for Sally, Moran cannot let her leave....he needs to feed the JuJu.  As Moran forces Sally into the secret basement lab, the JuJu begins to drool.  You would too if you saw Sally.  Will the cops be able to put enough clues together to figure out Moran is the fiend who abducts shapely English babes?

Would Sally be a bigger asset to mankind if she succumbs to the interest of science, or if she weds the mechanic (...really...how long would that marriage last, anyway)?  Is bringing the dead back to life really something we want to do?  Campy and visually pleasing, "The Woman Eater" utilizes the scream queen concept to the max.  Vera Day will make you forget Don Ho (...I guess we already forgot about him)!