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1981 - Italy Directed By: Umberto Lenzi. Starring: Lorraine De Selle, Giovanni Lombardo Radice, Danilo Mattei, Zora Kerova, Robert Kerman, Walter Lucchini, Fiamma Maglione and Perry Pirkanen.
Aka
Make Them Die Slowly
Woman From Deep River
Current Availability
Quite a few uncut DVD releases doing the rounds with the best all rounder being the US R1 DVD from Grindhouse Releasing which features a decent presentation and a bevvy of superb extras. Perfectionists however might favour the European R2 Ultrabit edition from Sazuma which has a sharper image than the R1 but lacks the extras. Whatever you do avoid the heavily cut and thus worthless UK DVD from Vipco.
Recommended?
While Cannibal Ferox lacks the substance of say Cannibal Holocaust and has precious little cinematic merit, as a blood-drenched endurance test of gory special effects and gloating sadism it is more or less without parallel as Lenzi dares the viewer to run a stomach-churning gauntlet of castration, graphic mutilation, dismemberment, cannibalism and some horrifically inane English dubbed dialogue. When uptight right wing MP's condemn "Video Nasties" this is exactly the kind of film they're thinking of! A must then for gorehounds, provided one can live with all the dodgy animal abuse.
Review
Out of the small clutch of entries belonging to the short-lived yet justly infamous Italian cannibal movie subgenre by far the most singularly notorious would have to be director Ruggero Deodato’s grueling and innovative Cannibal Holocaust (1980), which perhaps qualified as one of the most intense, extreme and widely reviled exploitation films ever. Having said that however, running the Deodato film a close second in the cannibal caper stakes and neatly typifying its subgenre in a gory nutshell comes Umberto Lenzi’s Cannibal Ferox (1981).
When his 1972 cannibal-themed jungle adventure Deep River Savages (aka - The Man From Deep River) became an unexpected box-office hit in his native Italy, Lenzi inadvertently kick started the cannibal craze only to have his thunder stolen by Deodato, who promptly directed the similar but better made and most importantly far more visceral Jungle Holocaust (1976) and – of course – Cannibal Holocaust. Although Lenzi expressed little fondness for the cannibal subgenre he was not about to be upstaged and hurriedly answered back in Deodato’s face with both Eaten Alive! (1980) and then Cannibal Ferox - the most conscientiously trashy and unapologetically repulsive Italian cannibal effort of them all.
Cannibal Ferox made its true ascent to notoriety in 1984 when it opened for a memorable summertime run on New York City’s legendary Times Square Grindhouse circuit, distributed by Aquarius Releasing. By this point Times Square audiences had become jaded by a steady stream of graphic horror, hard-hitting kung-fu, mondo shockumentaries and blaxploitation, but those same audiences were shocked to the core by Lenzi’s onslaught of sadistic mutilation and cannibalism. Released under its lurid alternate title Make Them Die Slowly, the success of Cannibal Ferox was boosted by a memorable ad campaign which claimed (erroneously) that the film had been “banned in 31 countries”. As dubious as this claim may be, one country where Cannibal Ferox was certainly banned was here in the UK where its uncut VHS release was predictably swept up in the infamous early eighties witch hunt against so-called “Video Nasties”.
Cannibal Ferox centers around American anthropology student Gloria Davis (De Selle), her brother Rudy (Mattei) and their promiscuous young companion Pam (Kerova). Together this intrepid threesome journey to the perilous Amazon jungles of South America. The purpose of their visit is to validate the ambitious Gloria’s thesis that cannibalism as a social practice does not exist and is merely a racist myth perpetrated by whites, which was invented in order to justify the cruelty directed towards the Amazon’s indigenous peoples by the invading Spanish conquistadores.
Having set out into the jungle, the threesomes luck takes a fatal turn when their jeep breaks down and they promptly meet up with fellow American’s Mike Logan (Radice) and his severely wounded accomplice Joe. Mike claims that he and Joe had visited the area as emerald prospectors, but were waylaid by the native tribe who proceeded to murder and eat their guide.
Something about Mike’s claims does not sit right and soon the real truth comes to light. Mike it turns out is in actual fact a sadistic New York drug pusher who had fled to South America after ripping off a rival drug cartel. Once in the jungle Mike and Joe had searched for emeralds, but having engaged in a fruitless and frustrating search Mike – addled by cocaine – had let off steam by mutilating, castrating then killing their hapless native guide.
Naturally this brutal act of violence has somewhat soured the native tribes views of the trespassing white men. In response to Mike’s actions, the natives proceed to capture all of the fair-skinned outsiders and take their horrific revenge by subjecting their terrified captives to sickening acts of torture, mutilation and ultimately cannibalism.
Whereas Deodato’s Cannibal Holocaust – for all its vomit inducing content – at least makes for a serious study of base human cruelty in the name of self gain, Cannibal Ferox despite being even more aesthetically revolting, is nowhere near as thematically powerful or disturbing. Cannibal; Ferox amounts to precious little more than a highly lurid but completely hollow attempt to pile as much brutality, gore and prosthetic sadism as possible into the framework of its thin, contrived narrative. In this respect Cannibal Ferox, to give Lenzi his full due, really excels itself with Lenzi delivering a film so pornographically violent that only viewers in possession of a hardy constitution are advised to even attempt sitting through it.
The human violence is mainly reserved until after the hour mark, Lenzi sadistically contenting himself in the interim with the usual cannibal movie penchant for the mutilation and senseless slaughter of live animals which manifests itself in a near unwatchable scene of a squealing pig being bloodily stabbed and the dismemberment of a turtle. This reprehensible cruelty in itself will surely be enough in itself to rank Cannibal Ferox - along with the entire Italian cannibal oeuvre for that matter – morally contemptuous viewing material for those sensitive towards the issue of animal abuse.
It is however with the onset of the human-directed carnage that Lenzi truly begins his stomach turning test of the viewers queasiness levels as a blood and offal encrusted final third sees the white protagonists captured by the natives setting the scene for a series of unremittingly graphic set piece tortures and deaths. In a notorious piece of sadism that has since found its way into exploitation legend, Pam (played by comely Czech blonde Zora Kerova) in a brutal gender twist on a similar scene in the classic A Man Called Horse has her petite breasts punctured with large metal hooks and is then agonisingly hung by her impaled mammaries until she eventually dies. Yet an even worse fate is reserved for the scumbag, sadist Mike, played by Italian genre regular Giovanni Lombardo Radice, appearing under his usual acting pseudonym John Morghen.
Aficionado’s of European trash cinema will no doubt be familiar with Radice/Morghen as something of an Italian horror whipping boy having appeared and subsequently died horrifically in noteworthy Italian horror/exploitation pictures such as Antonio Margheriti’s Cannibal Apocalypse, the late Lucio Fulci’s spaghetti undead classic City Of The Living Dead and Ruggero Deodato’s The House On The Edge Of The Park (all released in 1980). However, it is in Cannibal Ferox that Radice suffers his most systematic, protracted and brutal demise of all with the thoroughly irredeemable Mike Logan more than paying the price for offending the flesh-scoffing natives. Firstly he is subjected to an eye watering castration and when he attempts to escape he gets one of his arms promptly lopped off in return for his audacity. Finally he is put out of his misery when the tribe locks him by the scalp into a bizarre contraption and proceeds to hack off the top of his skull with a machete. The ghastly savages then take turns scooping out and eating handfuls of his gore-sodden brains.
Outside of the plentiful cannibalistic mayhem on display Cannibal Ferox is for the most part either nondescript or worse. Lenzi presents the viewer with a flimsy, inherently xenophobic premise which functions as nothing more than a template for all the sadism on display and despite having shot the film on location in the Amazon he fails to glean much in terms of either atmosphere or verisimilitude from his jungle settings. Cannibal Ferox also has a maddening insistence on flitting back every so often to New York City where in a disinteresting subplot, both stereotypical NYC detectives and rough-housing hoods are trying to locate the absent Mike. There really cannot be a bigger bastard than trying to track someone down only to discover their otherwise disposed having their knob, arm and skull top lopped off by cannibals in the uncharted hell of the Amazon basin! All jesting aside the NYC are not only badly executed (with a lousy disco-cheese score from “Buddy Maglione” squalling away relentlessly) but also tend to undermine the films overall effect. Whenever the intensity of the jungle scenes cranks up a notch the action seems to cut away to New York thus instantly diffusing any sense of trepidation or suspense Lenzi had managed to generate in the interim.
Whether due to overacting, crap dubbing or miscasting, the films cast are hardly a boon to Lenzi’s cause either. The aforementioned Radice in particular gives a ridiculously OTT performance, positively chewing on the jungle flora. Indeed Radice does so far off at the deep end in the overacting stakes that his portrayal of the drug-crazed Mike actually enlivens the film in a backwards respect as he brands women “twats” and seduces the sluttish Pat by referring to her as a “hot pussied little whore”. Radice – a serious theatrical actor who took exploitation roles to pay the bills – has since condemned both Cannibal Ferox and Lenzi (whom he loathes with a passion) and expressed his regret for his involvement in the film. Elsewhere Lenzi takes the usually reliable Lorraine De Selle – a raven-haired sex siren whose sultry presence enlivened several Italian exploitation pictures – and completely wastes her as the prim, uptight and totally sexless Gloria. The rest of the performances are rendered nondescript by typical dodgily synched English dubbing although cannibal regular and hardcore porn legend Robert Kerman manages a solid turn as a beleaguered NYC detective hot on Mike’s trail.
By any conventional standard of judgment Cannibal Ferox would be dismissed as rubbish and dispatched to the nearest rubbish bin without hesitation. Yet to critique a film such as this one on the basis of plot, acting, etc is really a fruitless exercise as providing a gripping narrative or an acting masterclass are really the two furthest things from its makers mind. The name of the game here is tastelessly excessive exploitation setting out simply to shock and nauseate as many would be viewers as possible and to this end Cannibal Ferox succeeds admirably!
Although Lenzi’s claim to auteur status is a questionable one (according to Radice he once hilariously likened himself to John Ford) his direction is nothing short of spirited as he zips through the first hour maintaining a steady sense of uproarious pulp en route to an extended final act which succeeds as a genuinely grueling test of the audiences endurance as Lenzi literally pummels the viewer into submission with one graphically sadistic gore set-piece after another in rapid fire order. Italian special make-up effects maestro Gianetto De Rossi has certainly done more convincing work in his time but nonetheless, the outrageous spectacles of Kerova hanging by her punctured breasts and the cannibals devouring Radice’s blood marinated brain matter are not images easily shaken off after having seen them. So as morally bankrupt as the emphasis on animal mutilation and slaughter for titillation may be, that aside few could really deny that as a brutal, gutter level enterprise in gore-driven exploitation there are not a whole lot of films out there on a par with Cannibal Ferox. Whether you ultimately interpret this as a good or a bad thing is entirely a matter of personal taste with the strength of ones stomach also being a factor to consider!
Also Try… Cannibal Holocaust/ Eaten Alive! (1980, Umberto Lenzi) / Jungle Holocaust / Deep River Savages / Mountain Of The Cannibal God / Cannibal Terror.
