***OK. First off let me state that Deodatos' Cannibal Holocaust is not for everyone. If you're in PETA and think it's perfectly logical to leave your pets money when you die then this film is most definetly NOT for you.***
Italians in the 70's loved nothing more than to take a good idea and run with it. "Go where the Lira is" was a way of life for a good many directors of the time. Like Argento's The Bird With the Crystal Plumage (2-Disc Special Edition) started the Giallo craze before him, Deodato is credited with kick starting the cannibal film craze. For those who dig on the sleazy and shocking underbelly of international cinema this film was long considered one of the harder to find titles. Banned in numerous countries for graphic, mean-spirited animal cruelty and snuff allegations leveled at Deodato by the Italian Government, it was almost impossible to find an uncut copy of this film. Now, thanks to a renewed interest in all things of bad taste, it's re-packaged, uncut, and ready to disturb a whole new generation of sickos!
Beautifully shot, the sweeping, panoramic views of lush rainforest at the start of the film, coupled with a feel-good melody scored by Riz Ortolani(Mondo Cane)quietly lull the viewer into a feeling they are watching something educational on the Discovery Channel or maybe Mutual Of Omaha's Wild Kingdom instead of being plunged into a world of images and sounds so realistic and profoundly disturbing that some I've shown it to state that they were overcome with a sense on numbness and overwhelming desire to shower upon viewing it to completion.
Cannibal Holocaust follows N.Y.U. Anthropology Prof. Harold Monroe's rescue mission into the amazon rainforests in search of a lost American film crew.
Monroe takes off to the Amazon and meets up with his guides, Chaco and Miguel(a hard-case amazon expert and his assistant), and a hostage from a nearby tribe to use for negotiation upon meeting the natives. After hiking deep into the green inferno they happen upon a rock-wielding native brutally raping and murdering what turns out to be his wife. The good Prof. is informed that the muderer is a member of the Yacumo tribe and is merely serving out the punishment his people reserve for adulterers. Following the tribesman closely, the party confronts him and offers up their hostage in exchange for permission to enter the Yacumo Village.
Once in the little village, the rescue party is confronted with anger, fear and hostility, until Miguel wins them over with a little old fashioned bribery. It seems that the last white people to come thru had left the village in turmoil. The next morning, the Yacumo leads the group to the edge of their territory, where they meet the neighbors: the Yanomamo and Shamatari. Both flesh-eaters, the tribes are perpetually at war with each other. The team witnesses the death of a Yanomamo woman at the hands of a group of Shamatari warriors, and then follows the warriors to a riverbank where they encounter a large group of Shamatari's preparing to massacre some Yanomamo men. The rescue team steps in with superior fire-power and the Shamatari warriors are forced to retreat into the jungle in fear and confusion. In gratitude, the Yanomamo invite the group to join them in their village.
The Yanomamo village is unlike anything you'd imagine. An elabotate shelter system is built into large clumps of trees, giving the place an overwhelming sense of malice and instilling in the un-initiated a sense of zenophobia. They quickly find that the same rules seem to apply here as in the Yacumo village...Don't Trust Whitey. In a bizarre attempt to gain some trust from the natives Prof. Monroe goes skinny-dippin in the river. Soon he's surrounded by brown skinned Yanomamo girls frolicking nakedly and playfully pinching at the good Professors johnson. When the bath-time fun ends, the small group of naked amazonians leads Monroe to a crude shrine made from the bones of the missing film crew. Prof. Malones worst fears are confirmed upon seeing the decayed remains of the Americans, but within them lies an unexpected bounty...Film Cans! Frustrated and angry at the brutality and viciousness the documentary team obviously experienced prior to their demise, Monroe confronts the tribe in their village and shows them the power of "White Man's Magic" by playing a tape recorder for them. Under the magical spell of the tape recorder, the leader of the Yanomamo trades the shiny film cans for the powerful, speaking box.
This is pretty much the end of the part of the film I like to call "The RIGHT WAY To Interact With the Natives", and the beginning of the "How NOT to conduct Yourselves while filming in Amazonia" part of the film...
Fresh from his arrival back in the states, Monroe is approached by executives of the Pan American Broadcast Company and they offer him the job of hosting the airing of the lost filmaker's documentary. The good Prof. states that he will only consider it if he can view the lost footage beforehand to see it for himself. The suits agree, and show him a short segment from one of the lost team's previous documentaries, The Last Road to Hell to get him up to date on the lost teams work. After the viewing, an executive tells him that the documentary was staged by the director Alan Yates to acquire more exciting footage. Puzzled, Monroe continues on to view the footage he himself fought so hard to recover from the Amazon.
The first film reel begins by showing the group preparing for their newest expedition. Joking, slap-assing, and playfully teasing each other in a way that illustrates the tight-knit unit that a documentary film crew often evolves into. The sight of a naked Faye drying herself non-chalantly, and barely registering any anger when she is teased by other crew members only strengthens the idea that these people are friends as well as co-workers.
Upon landing in the Amazon, Yates and his crew begin their journey into the "Green Inferno" and death and destruction are almost immediate. While making camp on the first night, the viewer gets a glimpse of what's in store as they witness the male members of the film crew(with the help of Felipe the guide)capture a gigantic turtle in the river and systematically destroy it under the guise of preparing a meal. The joking manner and adolescent way the western men toy with the decapitated and flayed-alive turtles still spastic head gives a glimpse into the true character of those in front of the lens. While the men prop the turtle head in front of the camera to film its futile gasps, Faye, the lone female on the trek gets sick at the sight and sulks along the riverbank in(soon to be hypocritical)protest of the poor reptiles treatment.
During the next days trek, Felipe is bitten on the foot by a poisonous snake. After killing the snake on camera, Jack cuts off Felipes leg in a futile attempt to save him from the poison. Quickly and painfully, Felipe dies. The crew buries him in a shallow grave, and argues about going forward with the filming faced with no guide. The film team decides to continue and in no time at all stumble into a small group of Yacumo standing in a clearing. While the tribesmen are in the open, Jack takes aim and shoots one in the leg with the idea of easily following the wounded tribesman back to his village, and hopefully, some great footage.
As the projectionist changes reels, Prof. Monroe voices his disapproval of the team's actions to the executives, stating that there are easier and better ways to introduce yourself to the natives.
When the second reel starts, the group is just arriving at the village. They descend on the villagers in a swarm of fire and gunshots, quickly herding terrified villagers into a large hut and burning it down to stage a scene for their documentary: the evil cannibal Yanomamos brutal burning alive of the Yacumo. After the fires, one of the crew shoots a baby pig in the head and watches as it slowly dies a suddering, pathetic death, while Alan and Faye make love in front of a large group of captured villagers.
Monroe breaks in with concerns about the films authenticity seeing firsthand that most of the footage is faked, but the executives ignore him and babble about how groundbreaking the documentary will be. They plan to air it without watching the rest and adjourn for the day. The following morning Mr. Monroe continues to view the reels alone, and in horror watches as a pregnant Yacumo woman has her fetus forcibly removed and buried in a muddy riverbank. Knowing that the executives are still planning to air the documentary having only glimpsed a taste of whats truly on there and hoping to change their minds, he decides to invite the suits to watch some un-edited footage that only he's seen.
The final two reels contain images of the film crews brutal gang rape of a young Yanomamo girl and subsequent fall-out with the natives..
The glee and animal behavior of the men during the rape is countered by Faye's furious(but ultimatly useless)attempts to stop them. The final reel begins with the group arriving at a site where the same poor girl is clumsily impaled on a pole(the image most associated with this film). The crew slowly circles the girl on a stick while describing the atrocity as an "Obscure Sexual Rite" of the Yanomamo Tribe. Shortly after leaving the site of the impalement, the team is attacked by pissed off tribesmen seeking some serious payback for the girls horrific death. Jack the cameraman is stuck with a spear in the ensuing attack, and instead of trying to help, Alan decides to shoot him and film the natives torture of his buddy. They sit and watch as Jack is systematically emasculated, cut into pieces and consumed by the ash coved savages. Faye is captured by the Yanomamo after jacks demise and Alan forces Mark the soundman to go back with him to try and save her. The two sneak up on the Yanomamos and film from the bushes as the tribesmen each take turns raping Faye before chopping her head off. The remaining two members of the team are quickly found hiding in the bush and chased by screaming tribesmen before first Mark, and finally Alan both fall victim to their own bad deeds. The film reel flaps to an end as the final image of Alan's lifeless and bloody face falls in front of the discarded camera. The executives sit in shocked silence as Monroe walks away, finally in the end, one of them orders the film to be burned.
It's been said that Cannibal Holocaust's "found footage" premise was in part the inspiration for The Blair Witch Project, and after viewing both titles, I'd have to agree. While wholly different films, the core premise of both is that someone got lost in the woods/jungle with a movie camera...bad stuff happened, here's what they filmed. |
Cannibal Holocaust - Limited 2 Disc Uncut Edition dvd movie.