Released: 1981
Director: Umberto Lenzi
Rated R
Run Time: 93 Minutes
Distributor: Grindhouse Releasing
Genre: Horror
Cast:
Giovanni Lombardo Radici: Mike Logan
Lorraine De Selle: Gloria Davis
Danilo Mattei: Rudy Davis
Zora Kerova: Pat Johnson
Walter Lucchini: Joe Costolani
Robert Kerman: Lt. Rizzo
It’s often been said that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. In movie terms, we’re talking about remakes, rip-offs and movies that were inspired by the original material. Take Eli Roth’s The Green Inferno, for example. Eli Roth has been a massive fan of the Italian cannibal movie genre for years. It’s clearly inspired a lot of his movies, to the point where he actually cast Ruggero Deodato in a cameo for Hostel II. The Green Inferno was finished in 2013, but didn’t get released until last year, but it was heavily inspired by the Italian cannibal movies of the late 70s and early 80s. I personally didn’t think The Green Inferno was a bad movie. In fact, I thought it was a solid horror film. But, it was definitely inspired by Ruggero’s opus, Cannibal Holocaust. It was the first found footage movie ever made and it ended up being a pretty savage little movie. It was notorious for several scenes of animal cruelty and for making people think that it was a snuff film. So, the film and Ruggero Deodato have a bit of a reputation. Along with remakes, you do get the occasional rip-off. In 1981, another cannibal film was released onto unsuspecting audiences: Cannibal Ferox.
As the movie begins, we are in New York City, where a young man is arriving at his apartment only to be shot to death by a couple of mobsters. Why? Apparently they were looking for another occupant of the apartment, who happens to be out of the country at the moment. Heading to South America, we see a trio of photographers who are making their way up the Amazon to prove that cannibalism does not exist. After a few mishaps in the jungle, the trio run into two suspicious guys, Mike and Joe, and then team up to get out of the jungle. Thing is, Mike’s hiding something and when they run into the natives, the shit hits the fan. Big time. I’m having the strangest sense of deja vu right now. Why? Because I’ve seen this movie before. What I mean by that, is that Cannibal Ferox is extremely similar to Cannibal Holocaust. It has all the same elements: You have a group of youngsters that are WAY out of their element, and they end up running into a village that has seen brutality at the hands of other Western youngsters. They also run into cannibals. It also has some scenes with live animals as well, even though the context is a little different this time around.
I’m going to come right out and say it: Cannibal Ferox is a blatant rip-off of the superior Cannibal Holocaust. It’s certainly a grizzly film, that’s for sure, but it lacks the visceral punch that Holocaust had. That movie was gruesome and absolutely brutal. It’s slower and the characters are not as interesting. Not only that, the film throws in an unnecessary subplot involving New York mobsters. After a couple of scenes, we never see them again. What was the point? The characters were extremely irritating, especially the women. The acting? Oh, God Almighty, the acting. It was awful. It’s obviously clear that besides Robert Kerman, the cast really doesn’t speak a lick of English, so they had to be dubbed. That dubbing was gloriously awful.
The effects were mostly okay, even though you could tell that some of it was fake. The music was abominable. They kept repeating some of the same musical score over and over again. It strikes me as completely lazy. I would say that Umberto Lenzi is the poor man’s Rogero Deodato, but the truth of the matter is that he’s nowhere NEAR that level. The animal stuff, while still utilizing live animals, isn’t nearly as atrocious. Yeah, there’s a scene with a turtle, but the context behind the animal scenes was surprisingly tasteful, to a certain extent. I still think they shouldn’t have used real animals, but it was nowhere near as brutal as Cannibal Holocaust. I don’t know if it was because Lenzi didn’t want to suffer the same consequences that Deodato suffered, but it’s absolutely clear to me that Lenzi just didn’t have what it took to be a competitor for Ruggero Deodato.
Cannibal Ferox was definitely gory and controversial, but it was controversial for the sake of being controversial and that does NOT make a good movie. Cannibal Holocaust at least had some blistering things to say about society. It had a message about the exploitation of the third world and the responsibility of film-makers. It was definitely in-your-face, but it got the point across. Ferox is just a cheap knock-off of a superior film. Now that I think about it, Eli Roth’s recent cannibal movie seems to borrow more from Lenzi’s film than it does Deodato’s. Still, The Green Inferno is better than Cannibal Ferox in every way. I’m digging the Italian cannibal genre right now, but if I were you, I would give Cannibal Ferox a pass. It’s not a good movie. It’s not even a good rip-off. Sorry, Ferox fans, this stinker gets 3 cannibals out of 10.