View source for Cannibal Holocaust

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Exploitation cinema comes of age in Cannibal Holocaust (1980)

Primary to the horror are the culture clashes in Cannibal Holocaust — the fear of the chasm between the streets of New York and the Green Inferno of South America — and the clash is highlighted by the bullying that goes on between the sadistic tracker and the captured tribesman, whom he forces to take cocaine and pulls around like a monkey or a dog on a lead.

The music is usually pretty well chosen too — including the mellow strains which introduce the film, the bass synths typical of the time and the sweeping strings which accompany much of the violence. 

But if Cannibal Holocaust is a horror film — yes it is! — then the horror is political and social. The real horror in the film is found first in the film-within-a-film The Last Road to Hell which shows real life political executions, carried out for ideological reasons. Having just seen some Amazonians eating each other, it is requested of us that we assess 
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hese assassinations and murders — not the norm for a video nasty or gory thriller — are what elevate the message of Cannibal Holocaust. Which is more unpleasant to watch? People we know are actors, indulging in a gory pretence of eating human bodies, or the real life ideological murder, shown in the next few minutes?
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his is compounded by the further revelation that the verite violence we have just seen was actually staged for newsreels and documentary — a little like the way the Red Brigade were presented. Tellingly there are more than just a couple of instances of vomiting in Cannibal Holocaust — and as with many horror films, the aspects you fear the worst are not the most terrifying. The degradation of the film crew themselves — the snakebite and its aftermath and the death of a giant turtle are a taste of the white man’s gratuitous violence, 

After which the news media patiently do the rounds of interviewing the families of the deceased filmmakers. It’s not unlike Man Bites Dog — in which the filmmakers turn rapist.

So what we’re invited to accept is that the civilised people are the animals, made all the more clear when the degradation continues as two of the filmmakers have very rough sex in front of the tribe, 

And what is said by the television producer anyway: ‘The more you rape people’s senses the happier they are.’ And Cannibal Holocaust ends up becoming that which it describes media culture as — dishonest, offensive and inhuman. 

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[[Category:Horror]]
[[Category:Film]]