(aka ANTHROPOPHAGUS: THE BEAST / THE GRIM REAPER/ THE ZOMBIE'S RAGE / MANEATER)
(1980,Italy)
“It's not fear that tears you apart....it's him!”
Any other year dear readers, and ANTHROPOPHAGUS would have nabbed a best picture Oscar. Sadly it was pipped to the post in 1981 by ORDINARY PEOPLE with Tisa Farrow losing out to Sissy Spacek in the best actress category. Or at least that's how I remember it.
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| Who slipped Toyah onto my Walkman? |
ANTHROPOPHAGUS starts with a German couple happily frolicking on a deserted beach in what looks like the depths of winter. This doesn't dissuade the fraulein from an impromptu swim along with a brief display of her ventriloquism skills, shouting sweet dubbed somethings at her boyfriend without moving her lips. These skills prove useless in the face of a subaquatic attack and she is soon dragged to a watery grave. Her boyfriend fails to notice the kerfuffle out at sea as he is too busy ...er.... cloud-bathing and listening to some early avant garde electro music on his ludicrously sized headphones. So entranced is he, that he fails to notice the titular character sneaking up with a meat cleaver in tow. A shiny sixpence if you can guess what happens next.
Meanwhile a group of tourists led by Alan (Saverio Vallone) hook up with solo vacationer Julie (Tisa Farrow from ZOMBIE FLESH EATERS (1979)) and take a boat out to a picturesque Greek island. Zora Kerova (CANNIBAL FEROX (1981)) plays Carol, the psychic, who when she is not sensing impending doom, is sulking with jealousy as Julie flirts with the mop topped Daniel (Mark Bodin). Then there's Arnie (Bob Larson) and his pregnant wife Maggie (Serena Grandi, later to land the title role in DELIRIUM: PHOTOS OF GIOIA (1987)) who complains a lot, vomits and falls over spraining her ankle. Quite why anyone wanted to bring her on holidays is anyones guess. Stathis, the captain of the yacht, offers to mind her while the rest of the group tour the island. Sadly Stathis ...er.... loses his head shortly thereafter, Maggie is taken hostage and the yacht is cast adrift. Julie fails to locate the couple she was due to rendezvous with but the scooby doo search does eventually lead to the discovery of the couple's daughter, Rita (Margaret Mazzantini), who was hiding in a large vat of red wine. Obviously.
Perhaps Rita might be able to provide some answers? No wait, she's blind, although her heightened sense of smell does make her aware of the killer's presence before anyone else, smelling as he does of blood (although, by his general appearance, I'm sure blood is the least he smells of). Never mind, why don't they ask the pasty faced mystery lady who quietly peers out windows like a goth who's taken a vow of silence? Oh wait, she keeps disappearing before they can find her. Never mind, they soon get first hand evidence of what has ravaged the island. It turns out to be that old chestnut - a monstrous cannibal with a stale pancake stapled to his forehead. Don't you just hate it when one of them shows up to spoil the fun?
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| Joe D'Amato's remake of CARRY ON SCREAMING did work out quite as expected ... |
Banned by the BBFC and vilified by the UK press back in the 80s, ANTHROPOPHAGUS is not quite the wall to wall gorefest that it's reputation would suggest. Sure it has that infamous nasty abortion scene (a skinned rabbit carcass filling in for the unborn foetus) but overall the film is very slowly paced and the moments that it's most notorious for mainly take place in the final third. The statuesque George Eastman, playing the killer, doesn't even make an appearance until the 52 minute mark. You may think this is a deliberate ploy to hide the 'not exactly' KNB prosthetic he has been saddled with (think your 6 year old nephew trying to create a Klingon with that aforementioned stale pancake and you'll get the idea) but the impression I get is that D'Amato was going for the HALLOWEEN (1978) method of slowly building suspense. Sadly there is only so much of Tisa Farrow wandering around with a candle that you can take before your mind begins to wander. However, it's certainly not without it's merits. When the gore scenes do occur, they are crude but often quite effective. A spooky crypt is put to expert use as Arnie goes looking for his missing wife with the eerily lit cannibal following not far behind him. Eastman's killer is an interesting blend of Michael Myers (in the style of his somnambulist walk) and a Romero zombie (in the way he literally goes for the jugular on many of his victims).
There's cheesiness abound also in the flashback scene explaining the cannibal's back story. The reason for his insanity you see is merely that he got a tad peckish whilst stranded at sea and so, ate his wife and child. However the wide shot of their little dingy under the blazing Greek sunshine makes it obvious that they are about 15 yards from the beach, and thus the nearest McDonalds can't be that far away. Still, his hunger induced madness does lead us to one of the all time great final scenes as his need for a snack reaches ludicrous levels.
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| "No thanks, I ordered the Tofu." |
It also gains some mileage from being shot in one of the world's most picturesque locations. However, finding a decent print of this movie has often been more difficult than crossing the English channel aboard a single Ryvita. Apart from the decent looking Shriek Show DVD from 2006, all prints I've seen give the impression that the lens cap was left on for fifty percent of the shoot, and the other fifty percent was filmed through a tobacco stained net curtain.
D'Amato's languid film making style is slightly more kinetic than usual, particularly in a relatively vibrant second half, but overall the film may prove too slow for some. TRANSFORMERS, this is not (although they do share a similar lack of plot). The film was released Stateside as THE GRIM REAPER in a truncated form that is best avoided as it removes all the gory punchlines, although the exciting footage of the lovely Tisa wandering around with a candle is mercifully left intact.
D'Amato went on to make a semi sequel, 1981's aptly titled ABSURD. It's a better paced film and ups the cheese factor by a further 200 percent, making it much the superior of the two films. And it too was pipped at the 1982 Oscars by CHARIOTS OF FIRE. I'm beginning to think the Academy had it in for poor old Joe. And what about that poor kid with the curly hair, losing out to John Gielgud in the best supporting actor category? What a travesty. Or least that's how I remember it.
BODYCOUNT 11 
female:6 / male:5
1) Female drowned
2) Man gets a meat-cleaver to the head
3) Man decapitated (offscreen)
4) Man has throat ripped out
5) Female hangs herself
6) Female is stabbed (in flashback sequence)
7) Man is stabbed
8) Female is strangled and has foetus ripped out of womb.
9) Female has throat slit
10) Female dragged through roofing and has her throat ripped out
11) Male has stomach sliced open, pulls out his intestines and starts munching on them
