Classic. Sergio Leone called it a masterpiece. Actually has a lot to say about "documentaries."
A Customer Review by The Doctor
"Cannibal Holocaust" is notorious, to say the least. Some claim it's the most notorious film of all time. Upon its release, the director was arrested and Italian police began confiscating prints of the movie from theaters because a rumor had started that the film utilized real dead bodies. This is of course not the case, but was likely thought plausible due to the convincing special effects (such as the very realistic scene of the impaled girl) and the actual footage of several animals being killed and slaughtered onscreen. (One disturbing scene shows a native eating a monkey's face.)
Many of the reviews here will likely focus on the gore in the film, which, honestly, if you've scene any number of other cannibal or "junglesploitation" films, the gore in this movie is really nothing exceptional. Rather, it seems exceptional because, unlike other equally gory exploitation films, "Cannibal Holocaust" is actually a very well-made movie, which makes its gore more powerful and disturbing.
Let the reader be warned, however, that this is not to say this is not a gory film! For instance, the scene where the muskrat is stabbed oncreen is extremely upsetting and is liable to make one consider becoming a vegetarian. (What interests me is that viewers find such things disgusting and violently object when a real animal is killed in a movie, and yet, they eat meat! Do they not realize that whenever they eat a dish with meat in it that SOMEONE KILLED the animal they are eating! But I digress...Let's move on to why this is a truly interesting movie.)
"Cannibal Holocaust," all mention of gore aside, is a good movie in its own right, is well-made and interesting, and is one of the best horror films of all time. Viewers will doubtlessly recognize that "The Blair Witch Project" was a blatant ripoff and a MUCH inferior film. In "Holocaust," an anthropologist and his guides enter amazonia, the "green hell," in search of any evidence of a group of young documentary filmmakers who went in before them and never returned.
The anthropologist finds what he is looking for with the tree people, a group of natives that literally live in the trees.
This gimmick is used to great effect in the film, as some of the shots of the natives coming out of their tree dwellings, as when they lower "dinner" from a tree, are extremely eerie. The anthropologist convinces the tree people to give him the film canisters left by the documentary filmmakers, and then returns to New York to view the films. What he discovers is shocking and repulsive, in a very surprising way.
"Cannibal Holocaust" surprisingly has a few important things to say. Those who think it an empty exercise in exploitation are greatly mistaken. This is NOT gore for the sake of gore. Unlike many other exploitation films, there is a point to it all here. It seems the director, Deodato, or the writer perhaps, had much to say about our tendency to call natives and tribal peoples "savages." How are we not "savages?" the director asks. We initially are repulsed by the cannibals and their actions, but then, upon viewing the documentary footage, become even more repulsed by the filmmakers.
The cannibals, which are perhaps the most savage "primitives" imagination affords examples of, simply eat to stay alive. The white filmmakers in this movie, however, are sadistic and vile manipulators, rapists, and murderers. The great surprise of the movie is that we expect to see a group of poor unfortunates and the horrible fate that befalls them. What we end up seeing are the actions of disgusting monsters of the most vile hedonistic sort, and we, as viewers, cannot wait to watch what promises to be their grisly demise. They are savages too, to be certain, and by our wanting to watch them be eaten, are we savages as well? Perhaps.
The documentary filmmakers in "Cannibal Holocaust" go around staging scenes to get their footage. When they want to get footage of the tree people massacring the swamp people, they simply massacre the swamp people themselves. Watch as, after raping a native girl, the main character smirks as he sees the aftermath--her having been impaled because she is no longer a virgin. He smirks, which is his honest reaction, and then, upon being told he's on film, starts acting shocked and appalled for the documentary.
This presents another interesting side of "Cannibal Holocaust": it really makes clear that when we watch the documentaries that we put so much faith in, we really have no "behind the scenes view," so to speak. I do not mean to imply that documentary filmmakers are out killing and filming it, like in "Cannibal Holocaust," but that rather, that we often have no real way of knowing what scenes are accurate, real footage vs. what scenes are skewed representations, dramatizations, or even staged altogether.
Real-life examples of this are easy to come by, for instance, the dramatic and tear-jerking images of the marines raising the flag at Iwo Jima is, lo and behold, a reenactment. That does not mean it didn't happen, but it remains that a reenactment is not the same thing as actual footage. The marines in the reenactment are not the same marines that really raised the flag. What we are left with then, is a dramatization that has survived as historical fact. Further, as Ralph Estling has pointed out, the footage of General MacArthur arriving on Leyte Island and proclaiming "I have returned!" was entirely staged, and was also filmed three or four times before they "got it right."
The reader may be asking "So what?" If so, here's a more dramatic example: Walt Disney's "White Wilderness." "White Wilderness" shows the only known footage of the now-famous act of lemmings running over the edge of a cliff in a mass suicide. Ethologists watched this and wondered where that footage came from, because, no evidence exists that lemmings EVER do that, and further, you'll never see more than a couple of lemmings together in the wild. Ethologists will tell you that lemmings don't even travel in herds, even though they are the standard example of "herd-like behavior." So where did Disney get the now-notorious footage of lemmings committing mass suicide? They made it happen! Disney, true story, wanted this scene as part of their documentary, but they couldn't find any footage of it, they couldn't find anyone who'd ever seen it happen, and they couldn't capture any footage of it (because it never happens). So what did Disney do? Not to be thwarted, Disney hired people to herd up hundreds of lemmings and TO SHOVEL THEM OFF THE TOP OF A CLIFF WITH SNOW SHOVELS. The camera was at the bottom of the cliff, filming all the lemmings plummeting to their deaths!
Fake documentaries are sadly today becoming more and more common, and, as a result, the word "documentary" is losing much of its meaning. Take the films of Michael Moore. In his latest, Sicko, the scene that touts Cuba's magical healthcare where Moore actually takes people to a Cuban healthcare facility is presented in the film as occurring spontaneously, as though they just walked in and were presented with such service and treatment, when, in reality, the entire scene was staged. It was totally fake! That should anger you no matter what your political affiliation is! In a real Cuban hospital you have to bring your own hospital supplies from home. Moore also portrays them as traveling to Cuba on a boat when they really flew there on a commercial airliner. On the other side of the political spectrum is Ben Stein's "Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed." The scene where Stein gives a lecture to "students" at a prominent University was entirely staged. The "students" were actors!
"Cannibal Holocaust" is disgusting, disturbing, eerie, well-made, and it might even make you think. For fans of exploitation it's must-see viewing, as it's probably the best exploitation film ever made. It also has one of the greatest horror/exploitation soundtracks of all time. Some would argue that "Cannibal Holocaust" even excels and rises above the exploitation genre in general, it's so well made.
Sergio Leone, one of the greatest directors in the history of film ("The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly," "Once Upon a Time in the West," etc.), is rumored as having called the first half of "Cannibal Holocaust" a masterpiece of filmmaking, he though it so effective. Those viewing this simply to be shocked out of their minds may, in this day and age, be disappointed.
Recall however that mood and atmosphere strengthen the impact of horror scenes--think of the original "Texas Chainsaw Massacre." It's touted as being a disturbing a bloody film, but there is actually little-to-no actual gore in the film. With this in mind, let the viewer be warned. Even if the gore in "Cannibal Holocaust" is not actually the sickest of any exploitation/horror film, it's damn close, AND, its impact is all the stronger as this is actually one helluva well-made movie.
By the way, you have to watch out for these DVD re-releases. The ones that are formatted to fit widescreen TVs are often NOT presented in their original aspect ratio. This is a bad trend that is fast becoming the "new fullscreen," a problem I was starting to think we'd finally overcome.