An oil prospector goes to check on a team working in the Philippine rainforest but when he gets there finds that they’re not there. When he finds a decomposed skull, he suspects they have all been killed by nearby cannibals.

This Ruggero Deodato cannibal film may not be as well known as Cannibal Holocaust but it’s still a striking entry in the genre. Of course, the staples of this type of film are present (basically gore, nudity and animal cruelty) but the script takes the action into some very interesting places (no plot spoilers here). It’s also beautifully filmed with some deft directorial flourishes that really surprised me. It’s also worth noting that some of the nudity is male which was judged as very risqué for the time.

Deodato tried to state that the animal cruelty scenes were all obtained from archival footage but this is widely disputed.

Cannibal would be cut by 4 minutes by the BBFC but this was lenient compared with other censorship boards. Sweden and Australia cut 10 minutes of footage from Cannibal. 10 minutes! That’s insane.

I’m the UK the film ran as part of a double bill with the excellent Psychic Killer.

3 out of 5 stars