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14 out of 18 people found the following comment useful :-
Bunch of SAVAGES !!!, 22 June 2004

Author: Coventry from the Draconian Swamp of Unholy Souls

A four-headed team clumsily ends up stuck in a jungle. Pretty soon, two of them die (rather clumsy again) while savage aborigines are chasing the other two males. The duo depletes one last time when one of them disappears during a wild-river flow …does it have to be said…clumsy! The supposedly last cannibal tribe on earth imprisons the one man left, named Robert. They don't start cooking him just yet, but fool around with him a little, first. He escapes and takes a local girl with him, who serves the role of beautiful hostage. However, the journey through the undiscovered jungle is hard, long and full of surprises.

Ruggero Deodato's general rehearsal before unleashing the notorious `Cannibal Holocaust' upon the world is an explicit horror film, but not as shocking or repulsive as its successor. This film merely serves as an old-fashioned adventure-movie, there were Cannibal Holocaust is a severely shocking ethical portrait. If you ignore all the illogicalness of this film, you'll have yourself a good time. That's a fact. It's a rough and straight-to-the-point horror production with more than enough footage to keep you entertained…although a lot depends on your definition of entertainment, of course. Italian horror standards stand throughout the whole film: gore, sleaze and cruelty! Since so many things are happening during the first 20 minutes of `Jungle Holocaust', the film tends to get tedious after a while…or so you would think! Surprisingly enough, there still are more than enough adrenalin-filled sequences that keep you alert and – and this really is positive in my book – Deodato gives an excellent portrayal of how someone is unintentionally driven into complete madness and a total loss of realism. Jungle Holocaust contains quite a lot of animal cruelty, which can be regarded as offensive by Italian horror-haters. The crocodile-dissection easily equals the vicious tortoise slaughtering in `Cannibal Holocaust'. The cannibals themselves are some of the wickedest I ever saw and they seem to follow some bizarre rituals, too. They show an unusual interest for male nudity and they don't seem to worry too much about controversial handlings such as murdering an infant (pretty disturbing sequence that was). They do bring forward beautiful women, as Me Me Lai is the sexiest native girl I ever saw. Jungle Holocaust is essential viewing for Italian horror/sleaze fans. Not as memorable as `Holocaust' or `Ferox'…but certainly worth your time.

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14 out of 18 people found the following comment useful :-
Thank God it wasn't in 3-D!!, 13 November 2000
Author: zmaturin from Pleasant Valley

A plane full of annoying oil hunters crash their plane deep in a jungle and almost immediately the non-Caucasian members of the expedition are caught and devoured by a band of revolting cannibal natives, leaving the smart, sensible survivalist Ralph stranded with the weenie, whiny, panicky dolt Robert, who gets them completely lost within minutes. They manage to construct a remarkably sturdy raft that is almost instantly crashed into some rocks. The duo is separated and Robert eats some mushrooms that make him vomit, and then he is captured by the always-naked, mostly male cannibal tribe. They tie him up, rip off his clothes, and tug at his genitals. There is more male frontal nudity in this than at a pool party at James Whale's house.

There is, of course, one beautiful female native with no body hair and breast implants who falls for Robert- although not until after he ties her up, leads her around on a leash like a dog, and beats the snot out of her. This is a pretty detestable movie.

The print I watched was called "Last Cannibal World" and it seemed to have all the good bits (the gore and sex, that is) cut out. The tons of cruelty-to-animals (not as much fun as cruelty-to-humans) and the offensive male-female relationship result in a non-extraordinary cannibal movie devoid of any likability. I was never bored, though, and there are lots of scenes of that pathetic blockhead Robert getting humiliated. He's peed on, gets rotten vegetables thrown on him, and it tied up and swung around on a rope because they think he's a bird. And, according to some text at the beginning of the flick, it's all true!

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7 out of 8 people found the following comment useful :-
If you don't take it too seriously, and don't object too much to the gratuitous animal slaughter, it's sleazy, trashy entertainment., 16 May 2004
Author: Infofreak from Perth, Australia

Ruggero Deodato's name is forever linked with the cannibal movie genre mostly because of his infamous 'Cannibal Holocaust', a movie which I've yet to see uncut. 'The Last Cannibal World' (aka 'Jungle Holocaust') was his first cannibal movie, and isn't as well known or talked about. If you don't take it too seriously, and don't object too much to the gratuitous animal slaughter, it's sleazy, trashy entertainment. Deodato by the way didn't start this movie cycle, Umberto Lenzi did, but Lenzi later recycled some Deodato footage, and cast Ivan Rassimov and Me Me Lai in his 'Eaten Alive'. Anyway, Massimo Foschi plays an American, Robert Walker. The plane he and his colleague Rolf (Rassimov) are traveling on crashes and they get separated in the jungle. I forget where the setting was supposed to be. It doesn't really matter as these cannibal movies are fantasies with no basis in reality. They usually film them in the Philippines and get the locals to wear dirty wigs and ham it up, which is alright by me if it's alright with them. It's a living, right? Walker gets caught by a primitive cannibal tribe, who tie him up, rip his clothes off and play with his penis. Maybe they are impressed, I don't know, but instead of eating him they imprison him. He witness all kinds freaky stuff while caged, but eventually escapes and takes Pulan, a beautiful local girl, as a hostage (Me Me Lai, also in Lenzi's 'Man From Deep River', made before this, and his 'Eaten Alive', made after). Their relationship is difficult to fathom and depends a lot on which cut of this movie you see. Walker is eventually reunited with his old pal Rolf and then decides to kick some cannibal butt. Really the plot is slim, and who cares? This is just an excuse to see lots of gross stuff and Me Me Lai's breasts. If I was forced to defend this type of movie I really couldn't, but hey, I enjoyed it while it lasted. My favourite cannibal movie is still Sergio Martino's unfairly dismissed 'Mountain Of The Cannibal God', starring Ursula Andress and Stacy Keach, which was released the year after this. It isn't as hardcore as the Lenzi and Deodato movies but it's lots of fun.

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10 out of 15 people found the following comment useful :-
The first great hit for the cannibal genre, 28 June 2005

Author: Helltopay27 from United States

Congratulations, Mr. Deodato, you've done it again for the first time. As weird as that sounds, it's true. Though Umberto Lenzi technically started the cannibal genre with the classic The Man from the Deep River, it was Deodato with Last Cannibal World that kicked the genre in the ass and really got it going, and unlike most films that share this genre, this is actually a good, legitimate movie. The influence this movie had on the genre is easy to see in subsequent films, which borrow heavily from events in the movie (most notably Lenzi's Eaten Alive and the awful Primitif). Too often are very heavy movies considered horrible and a waste of time simply because of the content. People ignore what factors go into a good movie. Good acting, good plot, good dialog, all are present in Last Cannibal World. It's great capture and escape adventure movie, not just obscure and violent trash. Deodato made a select few films that are his masterpieces, and however exploitative and violent they may be, they come together as thrilling and disturbing cinema hits. Last Cannibal World is one of them.

Mr. Rob Harper is in his group flying to Borneo (or somewhere in that region) with his good friend, Rolf, and his pilot and girlfriend, Charlie and Swan. The plane breaks down and they fix it, but have to stay the night because it gets too dark. Well, Swan disappears in the night, and Charlie gets a spike ball looking for her the next morning. Rob and Rolf are lost, and they soon separate in a raft accident. That's when Rob is captured by the cannibal tribe. De-clothing ensues, and Rob is, lets say, "mistreated" over the next few days. It's the beautiful cannibal Pulan, played by Me Me Lai (with implants and all) that gives Rob the chance to escape, even though he treats her like a low animal (except for when he decides she's worth have intercourse with). Be warned, the mysogyny is high in this film, as many cannibal movies are. If that upsets you, you'd better find a cut version. Despite this rape, Me Me realizes Rob's in charge, and actually helps and cares for Rob. Rob finds an old friend in the jungle, but the cannibals are coming back for them. Pulan is killed and eaten as a traitor in an incredibly well done montage going back and forth from Rob to the cannibals. Will he make it back to his plane and escape on time?

This movie is far better than what one may expect because of the heavy content. Yes, the violence and gore is extreme, but all elements present make it a good adventure movie. The plot is superb, and the dialog isn't bad at all, which is usually the problem with such films. There are actually plot twists as well, which is rare for the cannibal genre. Characters you forget about come back to support the film. Any gore monger would be satisfied and then some with this movie. The blood and guts are in enormous quantities, with organs and all intact and close-up. However, there's some rather disturbing images, also, which can make even the hardest gore lovers cringe, particularly the graphic birthing scene. The way the natives kill and then eat people is incredibly brutal, as they rip the rib cage in half and use it as the cooking medium. Massimo Foschi does a great job of portraying the character Robert. He shows sublimely that even though we're on his side and think the natives are the savage bad guys, we ignore the fact that eventually the hate and mal-treatment shown towards him shapes Rob into a savage himself, showing no regard to morals or ethics. This is best shown when Me Me Lai tries to escape, so Rob punishes her by raping her. All of these morals are almost exactly mirrored in Cannibal Holocaust, but in a far more brutal and disturbing way. Of course, however, there are the issues with the animal killings, as six or so are killed on stage, so an uncut version isn't for the animal activist or weak constitutions. Most of these killings are not plot elements, and are mostly unnecessary. The biggest problem I have with it is that the alligator they kill stays alive for most of the time, making the scene almost as disturbing as Cannibal Holocaust's "turtle scene."

A few qualms are present, however. The aforementioned animal killings can seem out of line, though some help for the plot. One hilariously unnecessary scene is Rob messing with the little cannibal kids, who moments before were peeing on his head. I've never had use for such scenes, which seems a lot like comic relief for a brutally intense film. Overall, however, it's a better than average cannibal film, and I'll even go to such lengths as saying it was outstanding. Last Cannibal World isn't a cheesy laugh-fest like most other cannibal movies are, and it's definitely for the better. This is one of Deodato's best work, surpassed only by the incredible and incredibly visceral Cannibal Holocaust. If you enjoyed any other cannibal films even slightly, then this is the next movie for you to see. It is outdone in Italian exploitation only by Cannibal Holocaust and Cannibal Ferox, and was the first great hit for the cannibal genre.

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4 out of 5 people found the following comment useful :-
Brilliant Italian cannibal film that offers so much more than guts and grue, 6 November 2000

Author: Casey-52 from DVD Drive-In

Director Ruggero Deodato carried on the tradition of the Italian cannibal subgenre by contributing arguably the best entries in the genre, JUNGLE HOLOCAUST and CANNIBAL HOLOCAUST. While CANNIBAL dealt with a very human threat in a cannibal tribe, JUNGLE is almost a more grueling film in that the villain of the film is the setting itself, the jungle surrounding the adventure.

A professor crash-lands in the jungles of the Phillippines and is captured by a tribe of stone age men, who torture him and hold him captive to use as bait for food. He manages to entice a young tribal girl to help him escape. Deodato creates a tense, grimy look at mankind. His cinematography is constantly fluid, never stopping for a second, in endless trucks, dollies, zooms, arcs, and cranes. Amazing visuals! The musical score is excellent, as well, but I still liked CANNIBAL's better. Lead actor Massimo Foschi is unbelievably good as the professor who undergoes mental and physical torture while kept in a cave. He witnesses the horrific punishments of the tribal people, including ants eating a man's arm clean off.

Deodato makes the jungle the real villain in the story. The jungle is filled with harsh conditions and jungle noise that adds to the atmosphere and injects suspense and tension into otherwise normal scenes. The jungle becomes a character and what a character it is. It requires the professor to revert to his primal instincts and abandon all civilized thought, making a harsh comment on human nature in the process. Me Me Lai is excellent as the native girl who helps Foschi escape and Ivan Rassimov appears too briefly, but is good anyway. This film is no picnic in the park, it's a bitch. By the end of the film, the viewer feels like they have been to Hell and back along with the protagonist. But that's what makes this film work so well. To many viewers' chagrin, Deodato, as he would later demonstrate in CANNIBAL, shows too much real-life animal mutilation.An alligator is torn apart while still alive, a snake eats a mouse, and other horrific scenes. It adds to the realism factor, but then again, that is broken anyway by Me Me Lai's breast implants!

JUNGLE HOLOCAUST is obviously not for everyone, but I can't recommend it enough. It is long out of print, but Grindhouse Releasing should consider re-releasing it. After taking on CANNIBAL FEROX and CANNIBAL HOLOCAUST, why not close the infamous "Cannibal Trilogy" with a remastered letterboxed DVD of JUNGLE HOLOCAUST?

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2 out of 2 people found the following comment useful :-
An adventure in the jungle., 30 March 2006

Author: CannibalThing from United States

Jungle Holocaust opens with some beautiful shots of a small aircraft flying over a seemingly endless jungle. The four people on the plane are going to the middle of said jungle to check up on a mining crew one of them sent out there. When they get there the camp is of course empty, and all that they find of the inhabitants is a heavily decomposed head. They end up having to stay the night in the plane because the pilot, understandably, will not fly over the jungle in the dark. At this point their situation goes from bad to worse as they have to deal with getting separated, a tribe of natives who just happen to be cannibals, being lost, and being far out of their element.

The movie centers around Robert Harper (Mossimo Foschi) and his ordeals with the cannibals and the jungle in his struggle to get home. The character development is a highlight as the events take their toll on Robert's psyche. He becomes more savage, animal like, and at times it seems, insane. Actor Mossimo Foschi does a very good job portraying all of this, by the way. Actress Me Me Lai is never clothed, a plus in my book, and performs well, though her obviously fake breasts do detract from the believability as she is supposed to be playing a native.

There isn't much gore but some of what there is can get a bit strong. Some will find a scene with a crocodile particularly hard to watch.

Overall Jungle Holocaust is one of the best of the Italian Cannibal genre and is oddly uplifting for this kind of film. Highly recommended.

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2 out of 2 people found the following comment useful :-
Savage, wild, and fascinating, 27 March 2006

Author: bensonmum2 from Tennessee

*** This comment may contain spoilers ***

As a primer for the better known Cannibal Holocaust, Jungle Holocaust is definitely not a movie for all tastes. It's rough and raw presentation of savagery would put-off many a viewer. And because director Ruggero Deodato chose to use real aboriginals as his cannibals and real jungle locations, the movie has an authentic feel to it that serves to increase the unsettling feeling Jungle Holocaust produces. I've never run into a real cannibal, but this is what I would expect them to look like. They're dirty, vicious, and wild and (other than one exception) completely believable. The situations our hero Robert Harper (Massimo Foschi) faces seem real making the horror in Jungle Holocaust very effective.

Beyond the gruesome on-screen action, the acting is a real highlight of Jungle Holocaust. Foschi has the most screen time and does the most with it. His slow disintegration into madness and to the savageness of the cannibals around him is fascinating to watch unfold. It's a terrific piece of acting. Me Me Lai has the second most screen time and while she's good in her non-speaking role, she's also the one exception to the believability factor in the movie I mentioned previously. I sincerely doubt that any stone-age, cannibal tribe in the history of the Earth contained a woman that looks as good as Me Me does in Jungle Holocaust. She looks too good to be believable and stands out like a soar thumb when compared with the other tribe members.

Finally, a word of warning: Those who do not want to see real animals die on-screen had best be advised to stay away. If you are easily offended by this kind of stuff, don't' watch the movie. While I personally find these scenes unconscionable and disgusting, I was able to get past them and appreciate and even enjoy the brutal nature of this fascinating film.

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1 out of 1 people found the following comment useful :-
Last Cannibal World (1977), 13 April 2007
Author: Steve Van Kooten from Manchester, Iowa

*** This comment may contain spoilers ***

(Jungle Holocaust) Contains ample nudity, loads of real/fake gore. A near disaster plane crash lands a group of decent people in a jungle inhabited by a cannibal tribe. Soon, one of them is captured and must fight to escape and survive the treacherous wilderness. - - - The first half hour of this movie is possibly the most well paced, creepy first act of any movie I've ever seen. Everything is portioned out right and features just enough horror to tantalize your interest. Sadly, once the movie moves into "Mondo Cane" style rituals and live animal killings, the movie draws to a dead halt and is difficult to slog through. Real animal killing has never bothered me too much, but the gratuitous flapping genitalia was a little hard to watch after a while. The movie picks up nicely for the last third and is suitably tense until the final frames- which isn't exactly the definition of a happy ending. there's a lot to like here, as with most of Deodato's movies, but he also includes some repugnant elements that end up distracting the movie to an unnecessary degree. A good movie, but not for weak stomaches or people who are just getting into the cannibal genre.

* *1/2 out of 4

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1 out of 1 people found the following comment useful :-
Just a warm-up to Cannibal Holocaust, 18 November 2006

Author: TheatreX from Louisville, KY

It was interesting to see Ruggero Deodato in the introduction to this film because he certainly doesn't look like someone that would put out the gut-churning films that he does. It was also interesting to hear that he was very much against the scenes of animals being killed and they were more or less inserted into the movie afterward. I guess he could have insisted they be taken out? Oh well. As for the film, some folks are headed for the jungle and upon landing their small plane they find out that their people that were stationed there are missing, apparently victims of the local cannibal tribe that lurk in the jungle waiting for Italians to happen along. The researchers have lost a wheel on their plane but when it's been fixed it's too dark to leave, so they hole up in the plane for the night & all might have been well had it not been for the need of Swan, the woman that was with them, to step out of the plane for a pee break. Of course she's dragged away by the natives and the remaining three go in search of her when it's light and quickly become the remaining two. Now these two men build a raft and take off down a river, only to become separated at some rapids when they hit the rocks and one remains. He is hungry and picks the wrong type of mushroom to eat and ends up being caught by another tribe (not cannibals, I guess) and imprisoned, and subjected to torture and humiliation. He does manage to escape with the help of a young native woman (Me Me Lai) and off they go into the jungle. They do find the other guy though (Rolf) and the three of them try to make their way back to the landing strip, although Me Me Lai is frequently trying to lead them away from that area because she knows what lurks in that direction. This isn't bad as far as cannibal/jungle movies go, it does have a couple disgusting scenes but is far eclipsed by Deodato's later film "Cannibal Holocaust". One thing that this shares with many other Italian Cannibal Operas is that the music chosen (especially for some of the more gruesome scenes) is incredibly inappropriate..lush orchestration more suited to romances or ANYTHING other than scenes of folks getting eviscerated or decapitated. Overall this is a decent jungle cannibal adventure flick, though, and a bit more tolerable than some of Deodato's later gruesome stuff. 7 out of 10.

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1 out of 1 people found the following comment useful :-
The One that Started Them All?, 26 April 2004
Author: squeezebox from United States

JUNGLE HOLOCAUST is a brutal, no-holds-barred early entry in the bizarre cannibal subgenre of the seventies and early eighties. It's shocking, violent, immoral, sleazy and exploitive. In other words, it delivers.

I can't defend this movie from an ethical standpoint. Even the observation that the live animal slaughter (which is fairly minimal here) is committed by people who apparently were members of a real tribe of primitives, as part of their daily routine doesn't change the fact that it was shot for purely sensational purposes. But it is undeniably intense, suspenseful and creepy.

A plane lands in the Amazon wilds while searching for a couple of lost explorers. The people in the plane wander off a little too far and become separated. The movie then follows one of them, who is captured by a tribe of cannibals and kept prisoner for months. He finally manages to escape and kidnaps a young, beautiful female member of the tribe to use as a guide.

The movie has a gritty realism to it that makes it play almost like a documentary. It captures the gradual transformation of the character from a "civilized" man to a grunting "savage" extremely well, although a scene in which he wins over his female companion by raping her is a little over-the-top, to say the least.

The midsection of the movie is almost entirely devoid of dialog, so the atrocious dubbing is confined mostly to the first and last sequences. Overall, it's a very well-made and unsettling thriller, although it would have been far more suspenseful had there not been a disclaimer at the beginning saying the main character survived to tell his story.

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