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Grim
Reaper, The AKA ANTHROPOPHAGOUS
BEAST
(1981) |
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The film begins with some horribly cheesy 70's style titles and music followed by a shot of a seemingly abandoned little boat drifting aimlessly by a pier. A couple arrive with their dog for a bit of fun in the sun and while the lad strips off his t-shirt, the girl has already wriggled out of her clothes and pounced into the water. Moments later she notices the little tug and swims towards it while there is an underwater Jaws-like camera-shot clearly indicating that something in the depths has got its nasty eyes on her. Just as she reaches the boat she is violently dragged into the depths by an unseen force. Her warm blood bubbles up, staining the surface. The boyfriend should normally have noticed what was going on but he happens to have his headphones on so loud that even the whining dog has no effect. Whatever was in the water now emerges and heads for the entranced man who has time only to look up at his image on the blade of a hatchet before it hacks open his head with a single blow.
The scene shifts to the mainland where a bunch of tourists are gathering for an expedition, one of them a very pregnant woman and another a typically neurotic clairvoyant. They are joined by Tisa Farrow who is just hitching a ride to the mysterious paradise island that they are all dying to visit. Predictably the psychic blonde starts playing up and someone or the other mentions how the townspeople were warning them not to go the island and to remain in the safety of the city. Upon arrival at the island amidst much forewarning music, the pregnant woman sprains her ankle and has to stay on the ship to attend to her swelling. The rest of the crew head out, but they are constantly watched and shadowed by some lurking presence that begins to take an interest in the pregnant woman and eventually drags her off having beheaded the fellow who was manning the boat. The group shack up in an abandoned mansion waiting for the tide to change before they attempt to rescue their boat that has drifted out inconveniently. In the mansion, one of the men is attacked by a blind girl with a knife and stabbed in the back. He survives, but it soon turns out that the blind girl was the very least of their worries. When she calms down, she tells the group about this sick cannibalistic beast on the island that has eaten his own wife and child to survive and now feeds on unwary tourists who happen to wander onto the island. She tells them that she knows when he is near because she can smell his stench of rotting flesh. One man tries to subdue the hairy beast but gets a chunk bitten out of his throat for his troubles and is left for dead in a pool of warm blood. More grim atrocities follow but most of them are shot in such murky light that one can hardly make out the horrors on screen, just as well because they are pretty grim. It's a very tedious, inept and uninteresting film and only remains of any consequence because of all the notoriety it has managed to attain. The film remains banned in the UK and remains a most sought after item on the underground horror circuit especially the lengthier cuts of the film with all the gore intact. Joe D'Amato has managed to make a bit of a name for himself as an exploitation master of highly sleazy proportions. This grisly, murky and gratuitously nasty film is truly dire stuff, despite its lofty reputation. Spare a thought for Tisa Farrow who shot this and Fulci's gore epic Zombie virtually back to back in her effort to rival sister Mia for fame and glory. Rumour has it she ended up driving a taxi cab in New York City where she lost an eye in some typical city violence. First dealing with blood lusting Zombies, then having to fend off an Anthropophagous Beast, all for nought. For what it's worth Ms. Farrow would have carved out a tiny little niche in horror history with her little brave/foolish foray into euro exploitation splatter. This Grim Reaper is one to steer well clear of.
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