EDITORIAL: Just What the Hell is ‘Antropophagus’?

In 1980, director Joe D’Amato made a movie called Antropophagus (aka Anthropophagus) (aka The Grim Reaper), and it’s quite... unique. It’s not unique in the way that surreal horror like Hausu or Eraserhead is; more so in its execution. I’ll elaborate on that shortly.

In Antropophagus, a group of tourists visit an island resort. Upon arrival, they discover that the entire island is empty. As it turns out, there is a cannibal serial killer on the loose, and he begins to hunt them down, just as he did the previous inhabitants.

As a complete work, this movie really isn’t very good. There are some positives, though. Tisa Farrow (of Lucio Fulci’s Zombie) is one of the stars, and she gives a pretty good performance. George Eastman, who also wrote the screenplay, plays the titular killer, and it is hard not to be suckered in by his manic and diabolical glee. Eastman also played supporting roles in two of my favorite spaghetti westerns, Keoma and Django, Prepare a Coffin!, so he is clearly a rather versatile performer. And for the most part, the gore effects in the film are pretty decent, in addition to being used in creative ways (another point which I’ll address later). Joe D’Amato is a serviceable enough director, but nothing all that special. While I’m not extensively familiar with his filmography, he did direct a film called Death Smiles On a Murderer, which is an exceptional giallo, so I definitely recommend that one.

There is one particular scene that caused this film to gain some notoriety among horror fans. The cannibalistic villain strangles a pregnant woman and actually eats the fetus (which, in reality, was a skinned rabbit). Obviously, the shock value, alone, turned plenty of heads, and it led to plenty of outcry. It ended up being banned in some countries, and was only given heavily edited video releases for a while. Eventually, the uncut version was restored and released on video, furthering its cult status. The scene in question is about as unsettling as one might expect (though it pales in comparison to many more recent extreme horror), and it most definitely leaves an impression.

But here’s the main problem with the film: most of it is actually pretty boring. Aside from the fetus scene, there is one other gory sequence that’s pretty gnarly and cool, but the movie is kinda dull. It meanders along with long stretches of little to nothing happening. And the film isn’t atmospheric enough to warrant that kind of languid pacing. Some horror films, like The Shining or last year’s Midsommar, have a rich and ominous atmosphere that justifies having plenty of scenes that don’t necessarily contribute to the main story. With Antropophagus, you just feel like they’re trying to stretch the film to its 92-minute runtime, despite having only about 45 minutes worth of material.

Adding on to the strangeness of it all is that Joe D’Amato and George Eastman actually made a sequel... kind of. The writer/director team made a movie called Absurd a year later. But other than D’Amato directing and Eastman writing and starring, there is no connection to Antropophagus whatsoever. While it was marketed as a sequel, it is, in fact, a crappy ripoff of John Carpenter’s Halloween. It’s really not even subtle about it, even down to a little boy referring to the killer as the boogeyman. There’s really not much to recommend with Absurd.

Antropophagus is certainly a curiosity. Despite being a lousy movie, its infamy is based on one particular scene gave it cult status; a movie that probably would have flown under the radar. It’s fascinating how one particular taboo can push just the right buttons to generate notoriety for just another low-budget, run-of-the-mill Italian slasher movie.