13 Movie Hoaxes That Completely Fooled Everyone

3. Cannibal Holocaust Is A Snuff Film

Almost two decades before The Blair Witch project fooled audiences, Ruggero Deodato's classic 1980 cannibal horror flick tricked many with its unflinchingly realistic violence and extremely convincing faux-documentary style.

Cannibal Holocaust remains controversial for its numerous sequences of real violence against animals - with six animals being killed on-screen in the movie - but at the time of its release many media outlets claimed that many of the film's human deaths were also real.

Deodato was eventually arrested and charged with murder, and Deodato's protestations of innocence were further clouded by many of the film's actors signing contracts preventing them from making media appearances until a year after its release. This seems utterly ludicrous in the age of social media, but it was a very different time.

Eventually the actors were convinced to appear on an Italian TV show while Deodato extensively detailed the film's impressive special effects to the court, leading to the charges eventually being dropped.

Without the benefit of contemporary savviness, though, it's easy to see how the media could manipulate people into believing these shockingly realistic death scenes were legit.