1. Cannibal Holocaust (1980)
A notorious Video Nasty from director Ruggero Deodato, Cannibal Holocaust seems to split opinion between people who think it is brilliant and people who detest it. The basic plot line concerns an Anthropology Professor who wants to go to the Amazon to investigate why a team of documentary makers apparently vanished. He ingratiates himself with the tribe and recovers the documentary crew's video footage and brings it back to NYC. When he lets the footage roll, the Professor finds a litany of debauched and depraved acts on behalf of the crew. He also wtches their brutal comeuppance. Despite having one of the daftest lines in Euro horror ever - "I wonder who the real savages are?" - Cannibal Holocaust is a generally unsettling movie which successfully utilised the lost footage film format years before The Blair Witch Project. It was innovative film making. The animal snuff is pretty revolting - worse than the human on human violence. Mind you, the human on human violence is so realistic, Deodato was accused of making a snuff movie and he had to parade his actors round an Italian court to prove his innocence. In the end he escaped with a four month suspended sentence for animal cruelty I basically think that Cannibal Holocaust is a grim parody of Mondo films - that most Italian of film genres. Obviously the crew were filming a Mondo-type movie about cannibals. Most Mondo films contain violence against animals so Deodato was depicting that accurately. The main Mondo film making team in Italy was Jacopetti and Prosperi. They faced allegations that they staged events for the camera - in particular murder (Africa Addio). The team in Cannibal Holocaust torch the mud huts of the natives just for something interesting to film. There is actually real life Mondo death footage in the film whenever the Professor views the crew's last effort - The Green Inferno. I'm not sure what Mondo film it is from but it is definitely for real. Just as many people thought Cannibal Holocaust's horrors were for real. Should have been called Mondo Cannibal.