3. Eaten Alive! (1980)
I had to watch Eaten Alive! - one of Umberto Lenzi's many cannibal movies - the other night to remind myself just how dreadful it really is. And it shouldn't be a bad film with a cast boasting Robert Kerman, Ivan Rassimov and other many Eurotrash luminaries. Cannibal Ferox (also directed by Lenzi) was made before Eaten Alive! and it is a veritable masterpiece compared to its successor. Lenzi isn't even trying with this film. There are the requisite animal cruelty scenes, the predictable trek through the jungle, the usual native suspects. There is even another castration scene and lots of gut munching. The 'twist' in this film is the existence of a Jim Jones-like cult in the jungle, in which Jonas (Rassimov) lords it over his subjects and likes to use rape as a weapon of terror and penetrates women with dildos covered in snake blood. Music from Cannibal Ferox pops up during some of the climactic scenes where the cult members all kill themselves with poison laced liquids and some opportunistic helicopters rescue the hero and heroine. Devoid of any tension or charm, Eaten Alive! is a scuzzy, but profoundly boring cannibal movie. And the worst thing is, it is scraping the barrel so much, you can't even laugh at it due to its dullness. File under D for dirge.