Joe D'Amato built a reputation based on shock and exploitation. When you go into a D'Amato film, you are expecting something offensive and usually, in a weird way, entertaining. Of his films that I have seen, he usually delivers the goods but in the case of Anthropohagus, the movie fell short of expectations. Rather than being intrigued by not knowing what was coming in the next scene, I found myself getting quite bored as the main characters wandered around a deserted island. Although there are a few moments that people talk about from this movie, I would not recommend sitting through the whole thing just to get to the last ten minutes. If you are enough of a gorehound to want to see a cannibal lunatic munch on a freshly extracted fetus and later eat his own intestines, I would suggest skipping through to the final few chapters rather than waste 75 minutes getting there.

Tisa Farrow (Mia's sister who was also in Zombie) stars as Julie, a young woman who hitches a ride on a small boat to an island so that she can visit her friends. Also aboard are Zora Kerova (Cannibal Ferox) as a tarot-card reading weirdo, Serena Grandi (Delirium, Miranda) as a pregnant woman, and a few guys. After the prolonged voyage to the island, they arrive only to find that it is abandoned. They take a quick look around and return to the boat but it has miraculously moved offshore to a distance that is too far to swim. Being the practical group that they are, they decide to go to the house where Julie's friends live and spend the night. Once they get there not much happens until they check the basement where they find one of her friends covered in blood and wielding a knife providing the most effective scare in the flick. They calm her down and talk some more until at long last the final act arrives and spaghetti-spolitation staple George Eastman shows up as the title cannibal freak to shake things up.

I don't know why D'Amato didn't pepper this film with some of the shock moments rather than save them all for the end. The effect of this poor pacing was a whole lot of disinterest on my part so that when things actually did pick up, I wasn't that into it anymore. Sure, there are a few good moments sprinkled here and there such as a suspenseful scene in some catacombs but they were not enough to pick up the tedious pace and make me excited to be watching the film. The other problem is that the characters are all quite boring and there is no David Warbeck or Giovanni Lombardo Radice around to give me someone to cheer for. The guys in this movie are all pretty invisible and the only actor who gives an interesting performance is Kerova who was underused. The saving grace of the flick is Eastman who is memorable as the demented flesh-eater who kind of looks like the subway-dwelling monster in Raw Meat. In fact, his whole character reminds me of that guy. The difference is that Raw Meat is a much better flick.

In the 80's this was one of the most notorious of the 'video nasties' due to a couple of scenes which I have mentioned but unlike other movies from this era, this is all that the flick has going for it. It looks and feels like it was made quickly and cheaply and the suspense and effects are minimal. As I said before, if you want to see gore, skip to the end. If you want to see an entertaining D'Amato flick, check out Emanuelle and the Last Cannibals or Beyond The Darkness. Anthropohagus is followed by an unofficial sequel entitled Absurd where Eastman returns as a similar character. For those who care, an anthropophagus is defined as a person who eats human flesh. (Josh Pasnak, 3/29/09)

Directed By: Joe D'Amato.
Written By: Joe D'Amato, George Eastman.

Starring: Tisa Farrow, George Eastman, Zora Kerova, Serena Grandi.

aka: The Grim Reaper, The Savage Island.