ChanFamous I wanted to like it more than I actually did... But much of the humor totally escaped me and I walked out only mildly impressed.

Taraparain Tells a fascinating and unsettling true story, and does so well, without pretending to have all the answers.

Tayloriona Although I seem to have had higher expectations than I thought, the movie is super entertaining.

Calum Hutton It's a good bad... and worth a popcorn matinée. While it's easy to lament what could have been...

GL84 Going along on a trip with friends, an accident strands the group on a small island in the Greek Sea where the completely empty and almost abandoned town is found to be the home of a relentless and vicious killer is after them forcing the group to find a way to fight him off to get away alive.This one is a lot better than many give it credit for. One of the main reasons for this comes from an unexpected source of the old-school vibes it has spread throughout the film. It is nice to feature some old-school Gothic flavors mixed into a gore film, and we get a large amount of the usual trappings in here from candle-lit walks through darkened rooms, the winding corridors heading off seemingly forever, stormy nights banging in the distance, and a quite creepy scene where one character walks through a large tunnel using only a torch for light and comes across a large number of ancient skeletons lying in the walls of the catacombs. Coupled together with the knowledge of the group being stranded as well as the concept of the abandoned, deserted village full of rotting corpses, the old-school nature of the film goes hand-in-hand with the films' most infamous nature in the unrelenting gore, which is in abundance here. There is a bloody machete in the head, a couple stabbings, a chunk of the neck bitten out, and a special scene that is the cause of its infamous nature. It's incredibly gory and comes as a complete shock when it happens, as it's not an expected scene in the situation going as far as it does. Beyond that, the film also does set-up the story quite nicely, with the continuing revelations of the killer slowly coming to light in a series of coincidences and discoveries that shed some light on the killer during the final half which manages to raise this one quite nicely. As well as the frantic final chase around the house that has plenty of action and some more good gore, the film does have a few minor issues that hold it back somewhat. The main issue here is that this is quite slow for the most part. It starts off quickly but then dangles for a while and nothing happens. Granted, the Gothic scenes are nice to watch, but only one has anything resembling a pay-off, leading to nervousness and then boredom as to when something is going to happen. The action comes in spurts as well, so it seems even slower than normal. When it needed to go for the jugular, it stopped to show an exercise in Gothic flavor that wasn't all that necessary and it does inter-cut with the flow of the film. The biggest flaw, though, is the killer. This is one of the less-scary killers in history. Other than killing people, there really isn't anything done to him that makes him scary to viewers. His look is also a problem and the cheap make-up looks more like a mask which makes him look more laughable than anything. Otherwise, this one wasn't all that bad of an effort.Rated NR/R: Extreme Graphic Violence, some mild Language and Brief Nudity.

MonsterVision99 "Antropophagus" it's a 1980 horror film by Joe D'Amato, this is quite an interesting movie, its very different from your average Italian gory exploitation film, I don't have anything to compare it to, Joe D'Amato manages to deliver a decent amount of thrills with the small budget and the little ambition he had for this film. The worst parts of this movie are it's boring scenes, they dominate the film to a huge extent, but that doesn't mean that the film its boring in its entirety, it has a decent amount of scenes that I found to be quite interesting, suspenseful, and even fun. The gore its cheap, but that's expected from films like this, with an incredibly small budget, but D'Amato creates a dreadful atmosphere with its direction and the locations he chooses.I cant say that its a forgettable film, some scenes are quite riveting and memorable, like the scene in the catacombs, a very grotesque and dreadful scene, or its amazing ending scene.I would recommend the film for those who like D'Amato's films, its quite slow at times, but it has some memorable scenes, and its suspenseful at times.

choochooman7 Anthropophagus (or The Grim Reaper, which is a cooler title) is a mostly terrible, unspectacular, and uneventful horror film that slowly stalls through it's non-plot, with some minor chasing and bloodshed during its brief conclusion. On most grounds, it is an undeniable failure. While it features the same goofy problems of every Italian horror flick from this period (terrible dubbing, bland acting in service of non-characters, and a story and sequence of events that don't seem to have been thought out in any logical fashion), this film creates a bigger sin than others of its ilk; it's about absolutely nothing for most of its scant runtime. Most Italian splatter flicks from this era are garbage, but entertaining garbage, and occasionally well-shot and insane garbage. But this film seems to exist in some sort of narrative black hole.The film follows a group of 6 boring tourists who travel to a small island for some bland fun: Tisa Farrow (who was briefly bitten by the acting bug just like her look-a-like sister Mia minus having, you know, any talent and never becoming famous), this guy who I think is supposed to be the male lead, but he doesn't do much and disappears for the entire last act of the movie (only to show up in the last 5 seconds to save the day!), this other guy who looks EXACTLY like the other guy, even down to having the same face and wearing the exact same clothes, he has a pregnant wife (uh oh!), this guy who is younger than the other two guys who falls in love with Tisa Farrow's charm and beauty, and Zora Kerova who completes the pointless love triangle by being in love with younger guy. Zora also acts as the one person who has a bad feeling about their trip to the island, as every one of these movies requires the crazy hysterical skeptic who turns out to be right about the evil amongst them. It's an easy way to work around characterization. Anyway, after an underwhelming opening kill, it takes the film almost an hour before the killer shows up and one of the central cast members is killed. An hour. It's amazing how long the characters are safe for in this film. They wander around, sleep in a spooky house during a thunderstorm, and wander around some more outside, and everyone is always A-OK, the killer is no where in sight. And then BOOM thunder reveals he's in the house with young guy and requisite blind girl. And the biggest surprise is that the cannibal maniac is actually kind of scary, genuinely.But his brief first appearance past the halfway mark of the film turns into another lengthy absence and he disappears for another half hour (!) only to show up again for the last 10 mins. D'Amato must have been going for a less is more approach, and normally I'd agree, but when the rest of the film is so static and uneventful and not particularly effective at sustaining any consistent mood or dread (though there are occasional moments that are decent at building this), it seems like an odd choice. D'Amato, the epitome of the lowest dreck of Italian cinema, and from what I read more interested in the business side of filmmaking than the artistic, either was genuinely trying to make a spooky film that didn't rely on only gore and sex (in fact, there's no sex or nudity to speak of), or they had no budget and most of the film is filler. There's no doubt the film is meandering and boring for 90% of its runtime, and the characters somehow feel like mannequins AND are blandly over-developed ("I sometimes work at a TV studio" "I'm in pharmacy, only 2 more tests and I have my degree").So it's a waste of time....except that killer is eerie! He's barely in the movie, but maybe that makes his appearance more effective. The make-up work is on the cheap side (as is all the gore), so some shots of him look better than others. But I must admit the chase/well climax kind of works because he is genuinely intimidating and threatening looking, and the music is actually kind of cool. It's an odd film because it is SO bland and uneventful, it doesn't seem right to suddenly have the cast be attacked by a giant scary madman with a gross face. A cast this minor and a plot this scant and atmosphere this lacking should feature a predictably lame villain, but in this case he's actually scary. And that well climax is a cool idea and is pretty suspenseful, though it doesn't milk the idea to its full potential, and then is kind of ruined by the film's stupidly abrupt ending.And disappointingly, most of the characters get off easy and get pretty minor deaths (except of course for the pregnant woman whose fate is the only one in bad taste, therefore it's the only memorable one). Zora Kerova is practically killed humanely for this type of movie (merely gets her throat slit, off screen I should add).So it's almost a complete waste of time, except for that killer, who fascinates me. He's like an uncontrollable, rogue element who doesn't seem to belong in the film, which is what makes him so off-putting and eerie. He doesn't conceivably belong in the movie; he's too creepy of a killer for a movie this uninvolving and pedestrian. So in that way, the movie stayed with me, despite 90% being a real slog. Is it worth it? That depends on whether one wants to put the time in to watch a worthless film with an underused but uniquely unsettling killer. He deserves to be in a better film. Anthropophagus just screams for a remake.

sbaldwin999 Antropophagus from director Joe D'Amato is a pretty notorious movie, mainly for making it's way onto the infamous UK "Video Nasty" list. When your hear about this movie you probably hear about its gore, mainly 2 infamous scenes that cemented its place in the list. I think this reputation hurts the film though because, in all honesty, the gore in this movie is pretty weak (except one scene that I will get to). People go into this movie expecting a very nasty and extremely gory horror movie but come out pretty disappointed at the shoddy gore effects and extremely slow pace...Well, that's because they overlooked all the great and more subtle things that the movie DOES deliver on.First off, this movie is creepy, a combination of atmosphere, music and a wonderfully over-the-top performance from George Eastman make this movie one of the spookiest Italian slasher flicks I have ever seen. Scenes of characters exploring darkened corridors by candle light are some truly creepy scenes and sort of remind me of more classic horror movies from decades before. There are also some really great jump-scares too. The cat is cheap, but effective, the girl popping out of the wine barrel is definitely effective and lastly, the scene at the end where Eastman's character emerges from the well nearly stops my heart every time I see it! There is some fantastic atmosphere in this movie as well, the deserted Greek town is beautiful but haunting, whether they are walking through the halls of a house or the streets of the town there is always a feeling of something not quite being right.The Music heightens the creepiness of all the scenes so well. Some might consider it to be annoying but I would call it nerve-wracking. Finally, and most important, is Eastman's character... this man is disgusting, disturbed and definitely somebody you would NEVER want to meet in real life. He towers over everyone with his immense stature, the make-up is excellent in giving him a monster quality. His performance is so over-the-top but it provides the energy the movie needs to keep it going.If there is one thing that I think sets Joe D'Amato apart from the rest of the Italian horror directors, it's the way he ends his movies. All his movies I have seen contain a wonderfully shocking and over-the-top climax. I think Antropophagus has the best climax of all too. I will try not to give too much away but basically Eastman's character reveals how truly mad he really is (as if he could be any madder) and in a fit of insanity we finally get rewarded with the one truly excellent and extremely disturbing gore effect that wont leave your mind for days to come.Everything else is pretty standard when it comes to Italian exploitation but I do think it's worth mentioning that there are some above average performances from Tisa Farrow (Zombi 2) and Zora Kerova (Cannibal Ferox) that make the characters a little more likable than your average slasher.In the end, I think Antropophagus is a really great Italian horror that should be appreciated for it's scares, not its gore. Don't listen to the hype, cause it's misleading.