Anthropophagous the Beast

aka

The Grim Reaper (US)

Man eater

Man beast

The Savage Island( venezuela)

Aristide Massaccesi (Joe D'Amato)

1980

88min 14sec

Re released at 87min 57sec

No longer available

Extended credits

This effort from Aristide Massaccesi is one of the most notorious video nasties and is completely banned in the U.K. , on watching the film for the first hour or so it certainly doesn't live up to that level of hype, not until one key scene starts the gore trip on a roll. The amazingly gruesome baby eating scene is so drawn out and nasty that most will think it is sick beyond belief, but look deeper and it's scenes like this that actually make the film what it is , an exploitation power house.

Before I had seen the film myself, I was expecting little more that an extreme gore film, but what most critics who've seen it seem to have missed is D'Amatos undoubted talent for filming scenes which cross the taste barrier with amazing gusto and cruelty.

Compared to a masterpiece such as "Zombie Flesheaters", this film obviosly doesn't stand up as a complete picture, but on the scenes that D'Amato does hit the mark, he does so brilliantly !

The plot is nothing to write home about , a bunch of holiday makers island hopping Greek Islands pick a bad one and are almost all slaughtered in a variety of gruesome ways. The story line's crap and so is the acting ! But as with most of the great horror nasties it doesn't matter.

This film has taken quite a slating by most of the mags, unfairly I think ! As it's an excellent horror film for a few reasons, the beast himself is a really nasty piece of work and far scarier that your usual slasher flick, the gore when it gets going is as good as most things you'll see , all in all it's not a classic but still a must see!

Gore Highlights

The first scene of the film shows a sun-bather getting a meat cleever through the head.

Things go very quiet for the next part of the film but eventually the beast makes its first appearance and rips one of the groups throat out !

He then goes on to knife another and then the infamous baby eating scene ! ( say no more).

The best gore scene is when he pulls a womans head through a hole of splintered wood ripping her face open, he then bites a chunk out of her throat.

The final scene shows the beast getting speared in the gut , all his entrails start spewing out , he then rips them out, takes a mouth full and drops down dead!

Back to Nasties List