We'd totally bin this, but we're waiting for a Letraset Haunted House Action Transfers Panorama Set to turn up on e-bay, as the opportunity of combining the two is something we just can't resist. Gary Glitter for your watch and finger nails? Well, fair exchange is no robbery.
‘Brutes and
Savages’ is a mondo film, so you’ll know what to expect: dusky foreign breasts
and repulsive animal cruelty.
The clearly Italian ‘Arthur Davis’
leads an expedition into Africa and South America to document the primitive rites
of the indigenous people, the titular brutes and savages. His modus operandi is
to tip up to a remote village and ask for the head man’s permission to film
some notorious ritual that the tribe are famous for. When the chief refuses (perhaps
because he is frightened of Arthur’s salmon safari suit) Arthur makes the culturally insensitive decision to go
ahead and film it anyway, at which point we cut to some faked footage that goes on for ages. Don’t worry
though: ‘all scenes, whether actual or
simulated, represents actual truth’.
This truth
includes a turtle having its throat cut, a goat being decapitated, a llama
having its heart removed and numerous scenes of birds and animals killing and
eating each other. Oh, and a monkey gets put on a fire.
The whole thing peaks very early on, with a bizarre sequence
in which African tribesmen are forced to wade through a river as part of their
initiation into manhood. Using stock footage, blatant re-enactment and a series of
unconvincing models, the film makers stage a fatal crocodile attack, including
jump cuts to footage featuring a different man battling a plastic croc in what looks
like a California swimming pool. It’s pathetic, especially the fake hands and fake head
stuffed in the fake reptiles fake mouth. Worryingly for the viewer, this is the
highlight of the film, and there is still an hour and fifteen minutes left
to run.
It's a long haul to the end, although we
do get to see men simulate sex with llamas and get a sneak peek at South
America’s most important collection of ‘erotic pottery’ (Arthur takes great
pleasure in pointing out the penises). Mostly, however, it’s quite boring,
interspersed with uneasy moments of graphic nastiness. On the plus side, the music is by Riz Ortalini, and is excellent, although sadly unavailable at present, which is just fucking typical.
In the end analysis, the
narrator (the recently deceased Richard Johnson, slumming it to the extent that
he is virtually a homeless, meth addicted derelict) asks if these ‘brutes and
savages’ are really any worse than us so-called sophisticates. Is slowly sawing
out the throat of a turtle any different to killing a chicken? Does having deep
freezes and TVs make us better people? Aren’t we all really brutes and savages
at heart?
He’s got a
point.
But,
unfortunately, he chose to make it in this film.
