Make Them Die Slowly (1981) Aquarius Releasing/Horror RT: 90 minutes No MPAA rating (graphic bloody sadistic violence and gore, cannibalism, language, nudity, drug use) Director: Umberto Lenzi Screenplay: Umberto Lenzi Music: Roberto Donati (as “Budy”) and Fiamma Maglione (as “Maglione”) Cinematography: Giovanni Bergamini Release date: December 1983 (Philadelphia, PA) Cast: John Morghen, Lorraine De Selle, Bryan Redford, Zora Kerowa, Walter Lloyd, Meg Fleming, Robert Kerman, John Bartha, Venantino Venantini, ‘El Indio’ Rincon. Box Office: N/A
Rating: *** ½
The Italian-made shocker Cannibal Ferox was released under the title Make Them Die Slowly in the US. The tagline proclaimed it had been banned in 31 countries. It carried a “No One Under 17 Admitted” warning in lieu of an official MPAA rating for its graphic violence. In other words, it was a teenage gorehound’s dream come true. Unfortunately, it didn’t open at a theater near me, so I had to wait about two years to see it. I found a copy at West Coast Video and rented it. I wasn’t disappointed.
Written and directed by Umberto Lenzi (Nightmare City), Make Them Die Slowly is an oddball piece to be sure. It starts out like some TV cop show from the 70s complete with the generic music that typically opened these programs. A junkie comes to his supplier’s apartment and gets killed by mobsters. They’re looking for a guy named Mike (Morghen) who stole a lot of money from them. The NYPD arrives on the scene and assumes it’s just another drug related murder. The scene then switches to South America where Gloria (De Selle), an anthropology student working on her dissertation, is out to prove cannibalism is only a myth and doesn’t actually exist. She’s joined by her brother/research assistant Rudy (Redford) and easygoing best friend Pat (Kerowa).
The trio heads off into the Colombian jungle where they encounter Mike and his seriously wounded friend Joe (Lloyd). Mike explains they were captured and tortured by cannibals. He further claims their Portuguese guide was tied to a stake, castrated and killed. The group arrives at a small village where the inhabitants seem to be afraid of them. They decide to rest there as Joe’s condition worsens. It soon becomes evident that Mike is lying about what happened. In a moment of lucidity, Joe tells them what really happened. Mike tried to force them to reveal the location of some emeralds. He tortured and killed one of the natives, then kidnapped a young girl to ensure his escape. The girl ends up getting killed. Now, the natives truly are restless and want their revenge.
The movie switches back to New York a few times as an aggressive detective (Kerman) pumps Mike’s girlfriend (Fleming) for information about his whereabouts. After a near-fatal encounter with the mobsters, she tells him where Mike is. Back in the jungle, the Americans are captured and that’s when Make Them Die Slowly kicks into full bloody gear. We get a castration, a disemboweling, a woman gets hung up by a pair of metal hooks through her breasts, somebody gets attacked by piranhas and, in the movie’s piece de resistance, somebody gets the top of their head severed and the natives eat the brains. These are the gory highlights of the movie. Cool effects, I must say.
Okay, the acting is awful and some of the dialogue is definitely laughable. The characters aren’t too bright either; they should have known Mike was trouble as soon as they saw him snorting cocaine like it was nasal spray. I like how Lenzi juxtaposes the jungle adventure with the NYPD investigation. It’s a 70s cop show with graphic gore. I’d love to know how Kojak or Mannix would handle this case.
Italian-made horror movies are usually pretty gory. European filmmakers don’t seem to have the same inhibitions as American ones. Some of them are terrible, but I have to admire a movie that has the balls to show graphic violence accompanied by copious amounts of gore. Look at the Spanish-made chainsaw killer movie Pieces. It’s low-quality. It won’t win any prestigious awards. It’s nice and bloody though and that’s what counts.
I feel the same about Make Them Die Slowly. It’s pretty decent overall even if it comes up short in the area of quality filmmaking. Oh, who am I trying to fool? It’s terrible filmmaking! That’s not the point of Lenzi’s gorefest (which isn’t as gory as I remember it being in ’85). Who looks for quality in a movie about cannibals in white body paint? It’s meant to gross out the viewer and succeeds. It’s much more raw and visceral than today’s horror movies, the Saw movies in particular. The killings feel more real although I could have done without all the animal killing. I know those scenes weren’t simulated. In any event, being killed by cannibalistic jungle dwellers is far freakier than falling victim to a guy in a weird mask playing deadly games. Make Them Die Slowly is definitely unnerving. On the basis of this movie, I won’t be making any trips up the Amazon any time soon…. or EVER!
