Synopsis
Opening with a prologue/flashback set in Vietnam, the movie gets right into the good stuff (as far as films like this are concerned): a raid on a cave complex being used by the Viet Cong leads to exploding dogs, flamethrowers torching VC, and cannibals munching on human flesh. The three protagonists - Norm (John Saxon), Charlie (Giovanni Lombardo Radice, billed as John Morghen) and Tommy (Tony King) - are introduced. Charlie and Tommy are prisoners kept in a pit in a Viet Cong camp, Norm is their commanding officer who leads a raid to rescue them. He is also bitten by Tommy...which somehow passes on a "cannibal virus."
The rest of the movie takes place years later in dreary looking Atlanta. Norm seems to be fairly well-adjusted. He's married to Jane (Elizabeth Turner) and has a nice house in the suburbs; however, he also has flashbacks to Vietnam that lead to him staring lustfully at raw meat in the fridge. While Norm isn't as bad off as Tommy and Charlie (both have spent their time after Vietnam in a mental institute) he is clearly not without problems. Played with a numbness that either shows a deep understanding of the character or a complete lack of interest in the role by Saxon, Norm's façade of normalcy rapidly starts to crack, starting with his biting Mary (Cinzia De Carois, billed as Cindy Hamilton), a trampy teenager living next door, during a brief dalliance.
The infection, however, continues to spread from one victim to another. At Jane's urging, Norm goes to the mental hospital for a check-up, is overcome with the urge for fresh human flesh, and helps Charlie, Tommy and Helen (May Heatherly - playing a doctor infected by a bite from Tommy) escape. The cannibal quartet winds up being chased into the Atlanta sewer system where, in an obvious parallel with the prologue, flamethrower armed cops chase the "enemy" through the man-made caves while Norm talks about going to the airport, in order to fly back to Vietnam.
As the film fades to black, all of the leads are dead and the authorities think the menace is over. With the last shot of an infected Mary, however, the audience knows that things are just getting started.
Analysis
What is impressive about the film is the major theme of the film; cannibalism as a stand-in for the trauma of war and its life-long effects. All of the vets display traits - albeit exaggerated - that one associates with post-traumatic stress disorder. Emotional detachment punctuated by outbursts of rage. Flashbacks to the horrors that haunt them. A love/hate relationship with the source of their trauma; at one point, Charlie rants about what's great in Vietnam - "leeches," "snakes," and "Viet Cong booby traps." At the end of the movie, Norm dresses in his uniform, to face what is his inevitable demise. By doing so, it is clear that Norm never left the war behind. And, it also serves as an indictment of a society that sends men to fight, but views them with suspicion, fear or indifference when they return home.
While not The Deer Hunter, this is certainly an interesting attempt to take the cannibal/zombie horror film and do something more than just go for the gross-out - although there is plenty of that too. Cannibalism as a metaphor may not be subtle; but it is pretty effective. Notes While technically not zombies - the flesh munchers are not dead - this follows the tropes of the zombie film. The zombie reflects aspects of culture - the fear of disease, the fear of death, the unease with consumer culture, even the idea that in the modern world we are nothing more than anonymous members of a mindless herd - all of which are found in Cannibal Apocalypse.
Verdict
Cannibal Apocalypse is a fun, goring romp. Check it out.
The trailer, just for you. Because I care (and it's on YouTube).
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