An old used VHS of Jess Franco's incredibly sleazy Italian-Spanish-German-French financed 1980 Cannibal epic SEXO CANIBAL (aka THE DEVIL HUNTER) is up for auction on EBAY now. Runtime is listed as 90m. The last time I looked there were 0 bids. This MANHATTAN VIDEO presentation has Dutch subtitles but may be preferable to the US DVD presentation which appeared earlier this year as one of the "Terror Tales From The 'Hood: Special Edition, Volume 8" from VIDEOASIA on a double bill with Manuel Cano's 1972 Spanish mummy howler, VOODOO BLACK EXORCIST.
VBE is a fun oddity but obviously ripped from the old fullscreen, heavily scratched late-1980's US video release. I still have my prerecord which I rescued when my local Mom and Pop video store, the one with a huge Eurohorror selection, was shuttered in the late 1990's . THE DEVIL HUNTER, on the other hand, is completely unwatchable. with the bottom of the image masked off (I believe to cover subtitles which would indicate a Japanese source), digital censoring of the frontal male and female nudity featured in the film (that really tags it as a Japanese product) and extremely blurry video quality. To top it off it's missing several gore sequences (since sex and gore are what this item is all about this presentation is totally useless) and the opening credits have been chopped.
I nominate this as the worst Jess Franco DVD ever! But you do get "2 GIANT features" for under $10.00 and an invitation to join a "Monster Fan Club" located on 1313 Mockingbird Lane, Westminister Abbey, NJ 66666... The cover art suggests 1970s era blaxploitation but it wouldn't surprise me if VIDEOASIA made a nifty profit. I've heard most of their previous TERROR TALES editions also feature poor prints from video sources. SEXO CANIBAL also had a 1980's video release as MANDINGO MANHUNTER [!] and could usually be found at your local Blockbuster Video.
COMMENTARY BY ROBERT MONELL: (C) 2006
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