Exotic as well as entertaining adventure movie based on a novel by the Spanish writer Alberto Vazquez-Figueroa who directed as well . In this weak but passable film there is intrigue , explotation , nudism , suspense , emotion , frenetic action and that's why it is fun enough . Apparently, the flick is actually allegedly based on a real true-life story . Victor (Hugo Stiglitz) is a boatswain who arrives in Providence Island governed tyrannically by Almeida Brothers who trade with human blood. The evil brother dictators traffic in human blood from the unfortunate islanders, selling it to developed countries. The population of the island is living horribly in very poor conditions suffering from hunger and hardship. Victor after losing his ship is also unhappy when he is attacked by bandits to rob him, and he meets the unfortunate and lazy Beni (José Sacristán) who is deeply exhausted due to the continuous blood draws . Along the way Victor is imprisoned by nasty Lucas Almeida (Jorge Luke) , dictator's son , and he's condemned to Las Salinas prison but he gets escaped . Victor gets aways through the sunny desert suffering thirsty and starvation , eventually he meets two jealous spinsters (Isela Vega , Terele Pávez) and then things go wrong .
From start to finish the drama develops with intensity enough including fights , shootouts , pursuits and being a little bit violent , at times . In the film there is thriller , suspense , emotion , action , dramatic events and that's why being amusing enough . Apparently, the flick is actually allegedly based on a real true-life story . This adventure movie also contains thrilling and adventurous elements as well as gorgeous moments when our starring escapes across desert and he's relentlessly chased . On a hand it is an enjoyable adventure film , including usual ingredients : deserts , volcanic outdoors from Lanzarore island , oasis , and anything else . On the other hand the valuable cast and promising screenplay are undone by sometimes slow pace . The picture is based on a novel with same title by successful Spanish author , an adventure expert and prolific author called Alberto Vazquez Figueroa who gets numerous cinematographic adaptations such as : ¨Manaos¨ , ¨Tuareg¨, ¨The Iguana¨ , ¨Ocean¨ , ¨Oro Negro¨ and ¨Rottweiler¨ . Factual reports on newspapers aboy human blood smuggling were a key source when author Alberto Vázquez Figueroa wrote this movie's source . It has a passable direction by Figuroa himself , in his film debut that wrote the script too , adapting his homonymous novel , adding a superb casting and spectacular scenarios from Canary Islands. And once again Alberto took the director chair in 1979 with ¨Manaos¨.
Alberto Vázquez Figueroa was born in Santa Cruz de Tenerife, Canary Islands in 1936 When he was not yet a year old, his family was exiled to Africa for political reasons, since his father was a socialist republican and was imprisoned during the Civil War. He spent his childhood between Morocco and the Sahara until he was sixteen years old. His father was released, but he was hospitalized for several years because of tuberculosis. Also, while in Africa, his mother passed away. Vázquez-Figueroa was then picked up by his uncle, the civil administrator of the military fort in the Spanish Sahara where they lived. This began to provide him with books to read, especially adventure novels by authors such as Joseph Conrad, Herman Melville or Jules Verne, which made this his favorite genre. At the age of 16 he returned to Tenerife to study. He worked as a diving and diving teacher on a training ship "Cruz del Sur", with Jacques Cousteau, where he would stay for two years.4 He worked in the rescue of corpses in Lake Sanabria after the Vega de Tera which destroyed the town of Ribadelago. As a journalist he covered wars and revolutions in Bolivia, Chad, Congo, Guatemala, Guinea, the Dominican Republic and others. As a writer he wrote Sand and Wind, his first novel, at the age of fourteen (which was published at seventeen), but it was not until he had been a journalist for fifteen years that he began to earn enough to dedicate himself exclusively to his literary career, which includes more than sixty years with a lot of successful published books. His success came with his 15th or 16th novel, Ebony, which deals with the slave trade in Africa. A film was made of this book a year after its publication; it would be the first of more than fifteen. Other works of his that are recognized by him are Manaus and Tuareg. In 1975 he wrote an autobiography, titled Anaconda. In 1966 he opted for the Nadal prize with the novel I do not believe in anyone, which was never published. In 1979 Manaus premiered on the big screen, directed by him. The Amazon, the desert, the African jungle, are some of his favorite themes, developed from extensive documentation. As he has commented, the fact of having traveled halfway around the world has given him the experience and experiences necessary to give realism to his novels.
