L'Amazone nue

Feitico do Amazonas (aka Naked Amazon) is a documentary style (real or set-up I really don't know) adventure into the heart of the Brazilian 'Green Inferno'. The documentary (or is that mockumentary?) team launch a year long search at the end of Carnivale for the mysterious and reportedly dangerous native tribes at the heart of the deepest, greenest uncharted areas of the Amazon. Dangers are around every corner as the beautiful jungle tries to take out the filmmakers at every turn. 'Naked Amazon' is a relatively tame precursor to the 'Mondo' genre spearheaded by 'Mondo Cane' some eight years later. There is however some animal killing (a boa constrictor and possibly an anaconda) as well as a sequence that has a river of crocodiles being smack rather mercilessly with oars and such. As can be expected there is plenty of local nudity as well. So if these things make you squeamish than this film might not be for you.

NAKED AMAZON is one of the earliest mondo-style documentaries and quite possibly the forerunner to future fare like the infamous MONDO CANE series. This one's a Brazilian production that features striking local starlet Andrea Bayard as one of a group of explorers who venture into the untamed Amazon to, well, see what's there. The film follows the usual travelogue format with ponderous, say-what-you-see style narration, lots of reaction shots, clips of wildlife and staged adventures. While the requisite native nudity feels very ordinary these days, the film is unfortunately marred by some real-life animal killing which, as always, is the blight of this genre.