A Ilha da Morte

Island of Death is a true ungodly video nasty coming to you straight from the best euro-exploitation period. This year 2003, the movie received a complete digital remastering and it finally got released on special edition DVD. The box showed nothing but a red background with the explicit words : "The one movie that the censors didn't want you to see" and "sorry but we can't display images of the film on the cover since they're too gruesome". A bit exaggerated of course, this movie is far from being the goriest or most shocking film I've ever seen. Nevertheless it's mean-spirited, raw, brutal and pretty disturbing from time to time. "Island of Death" doesn't take the rules of humanity too strict and it isn't exactly what they call "politically correct". The movie seems to start like a lovely romantic comedy when a young couple arrives on a Greek Island. They look average but in fact they put other famous cinema couples like Bonnie & Clyde and Mickey & Mallory to shame. They brutally slaughter every person they come into contact with (mostly right after sexual intercourse which give the killings a nasty effect) and they have a few bizarre fetishes.

Island of Death doesn't contain much humor unless you see the irony in many things. For example: the guy kills homosexuals because he thinks it's pervert and against the will of God, while he himself has sex with a young goat! I thought that was pretty ironic, and there are lots of similar "jokes" to discover in "Island of Death". Even though there are a lot of horrible scenes, the movie itself is pretty light and not at all difficult too watch. Excellent stuff for exploitation fans. The leading actress (Jane Ryall) is a beauty but she never played in movies again.

Director Mastorakis is apparently the first to say that this film was made with one driving force - Money.

It's clear to see that the director has sat down and said 'what's the most depraved, shocking and disgusting ways in which to rape, torture and kill a bunch of people' and on this level the film works.

However, don't go looking for some deep underlying message to whats going on. I find it impossible to find any way of excusing this nasty little piece of cinema by saying that it has some thought provoking undercurrent quite simply because it doesn't.

The story is of a couple arriving on a Greek island and instantly punishing the local residents for what the male lead see as sinful behaviour. Amongst the supposed sins are adultry (an ironic one given the nature of the stars vengence), homosexuality, lesbianism, drug-abuse and....well being a goat.

The scenes of violence are rather tame compared to many films of its time let alone some of the blood-soaked mainstream movies about today. But it is not the violence that shocks about this film still today. It is more so the notion of the acts commited and the seemingly pointlessness of them.

Some have called it a nasty little gem, others have found it to be over-hyped and rather dull, I however found it to be a classic piece of exploitation cinema. If you can't enjoy the film for it's visual acuity, I defy anyone not to enjoys its heavy seventies kitsch soundtrack, Classic.

This is one of the original 'video nasties', and still only available in a heavily cut version in the UK (although easily available in uncut R1 format). Apparently made quickly to make cash for its first time director Nico Mistorakis, it is the story of a young tourist couple, Christopher and Celia who arrive on the picturesque island of Mykonos. At first we think them innocents, entering a world of terror. Soon it turns out that in fact they are the monsters, Christopher in particular being concerned to rid the word of 'perverts', photographing the mayhem as they go through local acquaintances - at first for kicks, then to cover their tracks. Much of the film is just a pretext for a catalogue of imaginative slaughter. The acting is variable at best (Jayne Ryall, playing Celia looking particularly bemused at the whole business, and this was her only film). The film includes sex and rape, both human and animal but, like so much of its ilk, is ironically coy about these physical acts, showing only such nudity and rare bursts of pubes as would sit easily in a softcore sex comedy. The exception is perhaps the urination scene which, because it is so unexpected and rare away from porno cinema, does at least raise eyebrows. The much vaunted 'goat rape' is patently faked and unconvincing but, as it takes place very early on at least alerts viewers to the real nature of the psychopathic Chris.

Surprisingly for a film with such a strong reputation, none of the violence really shocks today, although the range of deaths (by crucifixion and paint poisoning, hanging from a plane wing, heroin overdose, sword and scythe, bulldozer, etc) have an ingenious variety - a testimony to the director's plan to outdo competing exploitation films in range. Celia's bathtub rape is loud and threatening, but that of Susan George in the newly uncut UK issue of Straw Dogs is much more disturbing as well as actually being 'concluded' in the scene. It's another case, I would suggest, of sensibilities having moved on, leaving the BBFC unduly squeamish in cutting so much. Victims of the homicidal holidaymakers include homosexuals, lesbians, a middle aged nymphomaniac, 2 hippies, a Frenchman, a policeman (sent to track the notorious duo down) and so on.

More of interest is the way in which the film provides continuous ironic inversion on a normal holiday narrative. The attractive island, full of native white buildings, blue skies and sunshine, looks to be straight out of a travel brochure, and our sense of place is aided by some reasonable good cinematography. Chris and Celia are the 'tourists' who are visiting, relaxing, and taking plenty of pictures. The difference being of course that they are snapping the humiliated, dead and dying rather than the serene landscape around them, making themselves a different sort of vacation altogether. `We do everything vice versa' as she says, and the film gains most of its power from the stream of atrocity-attractions visited upon the community in this peculiar context. It's their casual return to traditional holiday locales (the local taverna, romantic beach walks or cosy white washed rooms) between murders which is ultimately more disturbing than anything done in the meantime. Island of Death still bears watching, and is considerably better worked than some of the other 'nasties'. If you take this as a recommendation of course, that's up to you.

This movie is really twisted, I loved it! If you're easily offended by extreme sexual and violent content, don't see it! Death scenes are numerous and sometimes very original. The lead female is never dressed for more than 3 minutes (she's a beauty) and when she takes it off prepare to see something pretty BAD happening. She and her "husband" hate deviant people, they want them all dead. The only problem they have is that they ended up on an island where almost no one is "normal", it's like a perverts heaven so the job is never finished... Acting isn't so bad and the landscapes are so beautiful they made me want to see the island of Mykonos with my own eyes. The ending is a must see, I can't even find the words to explain it but its some kind of a sweet revenge for the goat that we see in the beginning of the movie...

Island of Death is the Video Nasty equivalent of the story of Bonnie and Clyde. This film has an elevated status on the Video Nasty list as it's often seen to be one of the more nasty entries. This is certainly true, as the film features all manner of gory and sadistic sequences, and it really isn't hard to see why it got banned. As far as I'm concerned, Island of Death is an absolute treat, as the film is a constant stream of highlights and it's a great deal of fun seeing our central couple skipping from one murder to the next. It's obvious that the film is not meant to be taken completely seriously, as director Nico Mastorakis implements a pitch black sense of humour into most sequences; the fact that the central duo are complete and utter hypocrites is perhaps one of the most amusing things about the film. The plot simply follows a young British couple who travel to a small Greek island. After a phone call to the man's mother, it soon becomes apparent that these aren't normal people; and when they start murdering their way through the island's perverted inhabitants in the name of God, this notion is confirmed!

The film is notorious for a few scenes, the one involving a goat being of the most well-known. However, aside from this; the film features a plethora of gory highlights to delight the exploitation fan, favourites of mine involving a man hanging out of a plane and a rather one-sided swordfight. As you would expect from a Video Nasty, the acting is rather poor; with the central duo putting in particularly horrid performances. It really doesn't matter, however, as director Nico Mastorakis makes up for his actor's lack of talent by selecting a beautiful lead actress; and the stunningly clean Greek locations, which brilliantly offset the gritty scenes of slaughter. Films like this are quite common, as aside from Bonnie and Clyde, we've also had Badlands, Natural Born Killers, True Romance and more; but this is the one that is relentless and really gives the audience the impression that anything can happen. The film boils to down to an excellent climax, which delivers a brutal final twist to the tale as well as serving up comeuppance...well, almost. Typically for this film, the comeuppance isn't dished out in the most immediately obvious way, and overall; for its imagination, brutality and daring - I don't hesitate to recommend this film!