Sexy Cannibals?

As a film student, I have to look into the strange subtexts of movies to explore the possibility of social and political messages the movie may represent. I know that this is basically a reflection of the treatment of Vietnam War Veterans but I see it as something completely different... in fact, I see Cannibalism in films being a symbollic reference to sexual taboo. Here is part of an essay I had to write about Horror movies and the monster within. Have a read and give me your thoughts. Enjoy!

'The idea of the Horror movie is more than just a series of scares. It is a study about the human condition under extreme circumstances and exposing the somewhat negative traits of man, envisioning the monster within as the ‘metaphorised modern subjectivity as a balancing act between inside/outside, female/male, body/mind, native/foreign’ and so on. This equality battle for supremacy is what creates the tension in a horror movie, having each individual having to face a choice of either being the evil or misunderstood monster or to be punished by it. The creature, villain or protagonist becomes a representation of society placed into a corrupted world, left to tackle contemporary insecurities through whatever means the character considers to be necessary. The majority of these messages are those that the audience can either relate to or understand as a commentary to the society at that moment in history. The Horror filmmaker could show this as an outside threat tempting or punishing the victim or as an interior mental breakdown of the certain character due to a personal insecurity, leading into drastic or extreme measures.
Cannibal Apocalypse is an Italian Cannibal movie that expanded on the realms of grind house gore and the exploitation of middle-class society to a film that even with an in-depth subject matter was banned in most countries for several years. After the launch of the 1979 George Romero movie Dawn of the Dead, the European cinema market exploded with a bombardment of many explicit zombie-like films, many being more of a gore-fest than a story of true cultural importance, mainly aiming on the conflict between the innocently civilised and the intensely savage. However, this movie can be an imitation of Romero’s film in the way it has been tackled, exploring different human emotions, views and indulgences through an indescribable cause or desire to taste another person’s meaty flesh.
Cannibal Apocalypse treats the cannibalism as a virally transmitted infection, much like the way most zombie movies depict the result of an attack. However, unlike zombie movies, it wasn’t caused by a scientific means such as radioactivity or mutation, but as a forced cultural shift. One person started this interest in cannibalism, taking this fetish to an irrational proportion. But oddly, this experimentation caused a mutation in the blood, making those victims bitten by a cannibal to become one. From the way each individual is tempted by this strange sensation, it appears as though they are being pressured into being apart of this special group by their peers, as if they have been ‘totalizing and each consuming other lives in order to prolong their own.’
The mental demon of peer pressure is very clear through the main protagonist, Norman Hopper played by John Saxon. He got bitten by his colleagues during a gruelling mission in Vietnam which still haunts him to the present day, having terrible dreams about the incident, and always reliving the moment the mental infection occurred. Norman has tried his hardest to avoid such temptation, constantly battling his alternate tastes. After many years, he has seemed to have buried these unnatural urges. It is only until one of his soldier comrades decides to randomly contact him after so long that this frightful craving remerges and has to fight back before he crumbles under the pressure to become this monster, seeking professional and personal help to help overcome the demon. This could be related to overpowering complex found in the mythical horror character Dr Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. Norman starts with the civilised yet haunted man that sadly produces his own personal Hyde ‘from within his own psyche and cannibalizes him when the pressure is on.’
If each character is being tempted to express their inner being through both this infection and peer pressure, what is the terrifying drama they all fear to express? The idea of transmitted infection and subtle tension between characters could be showing cannibalism as a representation of man’s secret sexual desires being exposed. The peer pressure that Norman Hopper receives through his cannibalistic friend to open up and become one of them is a subtle demonstration of a man’s fear to admit or understand his own sexuality, denying his possible homoerotic identity by suppressing these feelings that he was introduced to by his comrades for so many years and hiding it by having an ordinary, straight lifestyle.
The spread of the cannibalism is a clear but not completely obvious symbol of sexually transmitted diseases, having the cannibals shown as those with HIV or those who experiment with the unconventional while the victims are those who indulge in safe, protected sex lives. The tension created between the cannibal and its victim is that of exposing the unknown sexual needs and telling to either be apart of it or die without ever exploiting it, similar to that of vampires who tempt their victim with the ideas of eternal life and power, exploring what they thought couldn’t be done, but only to be shunned and scared by modern civilization, forced to live in darkness and secrecy. It is an illustration of man’s apprehension with sexual exploration and its fear of enjoying something deemed abnormal by society.'


Discuss.