New Page 1

THE PRIMITIVES

AKA: Primitif, Savage Terror, Der Todesschrei Der Kannibalen

Tag Line : Captured by flesh-eating savages.

The Primitives This is one of the rarer and harder to find cannibal films from the late 70's, which is actually by an Indonesian film crew as opposed to the Italians who dominated the cannibal sub-genre during it's short lived cycle.

Sharing distinct similarities with several other cannibal films, a group of student's go into the Pangayan jungle to observe the tribal customs of one of the native villages. Deciding that the local tribesmen are a bit too civilised to be worthy of study, they bribe their guides to take them deeper into the jungle in search of real primitives, which has predictably grim results.

Their raft overturns and the group becomes separated, and it isn't long before the 2 smaller parties find themselves being picked off by the local wildlife and various animal traps set by the natives, before the surviving members are captured by a group of savages who drag them back to their cave as they prepare to turn them into their next meal (though I'm not sure native women wear lipstick and eye shadow as evidenced here).

Pre-dating "Cannibal Ferox" by about 3 years, the film actually seems more akin to "Last Cannibal World", and even borrows several scenes from that movie. Perhaps the most bizarre thing about the film though is it's odd choice of music which opens with the song "We are the Robots" by 70's techno artists "Kraftwerk", and utilises tracks from the likes of Jean Michelle Jarre and even some of John Williams "Star Wars" music.

Not quite as gory or violent as the other films of this ilk, with the exception of a few yucky scenes of animal killing (an alligator being gutted and an orang-utan having its head split open), this is one that can really only be recommended to cannibal film completists.

Overall marks : 5/10.

Other Information.

The film has been released uncut in Holland on the 'Sunrise tapes' label under the title "Primtif", in Australia by 'Video Classics' as "Primitives" and in the UK back in the early 80's by 'Go Video' under the title "Savage Terror". More recently there's been a German language DVD by X rated by the title "Der Todesschrei Der Kannibalen". These releases however have all been out of print for some time.
The German release of the film by X-rated has a different intro title sequence, which misses out the music by Kraftwerk.
Director Sisworo Gautama Putra still works in the Indonesian film industry, his most notable film being Jaka Semberg/The Warrior.
Barry Prima, who plays the guide "Amri" is a prominent Indonesian actor and still features in films to this day. He also featured in the title role of the aforementioned Jaka Semburg.
A DVD of the film is available on a double feature disc from US bootleg firm Video Asia, which is available from Amazon.com. However this is clearly a VHS transfer taken from an Indonesian video and quality is not the best.