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Flesh Eaters (The)
R0 - America - Dark Sky Films Review written by and copyright: Noor Razzak and Roger Nicholl (28th March 2006). |
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The Film
 A young couple is fooling around on a yacht; an unbearable R&B song is on the radio (remember that this was made when R&B actually meant Rhythm and Blues). The man is playful, maybe stoned. The woman is pouty, but only for show. He chases her round the boat. He accidentally rips her bikini top off. She jumps in the water. We see nothing, except her die in a Jaws-like manner (i.e. in the water). Cut to the docks where the sea planes are moored. A drunken actress, Laura Winters (Rita Morley) and her assistant, Jan (Barbara Wilkin) hire a pilot, Grant (Byron Sanders) to fly then to the Caribbean so they can make it in time for rehearsals. The pilot agrees for triple his usual fee because they’ll have to out race a tropical storm. It’s a race they don’t win. They’re forced to land on a deserted island and ride the storm out. Well, deserted isn’t the right word since it’s inhabited by one guy, Professor Peter Bartell (Martin Kosleck) and some sort of flesh-eating plankton that floats in the sea. Seamen have nautical terms to describe almost everything, but I’m sure there isn’t one that describes that sort of archipelago arrangement. Professor Bartell is a strange German scientist, who comes wandering out of the sea in scuba gear which, judging by the reaction of our marooned heroes, is supposed to make him look like some sort of monster. However, he just looks like a guy scuba gear. The Professor leads them to his tent where they wait for the storm to pass so they can continue their journey. But events conspire against their onward journey, and they begin to suspect the Professor is up to something strange. And that flesh-eating plankton arrives. Oh, before the plankton arrives they talk, a lot. Speaking of arrivals, about half way through this guy called Omar (Ray Tudor) paddles in on a raft while blasting records on his hi-fi. If you’ve ever wanted to know what a space cadet was, Omar is the epitome. He’s the complete tripped out hippy, spouting almost total nonsense about love, and generally perplexing everyone on the island and in my living room (i.e. me and two dogs). It’s so completely out of tone for the film, that it’s strangely marvellous. Imagine you’re watching Se7en (1995) and half way through Morgan Freeman gets killed and Brad Pitt‘s new partner is Rodney Dangerfield. It’s totally out of place, but awesome none-the-less. In The Flesh Eaters, which was getting a bit talky, Omar is a welcome burst of life. In their island wandering strange things are discovered, and this reminded me vaguely of Lost. And some of the long stretches of competent, clichéd character development reminded me exactly of Lost. Other than that the stories are completely different. If you like Lost please don’t rush out and see this and then complain to me. The script is overall too competent in terms of dialogue and characters to be so bad it’s funny. That’s the job of the special effects and action scenes. The acting is solid from the straight characters, and Martin Kosleck does an excellent scientist who’s brilliant with large hints of nutcase. The Flesh Eaters is something for B-movie fans to check out, but it shouldn’t be at the top of the list. Non-genre fans will probably find it silly and boring. But, despite all that, certain images and feeling from the island will stay with me. Over time they’ll separate from the silly and talky elements of the film and I’ll find myself, over a few beers, waxing lyrical about the island. Then my drinking companion will go and watch it, and ring me to ask what the hell I was talking about. B-movies form a strange universe in your mind.
Video
Presented in the film’s original theatrical ratio of 1.78:1, this anamorphic transfer is head and shoulders above what I was expecting. I’ve watched many B-grade films on DVD and the commonality between them all are their overall poor presentation on DVD. I’ve seen some films that are not only damaged but taken from VHS sources, you really do need a decent transfer to get a good look at the bad special effects. In most cases the distributor simply doesn’t care to invest the time and money to restore these films, which is a shame. Dark Sky, however, have done a phenomenally good job with this release. The image maintained a consistent level of sharpness, although some effects shots appeared a tad softer than the rest of the scenes, contrast is balanced and blacks are deep and bold. The print exhibited some grain and the occasional scratch but these were few and far between and were never an annoyance.
Audio
Only one audio track is included the film’s original English Dolby Digital 2.0 Mono track, which as it sounds has also been given a clean up. Dialogue is clear and distortion free, it’s an adequate track for this film and I’m glad that Dark Sky included the original sound rather than up-mix to a 5.1 track. It won’t blow your mind but you won’t notice anything much out of the ordinary and that makes for a pleasant viewing experience. Optional subtitles are included in English for the hearing impaired.
Extras
First up we have the Long trailer which runs for 1 minute 5 seconds and has a narration from the director, this is followed by the Short trailer which runs for 23 seconds. Next up is the Rare Nazi Experiment Sequence, a deleted scene which runs for 4 minutes 6 seconds. It includes a brief scrolling text introduction about the footage and is book ended with the scene from the film that it was supposed to cut into. This sequence shows the Nazi Scientists experimenting with the Flesh Eating water on human subjects. The experiments wielded results that proved the Flesh Eaters only attacked living cells, corpse that was thrown in come back out untouched. Rounding out the extras is Nazi Experiment outtake, this silent footage runs for 49 seconds, we see naked women being dropped into the bubbling water and a skeleton being pulled out.
Overall
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