After falling so in love with Nightmare City, I immediately had to rent another Umberto Lenzi film. I figured he'd captured lightning in a bottle with Nightmare, but I had to give it another chance. Eaten Alive, isn't anywhere the same level, but it's also entertaining in the same fashion; good in a so-bad-it's-fun kind of way, bad acting, terribly inept action scenes, over-the-top gore, and obscene nudity; but instead of zombies this film focuses on cannibals.

The Italians had some sort of weird obsession with cannibal films during the late 70's, early 80's; cranking out endless films with morons entering the jungle, getting their clothes ripped off, then eaten by some blood-thirsty natives; with Cannibal Holocaust being the zenith and most famous of the bunch. It stands to reason that one of their best horror film directors would tackle the genre; which he actually did twice, directing Cannibal Ferox after this and Nightmare City. I read better things about Eaten Alive, so I tried it first, but I'm sure I'll get around to Ferox eventually.

While watching this, I wasn't sure if I'd seen it before or if another film had used some of the exact same locations, or possibly even the same footage. Because while I didn't remember this exact plot, I did remember the cave that they filmed in, with our hero climbing around trying to escape the tribe of cannibals. All these films are so similar, that they're tough to discern. Eaten Alive's is about a woman whose sister is kidnapped by a cult that has their compound deep in the jungles of New Guinea. Determined to bring her back, she hires a jungle guide to take her in to find the cult, led by an obvious Jim Jones type. (The Jonestown Massacre was two years before this film was released.)

The cult leader wants the world to go back to a simpler time, be closer to God, and once you enter his compound he won't let you leave. So the woman and her guide are forced to live the cult life, taking mind-altering drugs, and in her case painting her nude body gold, while they figure out a way to escape with her sister. Things are made tougher when the jungles they're living in are surrounded by cannibals. Eventually they escape, people are eaten, heads removed, spears chucked, helicopters hung from, native women exposed (some with obvious fake breasts no less), cult members drinking the Kool-Aid, and many animals killed. That's always been the most disturbing thing about these films for me, the fake blood and gore while people are eaten, are nothing compared to the real-life on screen killing of these jungle animals; animal torture is not my idea of entertainment, and unfortunately they're prevalent in this genre.

If you've never seen an Italian cannibal film; start with Cannibal Holocaust. If you've never seen an Umberto Lenzi film; start with Nightmare City. But if you've seen both, you will most likely enjoy Eaten Alive; it's got hilariously bad acting, especially by Robert Kerman (also known as porn-star R. Bolla) as the jungle expert he gets to perform a bunch of badly executed action scenes, tumbling about with natives and throwing spears in comical ways. There's gore a plenty, but nothing too memorable, a woman getting her breast cut off and eaten is probably the top of the heap. Eaten Alive isn't a classic, it's Velveeta compared to Nightmare City's smoked-cheddar, but for anyone that enjoys cheese, it's still edible. - Grade: C+

Sometimes you run across a film that despite not being a very well made film, there is a magical quality to it. Nightmare City is just that kind of film. With the perfect amount of cheesiness, mixed with great gore, nudity, a certain ineptitude in front of and behind the camera that is endlessly entertaining, but also enough skill in certain areas so that it's not too horribly painful to watch, and a deadly seriousness that becomes unintentionally hilarious. You honestly couldn't set out to make a film like this and make it work this well; many have tried and many have failed. You can't force your way into the label cult-classic, you sort of have to stumble your way in, and director Umberto Lunzi and crew tripped right into a masterpiece.

The film starts with reports of a nuclear accident; meanwhile our dashing-news-reporter-hero Dean Miller is at the airport where he's supposed to interview the scientist in charge of the power plant. Once the plane lands, a horde of zombies disembark with axes-swinging, knives-a-stabbing, and guns-a-blazing. Yes, guns. These aren't your typical zombies, they're quite proficient in using a number of weapons. Well, they're not technically zombies either; they're radiated and mutated humans, with zombie like qualities; rotting flesh, cannibalistic tendencies, and quick transfer of infection. They messily dispatch the rescue team sent to their plane, while Dean and his cameraman happily watch the blood-letting, only when one of the zombies (I'll continue to call them zombies for simplicities sake.) gets too close for comfort do they decide to run for it.

Dean rushes back to his TV studio and tries to interrupt his channels "disco show" for an emergency announcement; this was released in 1980 towards the end of the disco movement, this scene is painful to watch now, but the dancer get what's coming to 'em; he is unfortunately overruled by the military, who wants to pretend that everything is hunky-dory as the city is overtaken by the ever growing number of living-dead. When the zombies show up and start munching on all the dancers, Dean decides to escape the city, but first must find his wife who's an emergency room doctor. Where of course, the dead and infected are being rushed to in waves. Dean battles his way through the zombies, to save her and drive off into the country; where they're unable to find peace, as the military is hopelessly inept at stopping the radiation-infection from rapidly taking over the world.

The zombies, or seriously-pissed-off-radiated-humans are just too cool. Instead of trying to make them look like they've freshly risen from the grave, they're supposed to look mutated, which is achieved by basically slopping a bunch of green-crusty-goo on everybody's face; which ranges from slightly dis-nerving to hysterically inept. I love their use of weapons, instead of biting at people's hard skulls, they gouge them with knives and suck at the blood. They also have a tendency to rip girls shirts open, none who bother to wear bras; I mean if you're mutated and angry at the world, you might as well get some cheap thrills while your at it.

The acting is painfully bad; which isn't helped by the fact that it's all been dubbed. I never understood these Italian horror films, where half the time they seem to be speaking in Italian, the other half English, whatever the actors native language is; and the entire thing is then dubbed over, it's an extremely odd effect. The dialogue is deadly serious; it's supposed to be some great warning against the use of nuclear power, but it's delivered in such a ham-fisted way, that it's hilarious. The gore and blood come in great waves, with breasts ripped off and eyes torn asunder. The photography is nothing special, but you can see what's going on, and it's not bad enough to be distracting. The movie moves along at a good pace; there is constantly something gross, funny or both to be watching. Nightmare City is endlessly entertaining for anyone with an appreciation for fine cheese. - Grade: A