Cannibal Messiah

Director(s) - Crippler Criss (The Secret of the Magic Mushrooms) and Master W. (The Secret of the Magic Mushroom)
Starring - Crippler Criss and Master W
Release Date - 2016
Genre - Horror/Comedy
Format - DVD (Personal Collection) (Screener)

Rating (out of 5):

     I had one hell of a time with a Vinegar Syndrome triple feature recently.  Watched one fantastic horror flick before diving deep into exploitation cinema.  The second flick in my triple feature was a late 60s sexploitation flick before moving in the golden age of exploitation with the 1974 biker flick Trip with the Teacher. After checking out the sleazy flick of Vin Syn I wanted something in my beloved genre.  I started going through my review stack and found several that I really wanted to see but one really caught my eye.  Honestly, I forgot I had it.  Sometime ago SRS Cinema released the no budget German splatter flick Cannibal Messiah from Crippler Criss and Master W.  The artwork was fucking amazing and I had to see it right away.  Thank you SRS Cinema and MVD for sending this one my way.

     The film follows two filmmakers who are kidnapped by the brother of one of their former stars because he was killed on film.  He takes them to the woods in search of a cannibal cult and answers as to why his brother had to die.  What they don't know is that one of them is impressionable and turns on his captor and friend where he becomes a cannibal.  Now, they must fight to leave the very woods they went into.
    

     When I first saw the artwork for Cannibal Messiah I was fell in love with it.  The artwork is fucking fantastic but the film is anything but.  The film had a lot of things I really liked but was unable to put them in place properly to create an unforgettable movie.  Instead, we get something that was a struggle to watch.  The acting in this one is funny at times.  Crippler Criss and Master W are the perfect mixture of goofy and melodramatic.  I liked their performance but it clashed with the other characters in the film.  It's difficult to enjoy the goofy characters when other cast members are trying to deliver serious performances. The cast needs to be consistent.  The story for this one drags on like a bad date.  The movie is full of scenes that does nothing but put the viewer to sleep.  They are dialogue rich and do very little to tie them to the actual story.  The story itself has several things I liked.  The cannibal cult, the last supper parody, and so on was fun but they were so deep in the film that it almost felt irrelevant.  The film needs to be heavily edited to spare the viewer from the torture of almost 2 hours of nonsense.  Finally, the film does have a lot of the blood and gore.  The effects show the budget but doesn't take away from the fun.  I wouldn't compare this to the classic German splatter flicks of the 80s and 90s but the film tries hard to capture that.  Overall, Cannibal Messiah is one that just doesn't entertain.  The film had a fun idea but lost sight of the final product somewhere along the way.