Green Inferno (AKA Cannibal Holocaust II) is what you get if you suck all of the visceral power (and the cannibalism) out of Cannibal Holocaust. Like Deodato's infamous shocker, the film sees an intrepid female reporter and her team venture into the jungles of the Amazon to try and find a missing professor of anthropology. Unlike Deodato's film, it features no gruelling horror (unless you count the sight of a small carnivorous fish being extracted from a man's ass!), instead coming across like a National Geographic documentary crossed with a lame jungle adventure (with elements of humour). It certainly doesn't deserve to be associated with the king of all Italian cannibal movies.

Much of the film revolves around the protagonists stealing a plane and then trapping monkeys which they exchange for gas; this allows director Antonio Climati to include that genre staple -animal cruelty - but even these scenes lack the ability to shock or disgust (it's a wonder why he held back given his involvement with notorious mondo movies Africa Addio and Savage Man Savage Beast, both of which feature loads of animal violence). After successfully fuelling their stolen plane, the characters have a run in with angry natives that amounts to nothing, are attacked by bats, meet a topless jungle beauty, are captured by river pirates who are harvesting the organs of indigenous children, and eventually locate the missing professor, who is perfectly fine. No cannibalism involved whatsoever.

An overview of Italian cinema reveals a rich history packed with fantastic movies. First coming into prominence in the 1950s, with a series of epics, Biblical and otherwise, the 1960s saw the floodgates open with hundreds of sword and sandal and spaghetti western movies pouring into the world market. In the 1970s, the Italians made the thriller genre their own, splitting it into two sub-genres (the polizia and giallo film) and adding oodles of violence. Finally, the period 1980 to 1985 saw a final explosion of cheap-as-hell exploitation films to mark Italian cinema's dying days; the rip-off was the most popular type of film, with dozens of post-holocaust, horror, science fiction and fantasy movies released during these years. Sadly, post 1985, Italian genre cinema has been dull and derivative, lacking even a decent low budget; pretty much every film is a stinker.

So here we have the backdrop for CANNIBAL HOLOCAUST II, a supposed sequel to the classic 1979 horror film by Ruggero Deodato, which reached new heights in violence and disturbed everyone who saw it. This sequel comments on the real-life animal cruelty of the original film, by having numerous sequences of our heroes rescuing animals, rather than slaughtering them! Otherwise, the two films are unconnected. CANNIBAL HOLOCAUST II is as lifeless and worthless a horror film as you could expect; in fact, there's no horror to be seen at all, and barely any violence or gore. What kind of film is it then? Well, it could best be classed as an adventure I suppose, charting as it does a massive journey undertaken by the main characters, but it doesn't really have any of the genre trappings.

The film introduces all the jungle staples, including piranhas, crocodiles, monkeys etc. but doesn't do anything with them. There's one fun moment in which our heroes look like they're going to be tortured (by ants, amongst other things) but it cuts off at the last minute. Then there's the usual round of grub-munching and fish swimming into private places, but such scenes seem to be played for laughs rather than horror.

The casting is really dire in this film – there's nobody you ever heard of, except Sal Borgese. Why is it that when lip-synching got better, the dubbing got worse? Still, the actors are as lifeless as their characters, and for those who think modern Hollywood blockbusters are dumbed down, you should see this film's script! So, finally, is there any reason to watch this film? I have to admit that there are some cool props – the heads in jars are just plain bizarre, whilst the skeleton in the burial mound is suitably icky. There's plenty of native nudity on hand as well, especially a young girl who parades around topless for most of the movie. There are about three or four action sequences, usually involving our heroes escaping from smugglers or other myriad bad guys, but they're poorly shot and not at all entertaining. The film's "big" ending is a battle between Indians and gun-toting bad guys, and is actually quite cool, with some hilarious jungle traps flying about in the air. Sadly, it all comes as too little, too late.

Obviously, making this film was a major effort; the jungle locations are authentic, and there's no set-bound foliage on display here. So if director Climati (incidentally, the guy who wrote and directed SAVAGE MAN, SAVAGE BEAST in the '70s – what is it with this guy and his animal obsession?) bothered to get his cast all the way into the jungle, why didn't he make more of an effort to make a remotely plausible, plotted film? The answer will forever be a mystery.