Devil Hunter

 

Devil Hunter

1980

Director- Jess Franco, Lina Romay

Cast- Ursula Buchfellner, Al Cliver, Gisela Hahn, Antonio Mayans, Antonio de Cabo,  Bertrand Altmann, Werner Pochath, Aline Mess, Muriel Montossé

            The movie begins alternating between two scenes. In one scene, the beautiful starlet Laura (Ursula Buchfellner) flirts with the cameras before going to her hotel room and getting naked for a bath. In the other, a scared, naked girl runs from a tribe of men in an island jungle. The girl is tied up while a beautiful priestess prays to a totem pole. A creature that looks like a man, except for his red bulging eyes, comes from the jungle and kills the young girl, eating parts of her. Meanwhile, Laura is jumped by a group of kidnappers and carried away.

            The kidnappers are holding Laura hostage in remote jungle location and send her manager a ransom note. The manager hires Peter (Al Cliver, who starred in several Italian horror films including Lucio Fulci’s Zombi 2 and The Beyond). Peter is some kind of shady Mr. Fixit who gets called in for situations like this. He is paid a hefty sum to recover the stolen starlet and a bonus if he can hold on to the ransom money in the process. Meanwhile, it seems like Laura may not live long enough to be rescued. One of her kidnappers seems to be a rapist who wants to have his way with her. Another is an unhinged sadist who seems intent on hurting or killing her. The third kidnapper is Jane (Gisela Hahn) who seems to be the calm one of the outfit. There is no sisterly love here as she is content to watch her comrades torment Laura.

            Pater arrives on the island and he and the kidnappers try to double cross each other (poor Laura is just a pawn it seems). This results in a shootout and Laura runs away. Peter tries to find her before the kidnappers. As you’ve probably guessed, this island is the same one we saw at the beginning of the film so the cannibal creature is stalking all of them. Laura is captured by the natives who clean her up and prepare her as a sacrifice to their cannibal god.

            This film is a product of its era, when the taboo toward sex on screen was at its lowest. It’s chock full of full frontal nudity and close ups. There are a lot of women in the film and most of them are naked at some point. That said, it still doesn’t approach the level of some of Franco’s “dirtier” works, some of which were pornographic.  He made the movie back to back with another cannibal film, Mondo Cannibale, but this film is only peripherally a cannibal film. Franco often put elements into his movies that would differentiate them from other entries in their particular genres. Adding the supernatural element helps set this film apart from the (many) other cannibal films of this era. Calling it “Devil” Hunter is a bit misleading. The nemesis of the film could hardly be called a Devil, but I guess calling it “Naked Bug Eyed Cannibal God Hunter” would have been too long.

            Interestingly, Franco’s wife at the time, Nicole Guettard, edited the film but Lina Romay, who would become his lifelong partner, co-directed the film. How Franco walked that line, who knows.

     German actress Ursula Buchfellner, who plays the perpetual damsel in distress Laura, appeared in German Playboy at the age of 16. But don’t worry; watching this movie won’t get you put on a list. She was 18 or 19 when Devil Hunter was shot. She would later go on to pose in Penthouse as well, making her the first woman to pose in both magazines.

            Franco did so many different kinds of films; gothic horror, sleazy crime, Satanic inquisition, etc. He has several of these adventure style films on his list as well. It’s a mixture of horror with action with huge, generous helpings of nudity thrown in for good measure. If you like Franco, or like Euro B films of this era, Devil Hunter is worth adding to your collection.