A Werewolf in the Amazon (2005)

Really Surprised!

For all the hype it got I was expecting a lot more!

One of the most extraordinary films you will see this year. Take that as you want.

There's no way I can possibly love it entirely but I just think its ridiculously bad, but enjoyable at the same time.

Paul Naschy is in the forthcoming movie, Wax, currently in post-production. This, notwithstanding the fact that he died in 2009! So, thanks to animatronics he will play a moving (and talking!) wax figure some five years after death. I just thought how appropriate this is that this man who never really made a great film, nevertheless kept at it because he loved movies so much and ended up appearing in more than a hundred and directing a couple of dozen.This piece of work by Brazilian director Ivan Cardoso has to be deemed inept by in all departments, yet his multi part performances are far better than those anyone else in this and amidst the madness and mayhem he convinces in his portrayal of a Dr Moreau, mad scientist, drifting from one mauled corpse to another in his efforts to make his genius transformation. At one crazy moment, in what surely should really have been an outtake, one corpse sits up and grins at him. Naschy simply slaps him back down, telling him to stay dead.There are far better Naschy films to see if you are tempted into the murky waters of his world but for such a late work, this is certainly no disgrace. Not on his part anyway!

Paul Naschy is a werewolf in this film, although he is not Waldemar Daninsky, but Dr. Moreau.The best reason to see this film may be Danielle Winits in the shower before she is interrupted by her friend Samantha (Karina Bacchi). Or the Amazon Queen (Joana Medeiros).A group of tourists are in the Amazon looking for hallucinogenic tea. They will be fodder for the werewolf. I nominate Raul (Bruno de Lucca) to be the first. He is a real jerk!Corny dialog and bizarre happenings are dotted throughout, especially by Prof. Scott Corman (Nuno Leal Maia) and the police inspector (Tony Tornado).I am not familiar with Brazilian director Ivan Cardoso, but I will have to check out some of his other work after this.

I'm a Paul Naschy fan. One thing about him is that I usually enjoy his films when they are good or bad and there are certainly a number in each column in his filmography. This film is several big steps down from his best later career comeback movies. The thing to know about this movie is though it is a werewolf movie that's only one element to a really crazy plot that is mostly sort of a version of Island of Doctor Moreau. Naschy's character is named Moreau. Another character is named Corman--as in Roger Corman. So the movie isn't to be taken seriously. But it's not really all that funny either. There are three plot lines in the film and the story cuts abruptly back and forth from them and all combine in the end. One is the mad doctor which is where Naschy is. One is a detective and another guy investigating werewolf murders in the jungle. The final and most tedious is the "bunch of kids in the woods with a camcorder" story.The kids at one point get high and we are treated to bizarre trip "visions" they have. One is an Opera singing Inca.Naschy scenes are in Spanish so they are subtitles for Portuguese speaking Brazlians. I, of course watched it with English subtitles that appeared over the Portuguese ones making them very hard to read as all the letters blended together. Naschy is the only one in the film who can act and he's thankfully given much of the dialog but with this problem that was not a virtue. There is a lot of reuse of aerial shots of jungle. Did I mention that the crazy doctor is also somehow connected to Amazons, female ones? It's all really crazy but not too involving as it's pretty sloppy. Again there isn't that much werewolf action. It's tough to tell if Naschy is even really in the werewolf costume and there is no on screen transformation scene either. I just feel that the werewolf was the thing that interested the filmmakers the least of all the elements they had going. And, of course, Naschy's greatest fame is as a werewolf so it's wrong headed from the start. There is one scene with Naschy mostly unclothed that is not flattering. There is some other more pleasant nudity regularly scattered about the film. Gore isn't too well done and the film has perhaps the worst looking fake moon in movie history.I can't say there are many films like this. There is so much stuff in this film it should be much more entertaining than it is. It's just so poorly made and uneven that it can't earn too many points from me.

First of all: if you have never watched any movie by this director, I would advise you to watch THE SECRET OF THE MUMMY first. It is a more successful mix of naked bodies, idiotic dialog, silly delirium and trashy violence. But this one here is good too, if you like ridiculous movies that show young people using drugs in the vicinity of murder scenes.The director clearly wants you to know this movie is a low budget project. I sincerely hope the subtitles are even crazier than the original lines, when it gets to be shown outside Brazil. Inventing new lines would be the best way to be true to the conscious stupidity of it all. The story involves a mad scientist hidden in the rain forest, a group of youngsters who go there to drink a hallucinogenic beverage, even amazons! Turn off half your brain and enjoy!