Welcome to Decider After Dark, a new column dedicated to scrolling through the detritus of popular streaming sites to find the absolute worst they have to offer – the horrible, oh-so-bad-they’re-(hopefully)-great B- and C-movies that emphasize sex, violence, political incorrectness, cheap effects, bad acting, and some of the worst dialogue imaginable. In other words, pure cinematic enjoyment!
For our first installment, we look back on the 1989 feature, Cannibal Women in the Avocado Jungle of Death, a film whose very title raises many questions.
First, why would anyone take up residence in an avocado jungle? How much guacamole can you eat? And do they have a Margarita River? Because if they do, than get me to the Avocado Jungle post-haste.
But the bigger question is, if there truly is an avocado jungle, what use would it be to cannibal women? They’re cannibals. We know what they eat, and it’s not guac – unless cannibals use condiments. I must admit, in all my thinking about cannibals, it never occurred to be they might put stuff on their food. Salsa for that shinbone? Ketchup for that kidney? Mustard for that mouth? OK – that last one might have gone too far. (Then again, that’s kind of what this column is about – films that go too far.)
While there are early indicators the film is guac-obsessed – it was produced by “Guacamole Films,” and guac plays a larger role in the plot than it has any right to – it’s really a film about feminism.
Whether it’s pro-feminism or anti-feminism is hard to say, because it tries to show that it’s really very pro-feminist, but in that clueless 70s/80s way that allows one female character to be strong and smart (although she will end up in a bikini at some point) while another has an IQ equal to her bra size – which, the way these films were cast, leaves her with almost an average IQ.
Cannibal Women stars Shannon Tweed as a professor at a feminist university, a fact she repeats in pretty much every other scene. After teaching a class on the Piranha Women of the Avocado Jungle (which, it turns out, is in California – rough terrain), she is approached by a representative from “the U.S. Government – National Security Commission, Avocado Affairs.” The plot from here has something to do with an avocado shortage, but more important, it requires Tweed to go deep into the jungle to try to reason with the feminist Piranha Woman tribe, which has already killed U.S. soldiers, which we know because their dog tags were found speckled with guacamole dip. The military wants Tweed to convince the cannibalistic jungle dwellers to abandon the jungle, and relocate instead to government-owned condos in Malibu. No, I’m not making that up. Yes, that’s really the plot.
But wait, there’s more. Tweed is also charged with finding the last feminist professor they sent in for this, a Dr. Kurtz (Adrienne Barbeau), author of the book, Smart Women, Stupid, Insensitive Men.
As supposed exploitation films go, this one’s more exploitive in attitude than action. There is only one very brief topless shot about two minutes in (which was censored on Prime – WTF, Amazon?), and very little real violence.
What marks it as a top notch – by which I mean, really sh*tty – B-level film is its dialogue. Throughout the film, there were lines that stopped me in my tracks for their sheer ludicrousness. Among them in this scene, from the government guy:
“Avocados are vital to this nation’s security interests. We’re on the verge of an avocado gap with the Soviet Union.”
And this…
“An ancient commune of feminists, so radical, so militant, they eat their men. They have sex with their men, and they kill them. Then they tear them into strips like beef jerky and eat them with guacamole – so legend has it.”
And this, from Tweed.
“There are no modern feminists that advocate cannibalism. At least not since the sixties.”
The military, by the way, has no issue with the women killing and eating their men.
They just want the avocados.
Tweed, 1982’s Playboy Playmate of the Year and a longtime regular in erotic thrillers who is best known today as Mrs. Gene Simmons, will not be going alone, however. For reasons too stupid to explain, she will be accompanied by a student of hers named Bunny.
Bunny, played by Karen Mistal, is the kind of character once prevalent in teen and B-movies, but now gone, because you’d catch Sorkinesque hell if you wrote her.
Bunny is adorable, pliant, and remarkably stupid. When we first meet her, dressed like a cowgirl but in all pink, she is a home economics major (a formerly-common school major that directed women towards lives as housewives), but is so impressed with Tweed that she says she’s thinking about switching to feminism, asking, “Are there any feminist cooking classes?” Later, a frat boy tries to convince her to come to a party, saying “We’re going to be having a wet T-shirt contest.” “But all my T-shirts are dry,” she earnestly replies. Oy.
Tweed and Bunny take off for the jungle, but first, they stop at a bar that, Tweed knows from experience, is where dangerous mercenaries hang out, waiting for freelance gigs.
We get three comedic set pieces, one right after the other, of a ninja, a black-masked avenger, and a massive wrestler bragging about their mercenary prowess. Once she tells them her adversaries are the Piranha Women, though, they back off with better things to do (scared sh*tless). But then, a voice from the darkness.
“There are still some real men left in this world.”
What’s that? A manly hero, coming to rescue our damsels in need?
“Men who haven’t been castrated by the years of feminist propaganda that corrupted our public school system and infected prime time television.”
Or, a dude/bro with a chip on his shoulder. But also, a familiar voice.
“Men who believe that nature designed women to cook, nurture children, and pose for Penthouse Magazine.”
Now it all makes sense. That voice – it’s Bill Maher.
Yes, Maher, then in his early/mid-30s, plays the closest thing the film has to a masculine hero, a man who, it turns out, slept with Tweed once years earlier and fell instantly in love. He’s also a buffoon who can’t stand on his own two feet, slapstickingly tripping over everything in sight. He tries to affect a masculine pose leaning on a pool table, and falls on his ass. He then cracks a whip, trying to show off, and accidentally whips himself.
Much of the next half hour features Maher and Tweed bantering lengthy, expository passages about feminism like a cut-rate, self-important Billy Crystal and Meg Ryan in When Harry Met Sally in a Very Wordy Liberal Arts Jungle. Throughout, Tweed sounds like a poorly-written college textbook, while Maher sounds like the son-in-law Archie Bunker always wanted.
They eventually reach the Piranha Women, and the gaggle of men the tribe is keeping to sacrifice and eat. The men are shirtless, wearing fez hats, and can speak no English other than the names Alan Alda, Phil Donahue, and Walter Mondale. (There was a fourth name I couldn’t make out. It sounded like Mark Harmon, but that makes no sense.) They use these names to refer to everything.
Maher, of course, recoils at the sight of men being subservient to women, and teaches them about being men (beer, girlie mags), which means more horrible dialogue on the way.
By the end, they confront the Piranha Women – who Tweed tries to bond with by showing them her N.O.W. card. This meet-up provides us with these stunners, which, trust me, would not be improved by context:
“I knew the avocado board would send someone after me. But I never suspected it would be another feminist.”
Bunny decides to become a Piranha Woman, but she ultimately can’t, because it would mean killing Maher, and she can’t do that because she’s fallen in love with him. In the end, they marry. Tweed and Barbeau, meanwhile, wind down to a “climactic” sword fight, which is hilarious, because both can barely hold their swords, much less fight with them.
The film was written and directed by “J.D. Athens,” a pseudonym for J.F. Lawton. Around the time he filmed this, he was developing another screenplay, a dark tale of Hollywood prostitutes based on his real life conversations with some. He sold the film, but the studio and director gave it a very different tone, and it became the second film he’d written with a questionable take on feminism.
That film was Pretty Woman.
[Watch Cannibal Women In The Avocado Jungle Of Death on Amazon Prime Video]
Larry Getlen is the author of the book Conversations with Carlin. His greatest wish is to see Stefon enjoy a cheeseburger at John Belushi’s diner. Follow him on Twitter at @larrygetlen.
- Decider After Dark
