Search - Island of the Fishmen on DVD

There`s Something Fishy Alright...

4-Legged Defender | ATL. GA. | 03/06/2010

(3 out of 5 stars)

"The steam was gone from Italian cinema by the mid-70`s, and by this time (1979), it was just capitalizing on knocking-off whatever the 'flavor-of-the-month' movie was popular. Even directors who once did great flix like Sergio Martino ('Torso', 'All The Colors Of The Dark', 'Case Of The Scorpion`s Tail','Strange Vice Of Mrs. Wardh','Gambling City', 'Your Vice Is A Locked Room', etc.) had jumped on this bandwagon with varying degrees of success. Ruggerio Deodato struck gold with the original exploitation masterpiece 'Jungle Holocaust' in `77, based in part on a newly discovered cannibal tribe in South America (no joke), and Sergio struck w/ 'Slave Of The Cannibal God'/'Mountain Of The Cannibal God', the following year going back to the jungle to film both 'Big Alligator River' and 'Island Of The Fishmen', which both had the same actors and locations, for the most part. This one is less exploitive than the others mentioned, but it`s equal parts 'Creature Of The Black Lagoon','Island Of Dr. Moreau','Jungle Holocaust', and the creatures look like those from 'Horror At Party Beach' (1964). This is low-class-cheese-on-the-seas, for certain - bad acting,weak script,cheap sets,ridiculous monsters, you name it, it`s all right here. It`s good if you like campy monster flix and want a few laughs, but little else. The only real horror here is hearing Italian actors speak with British accents. These films proved Barbara Bach was no more than eye-candy, and the curse of being a 'Bond' girl struck again - no actress ever went on to become anything bigger after being in one. Sad but true."