Mondo Cane

MONDO CANE
By Jimmy Squarejaw

*WARNING*

All movies reviewed for SUNDAY SNUFF contain graphic depictions that may include rape, live animals being murdered, and extreme gore.  None of the writers condone such acts we just watch this shit. 

Well after all the bad news surrounding watching movies last week, we over at Y’all Are Dead’s Extreme Movie Department decided to give you folks a break.  Unbeknownst to me the movie I watched was also pretty tame so it might sooth the transition back into the wretched world of extreme cinema.  This week I chose the ol’ classic MONDO CANE from 1962.

I have heard murmurings about this movie since I was a video store hoping teen and I had always wanted to check it out since it was evidently a pre-cursor to FACES OF DEATH.  Well….what MONDO CANE actually is, is a sort of shock-u-mentary that has it’s place in a junior high school’s sociology class rather than a gore hounds video shelf.

The movie has a central theme of showing how archaic rituals and traditions relate to contemporary social norms.  After a bit you get the sense that the filmmakers are trying to paint a dreadful image of today’s Caucasian population and that aint’ too hard y’all.  A secondary theme shows all of the different roles animals play throughout the world relating to culture and cuisine and that plays off wonderfully from the translation of the title, “A Dog’s World.” 

A lot of the scenes in MONDO CANE were pretty interesting even if they weren’t horrifying.  A first choice bit for me is scene shot on an island poisoned by atomic energy.  Here birds live underground, fish jump out of the water and live in trees, and sea turtles lay eggs then beach themselves and die slowly because their internal navigation got fucked by atomic bomb testing. 

Another gem is an inside look in a foie gras farm in the foie gras capital of the world, Strasbourg, France.  Boy does that scene make me hate white people even more!  But at least geese can sit pleasantly knowing that the human race has adapted this custom for themselves with fast food and convenience shopping. 

And my favorite scene was at a pet cemetery in Los Angeles, which I didn’t even know existed back in the late 50’s and early 60’s.  Here we see a woman bawling as her poochy is lowered into a shallow grave plot.  The filmmakers add some choice footage of headstones for pets of the famous like Jack Warner, and the Jerry Lewis Family.  Hilariously the camera then turns to show random dogs shitting and pissing on the various headstones and kicking up grass onto them.  FUNNY!

I liked MONDO CANE a lot but not as a representative of extreme cinema.  I liked it because to me it seemed like a dark comedy that stung with cynicism and very well could have initiated the interest in shows like candid camera, funniest home videos, youtube and fail videos that we see today rampant in culture.  Another part of MONDO CANE I loved was the soundtrack.  Beautiful orchestration with a hint of cartoon-esque satire set to the barbaric rituals of the world!  Can’t beat hearing a zipper sound when a snake gets slit apart and it’s skin ripped off.  Trust me there is a lot more I can go on about this MONDO CANE but hopefully I’ve created enough intrigue to go out and rent the damn thing! 

Blake and Jimmy’s Extreme-O-Gauge!

 

Realistic Gore: 1 out of 5, unlike FACES OF DEATH, there really isn’t any.

Rape: 0 out of 0, but there is a scene where a woman breastfeeds a piglet!

Animal Death: 5 out of 5, there is a lot of different animals, some are cute, being killed or dying horribly!

Necrophilia: 0 out of 5, we’ll try and hit a homerun the next movie!

Torture: 2 out of 5, nothing too crazy.  Some inexperienced shark fishermen fuck with dying sharks and that poor damn sea turtle that wanders into the desert on the atomic island probably dies a slow torturous death. 
Overall Movie: 4 out of 5, there are better "Shockumentaries" out there, but this one had a really dark humor to it that a lot of others don't, and the music was AMAZING!