Africa Addio (1966)

Waste of time

This Movie Can Only Be Described With One Word.

How sad is this?

Although it has its amusing moments, in eneral the plot does not convince.

Both terrifying and fascinating are the words that sprang up in my mind as I was watching the movie.It's fascinating that the record of atrocities made to humans and animals in Africa existed already in the sixties. Just as those atrocities were happening. Today, fifty years later, we are only made aware post festum that something like that was happening and happened, but it is like some distant point in the past. If you think Iraq war in the nineties was the first 'live' feed of (war) terror from the other side of the world, think again. And try to find this movie. The movie maybe is not 'live' feed in the most rigid sense of the word, but it is a contemporary document of something that shouldn't have happened. And, what is worse, is still happening today.And terrifying? Well, you just have to see the movie.

This movie is about Africa after the English, French and Portugese and whoever else pulled out in the 60's and the aftermath. It shows scenes of how big game were slaughtered and how bad the people had it there, and how bad and unruly things became when Africans tried to take Africa back.I am a huge fan of the faces of death and any of these violent films that show death. They are disturbing at times but I find them rather interesting. I don't mind watching people die as bad as I do animals as morbid as that may sound, but it's true.This film starts off with an extremely long amount of time talking about the history of Africa and everything leading up to the 60's. It finally gets going and shows animals being killed for a long time. The animal deaths are brutal and violent. It later shows people being killed in numerous amounts of ways, some shot in the head and some killed execution style. It shows many dead bodies including children.I kept waiting and waiting for this film to get to the point and by the time it did it was rather too little too late. Animal poaching and big game hunters as well as tribes killing and spearing innocent creatures was not pleasant to watch, but not interesting in a shocking manner.I don't know what to say about this film, it isn't amazing, it is not interesting. Some people claim it has beautiful scenes and great editing but I beg to differ, it was garbage and out of about 50 shockumentary films I have about death, this was by far the most boring. I would not recommend it to anyone..it was not over the top or unbelievably gross or anything and I say avoid this film and don't buy into the hype.1 star out of a possible 10 -- this film SUCKS!!!

Quite the conundrum, 80% of the comments focus only on the violence, which is extreme and relentless at times. It should also be noted that the film clocks in at 2 hours and 20 minutes, and, there is a whole other world being presented when the violence stops. Quite simply, the cinematography will knock your socks off; we're talking major motion picture stuff with an original score that keeps evolving and is quite breathtaking(i still haven't seen this on a big screen but, wow). Speaking of breathtaking, visually this film is a feast for the eyes, it's hard to believe at times that i'm watching a documentary; a documentary that will open you up and get inside you and everyone that sees it, with no pun intended and no shame. As someone else said here, it is 'an uneasy time capsule'. The brutality, perfectly balanced with tender and profound beauty. Real situations balanced with oddity and humor.I mean, the directors won an Oscar for cinematography just before this and at one part of the film they are a breath away from being executed, only to be saved by an officer who points out that they are Italian. Now in 2009, and every day forward until the end of civilization, this collection of moving pictures becomes more and more potent, gaining credence with every new low that so-called 'modern' humanity sinks to, with the temporal yet exquisite fruits of it's labor always just out of reach of the masses. AN ABSOLUTE MUST SEE

Africa Addio contains some really strong scenes of animal cruelty and human death. However the editing, lack of storyline and historical facts in general disappointed me. If the directors had taken their time to research the events they portrait, the movie would have come out much better and informative. Some scenes are beautifully shot and made, but others seems added to just to shock and disturb the viewer. Generally the whole "Mondo" genre needs much more depth and facts, instead of the pure intention to shock the audience.Africa Addio is a movie that could have been so much more, but lands as an average gore filled documentary which display the lack of insight of the directors. Filming animals getting killed for sports, people executed, stacks of severed hands, rotten corpses along the road and mass graves for the sheer shock value seems uninspiring and sometimes plain dumb. The creators of Africa Addio invented the Mondogenre - but at the same time, they hit a new rock bottom for the whole documentary genre. It could have been so much more, but ended up real sad. I have seen the "Directors Cut" of the movie - which according to the directors should be "more political, historical and informative", all themes lack, and a movie which could have been highly educational end up as a sad shocker. Mondo Addio.