Italian screenwriter and director Ruggero Deodato died on December 29 at the age of 83, the Il Post newspaper reported. He had shot nearly 25 films including the famous “Cannibal Holocaust”.
Ruggero Deodato starts out as an extra, but after failing to audition for a film by Federico Fellini, gives up his acting career to take an interest in directing. He began as an assistant to Roberto Rossellini (with General de la Rovere) or Carlo Ludovico Bragaglia (Maciste in the Valley of the Lions).
From 1959 to 1968, he worked on nearly 30 films, including several by Sergio Corbucci (notably the famous Django), but also Le Chevalier de Maupin by Mauro Bolognini and Danse macabre by Antonio Margheriti.
Marbeuf Films Excerpt from the poster of “Django”
As was customary at the time in order to pass off certain Italian films as Hollywood productions, he adopted the pseudonym of Roger Rockfeller for his first two directorial feature films in 1968: Fenomenal e il tesoro di Tutankamen and Gungala la pantera nuda . He then dabbled in all genres, from drama (The Last Breath) to disaster film (SOS Concorde).
But it is truly with horror cinema that Deodato will forge a loyal audience. After a first attempt, The Last Cannibal World (1977), he released the film that shocked a generation: Cannibal Holocaust (1980).
With extremely violent images (and the real slaughter of animals on screen), the director makes believe that the murders of the film are very real. The feature film caused a scandal and the world remembered the name of Ruggero Deodato.
Eurogroup Film
Excerpt from the poster of “Cannibal Holocaust”
With this shock, Deodato continues on the horrific theme with Amazonia: the white jungle (1985), Body Count, The Full Moon Killers and Anguish on the line.
At the same time, he continues to shoot very diverse B series subjects such as Atlantis Interceptors, the nanardesque The Barbarians or even Les petite canailles. The films are very uneven, but his aficionados remain faithful to him.
Cannon Group
Excerpt from the poster “Les Barbarians”
The end of the 1980s and of Italian exploitation cinema marked the beginning of difficulties for Deodato. He then concentrates his activity on television, where his talent for shocking images no longer has any place.
He will attempt to return to horror with Ballad in Blood in 2016. The story of a trio of friends waking up the day after Halloween to find that one of their roommates is dead.
This will be his last solo feature film. When he had just announced in 2020 that he was working on a video game inspired by Cannibal Holocaust, supposed to be the 4th part of his cannibal saga, the Italian newspaper Il Post announced his death on December 29 at the age of 83.