A common occurrence with film titles, particularly in the international horror genre, is that many territories have different names - this film is on our grindhouse project list as Doctor Butcher M.D., but is also (exhaustively) known as: Island of the Last Zombie; Medical Deviate; Queen of the Cannibals; and even Zombie 3. The version of this film had the original Italian title. And boy is it a standard, generic cannibal/zombie film. After a series of strange mutilations and amputations in hospitals, a team make an expedition to the East Indies, in search of the answers to the strange ritualistic symbol left at each "murder".The film is essentially two previous Italian schlock movies, Slave of the Cannibal God (1976) and Zombie Flesh Eaters (1979), combined. The team encounter what turns out to be a "crazy" doctor who has been experimenting on the dead local cannibals, manipulating them to his power. It's not a particularly memorable inclusion into a very crowded market. There are some effective gore sequences, but it doesn't at all save a very tired, predictable, and often clumsy narrative. There is one piece of dialogue that amused me, that occurred towards the beginning of the film, after a hand has been severed and stolen from a body used for medical education. A conversation between two medical students goes as follows: Student 1: "I bet it was you who chopped that hand off". Student 2: "Why would you say that?" Student 1: "Well, didn't you say you needed a hand to help you study?"
Directed by: Marino Girolami
Starring: Ian McCulloch, Alexandra Delli Colli, Sherry Buchanan
Country: Italy
Rating: **
Marc Ivamy
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