When it comes to cannibal films, The White Cannibal Queen is a mixed bag of things that work and things that do not and all of it thanks to writer and director Jess Franco. Franco, best known to cinema fans as a man whose movies feature the female form in all of its glory more often than not would try his hand in this horror sub-genre. Despite middling results, this outing would satisfy anyone’s craving for a little exploitation in the jungle.

To enjoy this movie, one has to put the logic centres of their brain on hold, just for a little while otherwise they might pick up on a few fumbles that Franco would make during this picture. The worst to offend would be the cannibals themselves who were a bunch of white guys that Franco must have hired from the local dive bar, grocery store, or wherever he just so happened to be at the time and it is so painfully obvious given the haircuts they all sport, not to mention the odd piece of modern jewellery at times. The latter can be forgiven as it is quite possible that they scavenged it off of their victims but as far as casting goes, this is some of the worst that one will ever see anywhere. In contrast, they do a fair job of killing those they hunt down and more so when they eat their victims, Franco at least gives fans a good bit of gore to chomp down on. The main cast is decent enough with Sabrina Siani being truly lovely as the titular cannibal queen, but it is not nearly enough to save this entire affair from being as poor as it turned out to be. It is too bad that Siani’s role was not expanded a bit more, making her more of a focus to offset some of the obvious budget restrictions going on around her, yet such as it is, she mesmerizes and ends up being one of the few positives to be found within.

The story is a mess right from the outset and immediately has one wondering why a scientist would bring his wife and child into the jungle where a million things might threaten them, not to mention savage cannibals. The worst does happen obviously and could be seen coming a mile away as they are attacked and the man’s wife is killed and eaten. The good doctor loses an arm to the hungry jungle dwellers as well and he makes a frantic escape, leaving his child to be raised by the cannibals as their new queen. Many years later, he wants to return to the place where he lost his family and try to reclaim his daughter should she still live and that turns out to be quite the disaster too. If Franco had just taken a little time to polish the script up a bit, the man might have had a much better chance of success with this movie, even given his budgetary restrictions but for all that it is, there is still a good time to be had.

Starring Al Cliver, Lina Romay, Olivier Mathot, Pamela Stanford and Antonio Mayans along with the previously mentioned Siani, the cast had the talent and Franco is a director who would normally know how to use his cast effectively and for the most part, they do so here. It would have been nice to see this lot have a little more to work with, yet given what there is, The White Cannibal Queen is not as most make it out to be. It is not high art, as no movie about people eating people tends to be but when it happens to be late at night and needing something to watch in the wee hours, this film is not the worst one a person will ever see.

2 out of 5