Studio: MVD Visual (as part of their Classics line)
Release Date: June 3rd, 1983 (theatrical) / September 11th, 2018 (blu-ray)
Run Time: 83 mins
Region Code: REGION FREE
Picture: 1080p (1.85:1 Aspect Ratio)
Sound: English LPCM 2.0
Starring: Katja Bienert, Antonio Mayans, Aline Mess
Written by Jesús Franco (as A.L. Malraux)
Directed by Jesús Franco (as C. Plaut), Olivier Mathot (uncredited)
Rating: Not Rated (Graphic Nudity and Violence)
THE FEATURES ⭐
Trailers (Found on Main Menu)
- Diamonds of Kilimandjaro (2m 31s, HD) in French (I think)
- Golden Temple Amazons (1m 51s, HD)
- Attack of the Killer Tomatoes (2m 11s, SD, 1.33:1)
- The Violence Movie (1m 41s, SD, 1.33:1)
That is it. MVD has stated that their “MVD Classics” line would contain little to no extras. This is fine with me because I doubt that there is much that can be said about this film.
THE PACKAGING ⭐⭐⭐
Diamonds of Kilimandjaro comes to us courtesy of MVD Visual as part of their “Classics” Collection.
The disc is REGION FREE
THE PICTURE ⭐⭐⭐
THE SOUND ⭐⭐1/2
Presented in the film's original aspect ratio of 1.85:1, MVD gives us a "warts and all" transfer for Diamonds of Kilimandjaro. The transfer itself is pretty good. There is a nice depth to the image that makes it stand out and detail is pretty nice. Colors look ok, but the source is probably to blame for this. Outside of the transfer, there are scratches, hairs, specs, and all kind of debris found here. I kind of like this approach, but it isn't for everyone.
The sound comes to us courtesy of an English LPCM 2.0 track. The film is dubbed and you will find that it isn't well dubbed. Line readings can be off at times with some lines either not recorded or dropped. The track doesn't have a lot going on so there is an emptiness here, but that is the filmmakers' fault. All in all, it is a decent track.
THE FILM ⭐
A group of adventurers head to a primitive tribe in Africa to find a treasure of diamonds and a beautiful white girl who was lost years ago and was made the tribe's goddess.
The plot of the film is one of the easiest in the world and yet it is baffling how bad the film is. Now, this isn’t one of those “so bad its good” films. This is a plain old BAD film. The acting is just terrible(from what we can tell because the film is dubbed into English), the editing is horrible, and the “erotica” is eyerollingly tame and awful at the same time. I love me a good erotic film, but here it is like watching to slabs of meat being slammed against each other. Sure, the film has nudity (A LOT of nudity. In fact, there are characters that we ONLY see topless), and I am not calling anyone ugly (although the guy who gets naked is no spring chicken) but there is no eroticism to the proceedings. I am sure that Jess Franco was going for something that would drive men into the theaters, but they would have realized pretty quickly that this is not the film for them. For all the misgivings I have about the film, I will say that the film can look very nice at times and there are some things in the film that ARE laughable (there are many times throughout the film’s runtime that shots are repeated RIGHT AFTER the shot has concluded.), but it isn’t enough to see the film even for ironic reasons. Diamonds of Kilimandjaro is just a bad film from beginning to end.
OVERALL ⭐⭐
The blu-ray, from MVD, is pretty decent. The picture quality, while incredibly rough, is still nice overall and the sound is ok too. There are no extras besides some trailers, but that is ok. I don’t know if I can recommend this film to anyone outside of fans of Jess Franco or those who look for films like this.
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