Champion exploitation director Jess Franco provides another installment of his brief yet prolific jungle trash series with Diamonds of the Kilimanjaro AKA The Treasure of the White Goddess AKA a bunch of other titles. The movie shares a lot with the more notable Devil Hunter, another Franco flick from around the same era: some of the "native" music is the same, the cannibal-in-chief is the same actress in both movies, and the overall confused hodge-podge of half-baked themes is similar. Of course, there's also Franco's mandatory home-video style panning and zooming into random things (usually leaves), the totally inappropriate groovy jazz music, and that distinctive trash element that marks all of Franco's oeuvre.
Diamonds of Kilimanjaro has a deceptively complex plot, a story so confusing that a reasonable synopsis is impossible. A tribe of English-speaking island aborigines ruled by a drunken Scotsman kill all trespassers who attempt to steal their diamonds, except when convinced otherwise by their Goddess, Diana, a topless teenage white girl. Things get interesting when Diana's mother sends an assortment of bickering bounty hunters to return her daughter to civilization. When not arguing eternally over where they should cross the river, the rescuers develop alternate clandestine plans, including bringing back Diana but stealing the diamonds, not bringing back Diana and stealing the diamonds, murdering Diana and stealing diamonds, marrying Diana and bringing her back with the diamonds, marrying Diana but not bringing her back (forgetting the diamonds), and a few others. Just about everyone dies in the process of figuring this out, sometimes in the nude. At one point Jess Franco answers (again) the rarely asked question of whether it's possible to have a plot twist without having a plot to begin with.
Those who expected a Euro-cannibal fest here should have known better. In fact, anyone who knows Franco and expected something other than what he saw needs to have himself examined. Those seeking the ever-elusive Franco "gem" might be disappointed, as usual, but might find enough cheap thrills and mind-bending confusion to make Diamonds of the Kilimanjaro worthwhile.
Diamonds of Kilimanjaro has a deceptively complex plot, a story so confusing that a reasonable synopsis is impossible. A tribe of English-speaking island aborigines ruled by a drunken Scotsman kill all trespassers who attempt to steal their diamonds, except when convinced otherwise by their Goddess, Diana, a topless teenage white girl. Things get interesting when Diana's mother sends an assortment of bickering bounty hunters to return her daughter to civilization. When not arguing eternally over where they should cross the river, the rescuers develop alternate clandestine plans, including bringing back Diana but stealing the diamonds, not bringing back Diana and stealing the diamonds, murdering Diana and stealing diamonds, marrying Diana and bringing her back with the diamonds, marrying Diana but not bringing her back (forgetting the diamonds), and a few others. Just about everyone dies in the process of figuring this out, sometimes in the nude. At one point Jess Franco answers (again) the rarely asked question of whether it's possible to have a plot twist without having a plot to begin with.
Those who expected a Euro-cannibal fest here should have known better. In fact, anyone who knows Franco and expected something other than what he saw needs to have himself examined. Those seeking the ever-elusive Franco "gem" might be disappointed, as usual, but might find enough cheap thrills and mind-bending confusion to make Diamonds of the Kilimanjaro worthwhile.