I’ve Never Been To San Bernadino

Eeeep.

So-bad-they’re-good movies and food seem synonymous, reluctantly so, with food used for various nefarious and unthinkable purposes. For the very first So Bad It’s Good Blogathon, if anyone remembers,  I reviewed Attack of the Killer Tomatoes, an hilariously terrible cautionary tale that ended on a really weird note.

This year we’re plunging into the strangely awful 1989 camp-fest, Cannibal Women In the Avocado Jungle of Death, a battle of the sexes involving everyone’s favorite good fat that has to be seen to be believed.

The movie opens with two guys hacking their way through the jungle, looking all sweaty and worn out. They’re about ready to call it a day when one of them spies their quarry: A perfect avocado hanging from a tree. After snatching it, they’re about to leave when they spy a group of beautiful women swimming in a pool, and in the interest of full disclosure, yes, some of them are partially nude, so yeah, be warned.

One of the guys is ecstatic and goes out to introduce himself. One of the women looks him up and down before shooting two arrows at him. The other guy gets strung up by his ankles.

Cut to Spritzer University in Southern California (it’s really UC Riverside), where Dr. Margo Hunt (Shannon Tweed) is giving out on the topic of feminism. She’s got plenty of fans, well, at least one: a perky sorority sister named Bunny (Karen Mistal) who rushes up to her after class and says she’s going to switch her major from home ec to feminist studies. The only reason she’s not sure about this move is she doesn’t know if Spritzer has feminist cooking classes.

All that can wait, though, because two guys from the Federal Government have come to see Margo. They want her to make an expedition into the mysterious Avocado Jungle of Death and persuade the cannibalistic Piranha Women to move to condos in Miami. Why Margo? Well, no one has ever come back from the Avocado Jungle of Death, seeing as the Piranha Women have a reputation of sleeping with their men and then executing them, turning them into beef jerky that they eat with guacamole.

And where is the Avocado Jungle of Death? It starts in Bakersfield and stretches all the way to Mexico. Yeah. It’s basically San Bernadino, Riverside and Imperial Valley. If Margo doesn’t succeed in her mission, the Russians will corner the world’s avocado market, and we can’t have that.

Margo’s not interested until Spritzer’s president threatens to yank her grant money and her tenure if she doesn’t go. Bunny’s eager to go with Margo, but Margo says no. Well, at least she does until she sees a frat boy invite Bunny to a wet T-shirt contest. Margo and Bunny set off in Margo’s jeep, and when they stop in San Bernadino to find some male guides for the trip, Bunny is nervous. “I’ve never been to San Bernadino before,” she says, while she and Margo survey the city as if it’s Mos Eisley Spaceport.

Bunny might be nervous, but she’s got nothing on the guys she and Margo find at a local bar.  A bodybuilder, Vietnam vet, and a ninja all step forward, very confident in their abilities until Margo tells them they’re going to have to meet the Piranha women, and then they scatter like nervous cats.

Only one guy seems completely unconcerned: Jim (Bill Maher) Margo’s former one-night stand. He, Margo and Bunny jet off to the jungle together unsure of what they’ll find, and among other curiosities the jungle is bordered by almond trees, there’s a jungle cruise up the river, Jim teaches a tribe of subservient men how to drink beer and act like stereotypical guys, and Margo finds a long-lost professor named Dr. Kurtz (Adrienne Barbeau) who came to study the Piranha Women and stayed to go tribal.

This movie is so easy to mock. The way the Piranha Women look at intruders, this little bit kept coming to my mind:

Only in the case of Cannibal Women, it’s, “Hello. My name is Mysterious Jungle Woman. You stole my avocado. Prepare to become beef jerky.”

Yikes. It works on too many levels. One can only imagine what this movie would look like if it were made nowadays. A lot of us like our avocado toast. And avocado oil (raises hand).

Other than that, Cannibal Women seems to work best in its first half, because the stereotype satire aspect of it seems to really shine in the context of Spritzer University, where we have frat boys and other men walking around. Plus, we get an eyeful of Spritzer’s abundant store of tactical gear in the school supply closet.

Out in the jungle, on the other hand, where there aren’t many men, the battle seems a little one-sided. In any battle, it helps to know the opposition is lurking about in at least a somewhat noticeable way.

Instead, we get treated to an insane amount of sitting or standing around and talking, in which Dr. Kurtz reveals some things about that supposed cushy condo set-up in Miami that Margo had no idea about, we find out there’s a rival tribe called the Barracudas who prefer their man served up with clam dip. I’m not even going to talk about the characters having dinner. I’m just not.

Oh, and there’s a spear fight between Margo and Dr. Kurtz where, and I kid you all not, nothing happens. It’s more like they tap their blades together while Dr. Kurtz spews more exposition.

In all, watching Cannibal Women In the Avocado Jungle of Death seems to go in stages: Uproarious laughter, cringing, groans, abundant face palms, eye-rolls, at least one muttered “Are we there yet?”, and finally, a sigh of relief followed by various iterations of “What. Was. That?” Enter the Avocado Jungle at your own risk, folks.

For more so-bad-it’s-good-ness, please click here. Thanks for reading, all, and look for another cringe-y flick tomorrow…

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Cannibal Women in the Avocado Jungle of Death is available on DVD from Amazon, and is free to stream for Prime customers.

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