Chris D on The Flesh Easters DVD

Fans of Chris D (of the band Flesh Eaters) might be interested in his web comments on a DVD Talk review of the 1964 movie The Flesh Eaters.

2. Contradictory information from "Chris D", 10/14/05: Hi, Glenn. Your recent review of The Flesh Eaters DVD release mentioned Tim Lucas' assertion that the flashback sequence where the nude concentration camp women (carefully blocked by protruding objects) were forced to jump into the swimming pool of flesh eaters was not in the original release.

I can tell you most certainly it DEFINITELY WAS in the original theatrical release. I saw it as a child at the Rubidoux Drive-In in west Riverside in the week it was released in southern California (I had harassed my parents into taking me). My mom loved horror movies but was a definite Catholic prude when it came to even a hint of sex in the cinema. This flashback sequence was definitely in the version we saw. I remember it very vividly, and it was something my partents were not happy about. My mom almost convinced my dad to start the car and haul our shocked asses out of there. But my obsessive film-o-philia, even then, was able to turn the tide and convince them to stay. When the movie later turned up on TV, that sequence was conspicuously missing. I was wondering for a while if maybe it was my imagination until I purchased Sinister's unauthorized release (where it's included.)

Hope this clears up the issue. Of course, there's a good chance that the sequence may have been omitted in theaters and drive-ins in the Bible Belt down South or more conservative areas of the USA.

An interesting footnote - writer Arnold Drake also scripted many stories for DC Comic's BLACKHAWK and DOOM PATROL comics in the 1960s. I was a huge fan of both. Drake had one of the more deranged imaginations at DC in the 1960s (as if he'd been schooled working at FOR MEN ONLY-type pulp rags). and he most certainly pushed the envelope as far as what was acceptable. He quite often would work in borderline sleaze/sadism elements (especially in BLACKHAWK) as well as villains that were either Nazi or Japanese war criminals (I remember thinking even as a kid that the Nazi experimental atrocities back story in The Flesh Eaters was Drake's doing. ----- Best, Chris D., American Cinematheque