Review: Nekromantik


Robert (Daktari Lorenz) is a guy paid to remove dead bodies and remains from the site of accidents. He secretly steals body parts and has recently graduated to stealing an entire decaying corpse for him and his equally depraved girlfriend Betty (Beatrice M.) to engage in acts of necrophilia. Do I really have to go on? Well, I’m not going to. On to the review portion…

Banned in Australia for many years, I recently managed to catch up with this notorious 1987 German flick from director/co-writer Jorg Buttgereit on Aussie cable TV, funnily enough. I’m sure some of you out there will like it enough for it to be considered a cult item, but boy am I not among you. It’s not for the reason you might think, though. Is it a disgusting, deplorable, and perhaps even evil subject for a film? Sure, but I wasn’t offended or disgusted by it personally. That’s because a) It’s not real, doesn’t look real, and I think it’s all kind of bullshit, and b) When an eyeball comes loose while actress Beatrice M is licking the corpse’s mouth tells you that Buttgereit and co-writer Franz Rodenkirchen are pitching this as a morbid comedy for the most part. The closest the film gets to being offensive is when a rape scene suddenly becomes a necrophilia scene. That’s absolutely disgusting, but it’s so poorly lit that even then you can’t really see enough to truly want to vomit or anything. Hell, I was so disinterested by that point that even if it were well-lit, I probably wouldn’t be engaged enough to actually be terribly offended.

So, why do I hate the film? Because it completely and overwhelmingly sucks. It’s too damn stupid to be considered offensive (Bear in mind, most mainstream audiences would indeed find this impossible to stomach. I’m just a very jaded viewer). It’s boring as hell, there’s not much plot, even less character development, and neither on a technical nor entertainment level does it offer a damn thing of considerable merit to bring this out of the gutter. No, not even the decent score by Herman Kopp, Daktari Lorenz & ‘John Boy Walton’ is enough to lift this one off the bottom of the barrel. It’s been really poorly lit by cinematographer Uwe Bohrer as well, making it abundantly clear that the director was solely concerned with pissing censors off (That was apparently his sole reason for getting into directing). Some will find the finale hilariously bad, and I guess it kind of is. However, more on the bad end than the hilarious end for me. It’s very, very juvenile, and if you’ll forgive the pun, slightly wanky. That said, it’s the only moment from the film that you might actually remember afterwards.


One of the worst films of its year and possibly even the decade. This is less offensive and more just completely dull, empty, and worthless. I have no doubt the director of the “Human Centipede” series is a big fan, and you might be too. That’s nice, just keep your distance from me, thanks.  This is stupid shit based on objectionable themes. I don’t really regret seeing it, but I won’t recommend it even as a curio or for completist purposes. It’s shit, it sucks, and I’ve already written way more about it than the film deserves. The decision whether to watch or not is entirely up to you.


Rating: F

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