The Green Inferno -2013-

However, their plane crashes deep in the jungle. The surviving students, including Justine, wake up inside a cage. They quickly discover that the very tribe they sought to save is not a gentle, noble collective. They are starving. They are ruthless. And they have a longstanding tradition of ritualistic cannibalism.

While critics were lukewarm, the film was a modest financial success. Made for approximately $5 million, it grossed over $12 million worldwide—by no means a blockbuster, but profitable enough for Roth to later produce a sequel (which remains in development hell as of 2025). In an era of "elevated horror" (think Hereditary or The Witch ), The Green Inferno stands as a defiant throwback. It is not subtle. It is not psychologically complex in the modern sense. It is a visceral, gut-churning experience designed to test the limits of the audience’s stomach.

But if you are a student of extreme cinema—if you want to see a modern master pay homage to the grimy, dangerous VHS tapes of the 1980s—then this film is essential viewing. It is imperfect, it is often gratuitous, and it is unapologetically cruel. But in an age of sanitized studio horror, Eli Roth proved that he is willing to go back into the jungle, get the mud under his fingernails, and serve up a meal that most directors wouldn’t dare cook. The Green Inferno -2013-

That passion project finally materialized in . Released initially at the Toronto International Film Festival in September 2013 (before a delayed theatrical run in 2015 due to distribution issues), the film is Roth’s love letter—and modern update—to the infamous Italian "cannibal boom" subgenre, most notably Ruggero Deodato’s Cannibal Holocaust (1980).

Here is everything you need to know about the production, plot, controversy, and lasting legacy of . The Plot: Activism Gone Horribly Wrong The film follows Justine (Lorenza Izzo), a naive college freshman from New York City. Eager to impress Alejandro (Ariel Levy), a charismatic but manipulative activist, she joins a student protest that successfully disrupts a court case for a corrupt corporation. However, their plane crashes deep in the jungle

What follows is 100 minutes of unflinching survival horror. The students must escape a village where dismemberment is a ceremony, where their modern morals mean nothing, and where "The Green Inferno" (the tribe’s name for the eating of human flesh) is simply a part of life. To understand The Green Inferno -2013- , you have to understand its DNA. Between 1977 and 1981, Italian directors like Umberto Lenzi ( Cannibal Ferox ) and Ruggero Deodato produced a string of films that blended mondo documentary realism with extreme gore. The crown jewel was Cannibal Holocaust , which was so realistic that Deodato was arrested and forced to prove in court that he hadn’t actually murdered his actors.

During that two-year delay, The Green Inferno became a legend in horror forums. Fans circulated stories about audience members fainting at screenings. The MPAA slapped the film with an NC-17 rating for "aberrant violence and cannibalism." Roth famously had to cut less than 20 seconds of footage (primarily a genital torture scene involving a razor blade) to secure an R-rating. They are starving

Emboldened by their viral victory, the group—calling themselves "ACT" (Action Against Tragedy)—decides to take their mission to the Amazon rainforest. Their goal: to chain themselves to bulldozers and halt the construction of a pipeline that will destroy a remote indigenous village.