The infamously banned video nasty, Cannibal Holocaust, is getting a 4K Ultra HD release from 88 Films in the UK this November. Cannibal Holocaust was originally released in 1980 and is one of the first notable found-footage horror movies ever made. The film follows a rescue team searching for a missing documentary film crew in the Amazon Rainforest, who get more than they bargained for when they discover the crew's footage. By 1984, the film was banned in several countries including the U.S, Australia, Norway, and Iceland, but has since developed a cult status and is thought of by some as not just a mindless gorefest but a critique of journalism.

When Cannibal Holocaust first premiered in Italy, director Ruggero Deodato was arrested for obscenity, and later charged with murder due to rumors stating that several members of the cast were actually killed. The murder charges were dropped when it was confirmed that Cannibal Holocaust was not a snuff film after multiple actors came forward, revealing they were indeed very alive. However, the film remained banned in several countries including Australia and Italy due to its depiction of actual animal cruelty and its graphic scenes of sexual assault.

It is currently not clear which version of Cannibal Holocaust the upcoming 4K Ultra HD release will contain, since the film has been heavily censored several times since the time of its initial release. Although, the British Board of Film Classification (BBFC) has recently rated a 95-minute version from 88 Films. That version is three minutes longer than Ruggero Deodato’s New Edit, which was released back in 2011. No matter what version is released in 4K Ultra HD, it won't be a fully uncut version, since the BBFC guidance stated:

“This work required a compulsory cut to a scene of animal cruelty. Cut was made in accordance with BBFC Guidelines, policy, and the Cinematograph Films (Animals) Act, 1937, which is applied in accordance with the Video Recordings Act, 1984.”

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Image via United Artists Europa

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Cannibal Holocaust will be released on 4K Ultra HD in the UK on November 22.

Here's the official synopsis attached to Cannibal Holocaust's 4K Ultra HD release:

"Primitive savagery meets the brutality of the modern world in Ruggero Deodato’s timeless slice of visceral horror – Cannibal Holocaust, a film so violent and depraved that the director was charged with killing his own cast!Anthropologist Harold Munroe is hellbound as he travels into the green inferno of South America's rainforest in an attempt to find a documentary crew lost months before. Instead of survivors he discovers a world of cannibalistic excess beyond his wildest imaginings but when he returns home and screens the footage left behind by the eviscerated filmmakers, chaos erupts as the screen is filled with some of most disturbing images ever committed to celluloid."