Cannibal Mukbang (2023) (Blu-ray Review)
DIRECTED BY: Aimee Kuge
STARRING: April Consalo
RATED: UR/Region: O/1:85/1080P/NUMBER OF DISCS 1 (BDr)
AVAILABLE FROM Well Go USA
If you’re going to make a romantic comedy about a shy guy falling for a mysterious woman, you could always go the traditional route: dinner, flowers, awkward small talk, maybe a rom-com montage where they inexplicably fall in love over three days.
Or you could make Cannibal Mukbang, where the dinner is human flesh and the relationship comes with a frankly outrageous amount of bloodshed.
Directed by Aimee Kuge, this 2023 horror-comedy follows Mark, a painfully shy guy who becomes smitten with Ash, an outgoing woman who seems surprisingly interested in him. Unfortunately for Mark, Ash has a rather unusual hobby involving mukbang videos. And by “unusual,” I mean that eventually the menu starts looking like something the local homicide department might want to investigate.
The funniest thing about Cannibal Mukbang is how seriously Mark takes this relationship while the audience is sitting there thinking, “Buddy, there are some pretty obvious red flags here.”
She’s mysterious.
She’s attractive.
She’s fascinated with food.
She also eats people.
But hey, nobody’s perfect.
The movie gets a lot of mileage out of the contrast between Mark’s awkward, lonely existence and Ash’s much more outgoing personality. Watching him get pulled deeper into her bizarre world is genuinely funny because you can practically see his brain going, “This is probably fine,” while every available warning siren is screaming in the background.
It’s basically a romantic comedy for people who think When Harry Met Sally needed a meat cleaver.
And thankfully, Kuge doesn’t forget the comedy once the blood starts flowing. There’s plenty of dark humor mixed in with the gore, and the whole movie has a wonderfully ridiculous quality that keeps it from becoming just another grim cannibal movie. Festival descriptions have even compared its flavor to a mash-up of Jennifer’s Body, Scott Pilgrim, and Pearl, which is honestly a pretty accurate indication of the strange cocktail you’re about to drink.
The gore is also gloriously over-the-top. Once Ash starts treating unsuspecting people like items on a buffet, things get messy in a hurry. There are guts, blood, bones, and enough butcher-shop imagery to make you reconsider whether that “all-you-can-eat” sign outside the restaurant is actually worth investigating.
And the movie has fun with the mukbang concept itself. In a world where people will watch strangers eat enormous quantities of food online, apparently the next logical evolution is watching somebody eat the wrong kind of meat.
YouTube’s recommendation algorithm has officially gone too far.
I also really enjoyed how colorful and strange the movie can be. It’s not just wall-to-wall darkness and gore. Kuge gives the movie some visual personality, and there are moments that feel almost like a warped candy-colored romance before somebody inevitably ends up on the dinner table.
April Consalo is especially good as Ash. She brings enough charm and personality to the character that you can understand why Mark falls for her despite the increasingly obvious evidence that dating this woman could have some serious consequences for his life expectancy. Nate Wise is also a lot of fun as Mark, particularly as he gradually gets sucked further into Ash’s world.
The movie does run a little long, and there are stretches where the relationship material slows things down. But considering this is a 104-minute movie that somehow manages to combine romance, horror, comedy, cannibalism, revenge, social-media culture, and enough meat to stock a supermarket, I’ll cut it some slack.
At its best, Cannibal Mukbang feels like someone asked, “What’s the worst possible thing that could happen on a first date?” and then refused to accept any answer that didn’t involve a chainsaw.
It’s bloody, weird, surprisingly sweet in places, and genuinely funny. It’s also the kind of movie where you can spend half the runtime laughing at the absurdity of what’s happening and the other half wondering why you’re suddenly hungry.
Although, after this movie, I’d probably avoid anything labeled “chef’s special.”
Cannibal Mukbang is one seriously twisted love story, but that’s what makes it work. It’s not just a cannibal movie with a romance shoved into it. It’s a romance where the cannibalism is, unfortunately, part of the relationship.
Some couples have communication issues.
These two have consumption issues.
