It's fun, it's light, [but] it has a hard time when its tries to get heavy.

Story: It's very simple but honestly that is fine.

.Like the great film, it's made with a great deal of visible affection both in front of and behind the camera.

It's simply great fun, a winsome film and an occasionally over-the-top luxury fantasy that never flags.

The original "Faces of Death" 'shockumentary' was many things in its heyday: the ultimate Mondo-movie, the closest thing to a real snuff-movie and, during the staged scene, an often (unintentionally) hilarious bogus-documentary. More than that, during the 1980's and 90's it was somewhat of a "rite of passage" for many teenagers, who tried to show off their psychological 'manliness' (and at the same time were hoping that the creeped-out girls in the audience would snuggle a little closer).Those teens eventually grew up, possibly going to college and having long realised that 90 percent of "Faces of Death" had been fake, staged, pure bogus. But word had it – promoted largely by word-of-mouth, obscure Heavy Metal fanzines and a 14.4kbps internet – that there was a new, a "real" shockumentary around, and this shockumentary was "Traces of Death".The entrepreneurial Metalhead Damon Fox had not only realized that the taste for gore among gorehounds had not faded, but that – unlike in the 70's – one no longer needed a film-crew to create a mondo-documentary. All that was needed was an editing device and enough shock-and death-footage from various news-sources, "Faces of Death"-clones and the internet to stuff 90 minutes into a video-tape.Having culled and assembled said footage, all Fox had to do was to add narration (provided by himself in a distorted voice, all the time sounding like that creepy neighbor-kid who explains why pocking a dead dog with a stick is "good fun") and a soundtrack. The soundtrack itself is already the highlight – if we may speak of a highlight in this context – a minimal, yet haunting, pulsating Electro-sound-frenzy, both morbid and captivating at the same time. In consequent sequels the electro-sound has been dropped in favor of Grindcore, Black- and Death Metal, supplied by bands hoping to promote their equally gore-soaked albums and demos.Where mondos like "Faces of Death", "Mondo Carne" or "Shocking Asia" still had unwanted humor in the staged scenes and an air of the forbidden, "Faces of Death" is just a an assembly of disfigurement, accidents, suicides and autopsies that, more than being shocked or grossed-out,leaves the viewer with the same impression of having spent a day at the slaughterhouse: desensitized and nauseated more by the smell than by the actual carnage.Today "Traces of Death" is merely a footnote in the history of mondo-productions; the internet is full with infinitely more shocking images, videos and sites, free-of-charge for the jaded souls and ghouls who seek them (and have turned off the safety-mode of their search-engines). Even Fox himself has turned on his on "film-production", despite his cinematic and musical brilliance (which his IMDb-biography assures us of, no doubt composed by Fox himself)."Traces of Death" remains a curiosity in the history of mondo-films, having no other merits than that. I'll give it two points from 10: one for the soundtrack and one for the sake of being a curiosity.

Traces of Death lasts for seventy eight minutes & is a collection of extreme footage edited together with a few brief & largely uninformative snippets of narration provided by writer & director Damon Fox.Anyone familiar with these shockumentary style films will be feel right at home, having just watched Traces of Death I would say that it's 99% real footage of accidents, autopsies, suicides, crime scenes, morgues, gory medical operations & animal slaughter with the one notable exception being the scene at the end in which a man is supposedly killed by several Lions which is definitely fake & is actually ripped from another shockumentary from the 70's & even has Japanese subtitles like the only tape the makers could find was a Japanese one.Some of this is very grim & very hard to watch, from Pigs being blow torched while still alive to autopsies in which intestines, spines & brains are graphically removed (I assume this is medical school footage filmed for teaching purposes, I simply don't know why else an autopsy would be filmed in so much detail (edit: a little research proves my initial thoughts to be correct & the footage is actually taken from something called Basic Autopsy Procedure (1961) made by the U.S. army)) to various medical operations that will make most wince just looking at them including an Asian sex change change in which a guy has his cock surgically removed & a nice new glory hole created. I feel queasy just thinking about it but I am almost positive I have seen this exact same footage before in Shocking Asia (1976).There's the well known suicide of Pennsylvanian treasurer Budd Dwyer who blew his brains out during a live press conference, the close-up of Dwyer's face with blood pouring from his nose & mouth is yet another dubious highlight. Various crime scene photo's, sporting accidents & various other forms of human suffering, mutilation, death & pain are also included for our viewing pleasure.The majority of this footage has no narration, Traces of Death is just scene after scene of human misery & suffering not put into any sort of context. Budd Dwyer's name is never mentioned during his suicide, medical operations are shown but quite what is going on is a mystery as are the outcomes & why the Pigs are being blow torched alive remains unanswered (although I assume it was some sort of horrible experiment).The IMDb says this had a budget of about $18 which sounds about right, most of the footage is probably edited from other sources & randomly pieced together with no great thought behind it. Banned here in the U.K. the BBFC stated that it did not have any 'journalistic, educational or other justifying context for the images shown' which is just about spot on.Traces of Death is brilliant if you like this sort of thing with it's graphic footage of murder, misery, death, suffering & pain but I doubt there that many people out there who will truly enjoy all seventy eight minutes of this. Followed by Traces of Death II (1994), Traces of Death III (1995), Traces of Death IV: Resurrected (1996) & Traces of Death V: Back in Action (2000).

I agree with D Segura that most of the film especially the autopsies need some narration of some sort as they tend to get a bit boring if you don't know what is happening. Its still fascinating in some parts. The sex change operation is painful to watch if you are a man ha ha. The pigs getting burned I could have done without though, very cruel indeed. The Faces of Death series at least had some sort of structure to it and it feels as though this has just been thrown together in no order.Some of the scenes were short/poor quality and not explained at all.The narrator is a giggle with his horror voice.

Without a doubt one of the most atrocious movies (made for $18?) you're ever going to find, "Death" or otherwise. The great majority of the movie is still-photographs of murders, suicides, electrocutions, car crashes, and it's mostly SILENT FOOTAGE, so that little bonehead Damon Fox added in some horrendous, canned background music, and his own idiotic narration to fill that particular void. Damon has the personality of a toilet plunger, so why would we need to hear what he has to say? Why did Damon not address the allegations of his pedophilic convictions, alcoholism, and various other sundry affairs in his bone- gratingly bad narrative, or in his lengthy, and wholly fraudulent, bio?By the way, to Damon Fox, clever title that you came up with for this. What did it take you, maybe all of about four seconds to think of that title? "Faces of Death" and "Traces of Death" may have similar titles, but they're nothing at all like each other. Faces of Death was a brilliantly marketed movie. Its tag "Banned in XX countries" made people believe that it really had been banned in many countries all over the world, which only made many people want to see this to see what the big deal was. It was largely fake, but was coherently put together, and told its mock story well enough to make it involving.. Faces of Death at least had a sleazy, trashy documentary feel to it, some attempt at a sequence or progression from one scene to the next.None of that here though.This is just one still-photograph of brains splattered on the wall after another, another silent video of someone crushed in a compactor after that, all edited together without any progression from one scene to the next, with that annoying hairball Damon providing a thoroughly obnoxious and grating narrative. His fraudulent bio on IMDb is pitiful, claiming to be a big time film producer, musician, alleging that he graduated high school when he was 12 years old, etc. Why did IMDb bother to add such nonsense? What a pathetic fraud Damon he is, and what a pathetic video this was. We can only hope that his death comes soon. Few times has a movie made me as angry as this, or has a worthless waste of life like Damon made me as angry as this has. Rot in Hell, Damon.Damon, and every copy of this, should be burnt, and the ashes sent into deep space, to never be seen again.