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Peplum Populist: Hercules, Samson & Ulysses

Peplum Populist: Hercules, Samson & Ulysses

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hercules-samson-ulysses-posterThe “versus film” has been with us for decades, even if “vs.” didn’t show up in early movie titles like Frankenstein Meets the Wolf Man. Audiences crave watching cinematic legends smash into each other in duels to the death — or duels to the mutual understanding. Alien vs. Predator, Freddy vs. Jason, Batman v[s]. Superman, King Kong vs. Godzilla (soon ready for a rematch), Jesse James Meets Frankenstein’s Daughter (this really happened), Sherlock Holmes vs. Jack the Ripper (a number of occasions), and Dollman vs. The Demonic Toys. Bring up anything involving the SyFy Channel and sharks and you get hurt.

Italian sword-and-sandal (peplum) films couldn’t resist putting titans of the ancient world into the ring together, and there’s no finer example than 1963’s Hercules, Samson & Ulysses. The Italian title translates as “Hercules Challenges Samson,” in case you needed to know who goes up against whom and who is hanging around as the sidekick.

When it comes to peplum-as-pulp, Hercules, Samson & Ulysses is the real deal. Appearing at the point in the genre’s evolution when sword-and-sandal films either went stale or went silly, HS&U falls solidly on the positive silly side. It’s an outrageous actioner that knows exactly what its audience wants to see and delivers 100% on the promise of watching two legendary supermen batter each other in muscular absurdity. It may not be the best sword-and-sandal film, but it’s one of the most entertaining. This is the peplum film to watch if most of the genre’s other offerings don’t grab you.

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Peplum Populist: Colossus of the Stone Age (Fire Monsters Against the Son of Hercules)

Peplum Populist: Colossus of the Stone Age (Fire Monsters Against the Son of Hercules)

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colossus-of-the-stone-age-maciste-contro-i-mostri-italian-posterHere’s a pleasing discovery: Amazon Video has a widescreen print of the 1962 sword-and-sandal (peplum) film Colossus of the Stone Age available under its U.S. television syndication title, Fire Monsters Against the Son of Hercules. And the print is a good one. It’s not the level of a professional 4K restoration like the Phantasm Blu-ray that came out in December, but considering sword-and-sandal movies often look like someone dragged the film along the sidewalk on the way to the telecine department, Colossus of the Stone Age is damned near pristine. It isn’t part of the Amazon Prime library, however, so subscribers have to shell out $1.99 to rent it, or an extra 51¢ to own it. There’s a version streaming on Amazon Prime under the same title, but it’s the standard cropped and dragged-across-the-pavement type.

So as far as pepla available in English, Colossus of the Stone Age looks fantastic. But is it any good?

Perhaps the better question is, “Is it worth watching?” For this type of low-budget fantasy production, the question of quality is often separate from the question of whether to spend time with it.

But my answer to both questions is “no.”

The appeal of a peplum movie set in the Stone Age and the promise that it will have fire monsters is tempting, and the quality widescreen presentation is a legitimate bonus, but Colossus of the Stone Age (the U.K. theatrical release title) is one of the more tatty and flavorless examples of this genre. Pepla at their best have bizarre imagination, creative production designs and visuals, and robust action scenes. At their most mediocre they have heroes who don’t do anything and long scenes of extras running around in fields or through cheap cavern sets while clumsily swinging sticks at each other. Which is a sentence that works as a summary of this movie.

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Peplum Populist: Perseus the Invincible (Perseus Against the Monsters)

Peplum Populist: Perseus the Invincible (Perseus Against the Monsters)

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Perseus-the-Invincible-Poster-ItalianThe peplum film, a.k.a. the sword-and-sandal movie, was a dominant genre of Italian cinema from 1958 to 1965. Over a hundred pepla were produced, frequently in co-productions with other European countries, and often starring beefcake actors from the U.S. and U.K. like Steve Reeves, Reg Park, and Gordon Scott.

Buried in this heap of musclemen action pictures and low-budget ancient costume dramas are a few fantasy treasures. Locating these gems of the fantastic is an occasionally, uhm, Herculean task because peplum films are poorly represented on home viewing options in English-speaking countries. You can find hordes of them on streaming services — 75% of Amazon Prime’s library seems to consist of public domain sword-and-sandal movies — but most are horrendous and unwatchable pan-and-scan transfers from prints faded almost to gray smudges. The same is true of the numerous budget pack DVD collections. Even the occasional prestige disc releases are often inferior.

So in this first of an occasional column excavating for the sword-and-sandal films the Black Gate readership may wish to sample, I’m glad to report that one of the most fantasy-heavy pepla, Perseus the Invincible, is available in a decent version from (who else?) Amazon Prime under one of its alternate titles, Perseus against the Monsters. Pepla often skimped on outright fantasy beasts in their mythological stories, but Perseus the Invincible delivers creatures from legendary special-effects designer Carlo Rambaldi. That alone makes it worth a look.

An Italian-Spanish co-production, Perseo l’invincibile was released in Italy in February 1963, just as the sword-and-sandal craze was poised to wind down and the Western was waiting in the wings to take over. It reached the U.S. on television as part of the “Sons of Hercules” Embassy Pictures syndication package, where it was retitled Medusa against the Son of Hercules. It’s also gone by the names Medusa vs. the Son of Hercules and Valley of the Stone Men. There are at least three different cuts in circulation: the original Italian version, the U.S. syndication cut, and a Spanish cut with additional special effects like laser eye beams from Medusa.

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Blogging Dell Comics’ Hercules and Hercules Unchained

Blogging Dell Comics’ Hercules and Hercules Unchained

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hercules-dellhercules-unchained-dell1When bodybuilder turned actor Arnold Schwarzenegger brought Robert E. Howard’s Conan the Barbarian to the big screen in a pair of stylish costume dramas in the early 1980s, it ushered in a Sword and Sorcery craze with scores of imitators on the big and small screen eager to recapture the first film’s runaway success. For many, it was as if history was repeating itself for in the 1950s, bodybuilder turned actor Steve Reeves had starred in a pair of Sand and Sandal epics, Hercules and Hercules Unchained that created a similar sensation. The Italian sword and sandal craze (or peplum, to use their proper title) dominated the European box office in the late 1950s until the advent of the so-called Spaghetti western in 1964. The film that started it all was Pietro Francisi’s The Labors of Hercules (1957) which was dubbed in English by Joseph Levine’s fledgling Embassy Pictures and released as Hercules by Warner Bros. in the US in 1958. Its success led to a Dell Comics adaptation by the legendary John Buscema in 1959.

The plot of this first film was a reworking of the Greek myth of Jason and the Golden Fleece with Heracles (going by his Roman name, Hercules) promoted from a supporting player to the lead role. Of course within a few years, Charles Schneer and Ray Harryhausen would cover much of the same territory with Jason and the Argonauts (1963) creating a lasting classic which would quickly supplant the movie that started it all. The latter film’s longevity is largely due to Harryhausen’s superb stop motion effects work which continues to influence film-makers after half a century.

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Peplum Populist: Hercules in the Haunted World

Peplum Populist: Hercules in the Haunted World

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hercules-in-the-haunted-world-us-posterAmong the most popular articles I’ve written for Black Gate is a look at one the goofiest fantasy films of the ‘80s, the Lou Ferrigno Hercules. Two-and-a-half years later, I feel I should give the on-screen Hercules another shot with one of the better films to carry his name. Plus, I just pondered the news that a new Hercules film is on the way. Or maybe I’m just trying to repeat the search-engine magic of the name “Hercules.” So let’s leap back twenty-two years from the science-fiction cheesy glitz of Ferrigno’s film and take a kaleidoscopic trip to Hell on a shoestring budget with Mario Bava.

Among the many movies produced in the “sword-and-sandal” (peplum) deluge in Italy between 1958 and 1965, two stand out for movie fans: The Colossus of Rhodes (1960) and Hercules in the Haunted World (1961). Both were early efforts from directors who went on to re-shape other genres and subsequently turned into legends. Sergio Leone, director of The Colossus of Rhodes, created the style of the Italian Western with his three films with Clint Eastwood and the ultra classic Once Upon a Time in the West. Mario Bava, director of Hercules in the Haunted World, gave form to the Italian giallo film and Continental horror in general, starting with Black Sunday made the year before his one Hercules films.

The difference between The Colossus of Rhodes and Hercules in the Haunted World is that Bava was already in fine form and showing his signature style, while Leone displayed little of his famous “Leone-ness” in his first movie. The Colossus of Rhodes looks like something any competent director could have turned out. Nobody but Bava could have created the colorful fantasy eeriness of Hercules in the Haunted World.

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Hercules vs. the Giant Robots

Hercules vs. the Giant Robots

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herculesposter1983Hercules (1983)Last week I reviewed a silly Conan pastiche novel. Today, I offer a sequel of sorts: a review of a very silly Hercules movie. The 1983 Hercules, sporting former mean, green, grunting machine Lou “Hulk” Ferrigno and the best special effects the Italian film industry can sort of buy, is one of the grandly awful pieces of entertaining oddness ever to come from a Roman studio. And Rome has given us some odd stuff. Aside from sanitation, medicine, education, wine, public order, irrigation, roads, the fresh water system, and public health, of course.

I encountered this Hercules when I was eleven years old. I adored Greek mythology since I was in second grade and was well-read in the topic, for which I can thank Clash of the Titans for the initial push. One Friday night, a friend and I watched Hercules when it premiered on cable. It sounded like a sure-winner for kids still not old enough to go out on weekend nights: Greek mythology, monsters, and that guy who played the Hulk. (Plus girls in skimpy outfits, but at eleven we weren’t willing to admit that was already a motivation.)

I’m not certain what I expected from Hercules back then, but it certainly wasn’t what I ended up getting. I had this strange illusion, which only an eleven-year-old can sustain, that a mystical law forced filmmakers to adhere to their source material as closely as they could. When I saw this oddball Hercules film on television, my young boy’s illusions died forever. Which is safer for my sanity, although I still feel the pains from the 1998 Roland Emmerich Godzilla and Jan de Bont’s 1999 demolishing of The Haunting [of Hill House]. The 1983 Hercules has only the most tenuous connection to Greek mythology, and appears like a mishmash of tiny bits and pieces of Hellenic legendary in a goopy stew of trendy science-fiction clichés from the SF-explosion of the late-‘70s. Welcome to Battlestar Hercules. Or perhaps Krull is the most appropriate comparison.

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