As a kid, I always did. Usually horribly dubbed into English, and at the time, it didn't matter. Wondering if any of you out there loved those old Hercules movies of long ago as well. It doesn't matter if it was for the beefcake, or the scantily clad women, or the actual gladiatorial fighting, the adventure, or the beefcake. Oops, mentioned it twice! Feel free to describe the films and / or scenes here.
Here is one of Mark Forest as the most mellow and laid-back 'California style' of any Hercules I can recall:
I saw most of these films, in a theater, when they were new. My memory of them, is that they were magnificent-looking, color films (in the day, when we saw just as many black and white films, as color). It would appear that none of them has ever had a proper, restored home video release, which is sad. My favorite of the lot (and my most-wanted remastered film release) is THE THIEF OF BAGHDAD with Steve Reeves.
Of all sub genres in films, this genre which once saturated local TV stations in the 60's and 70's has in recent history been really neglected, as mention no decent DVD transfer, but except for a few, cable tv has ignored the hundreds and hundreds of these films which was made in Italy and elsewhere from the late 50's when Herculus, became a big hit for Joseph Levine till the mid 60's when spaghitti westerns took off replacing them.Whatever one's opinion on these films it is a shame so little exposure is given to them in the modern media.
Of all sub genres in films, this genre which once saturated local TV stations in the 60's and 70's has in recent history been really neglected, as mention no decent DVD transfer, but except for a few, cable tv has ignored the hundreds and hundreds of these films which was made in Italy and elsewhere from the late 50's when Herculus, became a big hit for Joseph Levine till the mid 60's when spaghitti westerns took off replacing them.Whatever one's opinion on these films it is a shame so little exposure is given to them in the modern media.
It would be interesting to see a sizeable chunk of these films restored and arranged in some fashion and run for a week or so at say, Village Cinema or Film Forum in New York. Well, perhaps not Film Forum, tiny auditoriums. But I never saw any of these films assembled in any kind of homage as a retrospective. It would be out of the question here in Montana as I'd be the only person in the auditorium - out of the entire state!
Of Pietro Torrisi I know nothing. But I do recall this:
I really like the sounds of those massive clubs that are swung and hit human bodies. When the clubs hit flesh they make a sound like, 'bonk!' I think everything was dubbed except for the sounds of the hollow plastic clubs!
HEY! Wasn't that a very young Peter Lupus playing Hercules? He made some Italian muscleman flicks using the name Rock Stevens, before becoming Willie Armitage on Mission: Impossible.
These were always great fun, with colorful photography, settings and characters.
I always wished they had better, thoughtful, matched lip-sync dubbing, however. But perhaps that's what made them somewhat tawdry entertainment beyond the often first-class cameramen, art directors and fancy (and expensive) technical details like Technirama 70, etc.
There are quite a number of the higher-class ones of these in the Turner/MGM and Warner libraries, some of which are now being released on the Warner Archive label.
If they were of a mind to do it, Warner could probably gather quite a number of these from their own extended library, make digital transfers, and run them in a short season around the country. If they didn't expect too much from the boxoffice, and advertised the season interestingly, they could probably have some audience success in special venues.
Yes.Like so many of those karate films from the 70's when you hit human flesh it sounds like your hitting something wood or a wall.That's dubbing for you.
I don't know that I'd get my butt all the way into a theater to see Turner's putative collection of these films, but if they'd run them on TCM I'd be happy to take a look to see what I missed all those years ago. Especially the Steve Reeves THIEF OF BAGDAD which PhiladelphiaSon has spoken of so highly on another thread. I never saw any of these films in a theater -- they never made it out of the big city into the suburbs where I grew up -- and the only Steve Reeves movie I ever watched on Million Dollar Movie was MORGAN THE PIRATE -- chiefly because of Chelo Alonzo's dance.
Love 'em. Grew up on the things. Definitely an ongoing guilty pleasure.
Have lots of them on DVD, some the restored ones from Warner Archive, such as DAMON AND PYTHIAS, GOLD FOR THE CAESARS, THE TARTARS, and a couple of others whose titles I don't immediately recall.
One aspect of all of these is that they were all originally widescreen, but most of the only available DVD versions are, at best, pan-and-scan. Besides that, and these were never high quality films to begin with, often the color is faded, the texture is riddled with blips and pops and bad cutting, so that I often wonder if many of these films have aged beyond restoration.
The original Steve Reeves HERCULES, released in 1958, started the phenomenon, which endured up into the early 60's. (I'm told that, while CLEOPATRA was being shot in Rome, apparently, various quickie film companies used the sets for their less-expensive films, but I've never recognized any of the CLEOPATRA sets in any of the ones I've seen.)
Though I'd always heard these films referred to as "sword-and-sandal," or "spear-and-sandal" films, Italians call them "peplum" films, after the name of the single-piece tunic worn by many of the male characters.
At the time I saw these originally, I thought I went to them because of the sets and costumes depicting the ancient world, which has always fascinated me. It was only as I got older that I realized a more sensual attraction was present. (Even though most of the musclemen in them seemed pretty dim as characters: big on the beef but not on the brains... I had more fun with the villains, who were always scheming about something. There's a great book, called "The Ancient World in the Cinema," where the author has a wonderful chapter on these films, as well as a few books of the posters of these films, which were often more interesting than the film they publicized.)
I remember seeing a documentary program back in the early 60's, all about the making of these films, showing one scene in which all the actors in a scene were speaking in different languages, which the narrator explained later would be dubbed into different languages anyway, so that it didn't really matter what the actors were saying. Fascinating documentary; wish I could see it again.
There are also a number of videos out there, consisting only of previews for these films, which are often more fun than seeing the whole picture. Although, I should warn you: after you've seen several of them in a row, they start to look pretty much alike...
Also, for those who are interested, Digitmovies and GDM have released more than 25 CD's of the music from these films, some of which is quite good. I have purchased all such scores that I can find, if only on principal.
They were always a lot of escapist fun, and some of them, at least, deserve preservation.
Well, the plots of most of them are pretty generic. There's this big muscle guy, see, who hangs out with these other guys, some with muscles but not nearly as much as he is. And there's a villain, usually with some kind of pointy beard, who makes life tough for the muscle guy and his buddies. Then there's this temptress type, who usually wears what looks like a bikini with veils attached here and there, and she invariably tempts Mr. Muscles from the straight and narrow path of helping his friends. Too late, some of his friends are caught by Evil Guy Pointy Beard, and some are tortured, sort of graphically. But it all ends well, because the "people," i.e. the extras, all wearing variations on a burlap bag, revolt at the end, and, with the help of Mr. Muscles, overthrow the Evil Guy, so that some kind of primitive democracy can take over.
(And, there's often a shot of Mr. Muscles pushing over a Big Rock, or throwing a Column, or destroying some fancy Piece of Architecture, which ends up rolling over all 6 of the extras working as soldiers for the villain...)
And then, our hero is joined by his, usually nebulous, girlfriend, who wears a one-piece outfit, to show she's more virtuous than the Temptress, for a kind of clinch at the end, amidst the victorious crowd of "the People," who've just defeated the Villain.
Meanwhile, the sound, not to mention the music, makes one think the whole thing was recorded underwater in a goldfish bowl.
Sound familiar?
(But they're all still a lot of fun, in their way, and never pretentious.)
There are quite good, anamorphic, widescreen DVDs of many of these films available from the European Amazon sites (Germany, Spain, France, Italy). I have many of these import DVDs – and will post information on the ones that I own when I have time. For example, there is a deluxe edition of “Colossus of Rhodes” that is beautiful – also a deluxe edition of “Dual of the Titans/Romulus and Remus”. There is a super French DVD of the Reg Park “Hercules vs. the Captive Women” (I believe the only peplum actually filmed in 70mm)– and there is a French series of double deckers – 2 movies per disc – that have gorgeous restored prints of many peplum and adventure films that aren’t available elsewhere – this series includes an eyepopping edition of the Gordon Mitchell film, “The Giant of Metropolis” – the Kirk Morris “Maciste in Hell” – and many more. This series also has a beautiful release of the Steve Reeves “White Warrior.” There is an edition of “Thief of Bagdad” available in Europe from Titanus that looks widescreen – but I have no idea of the quality of the print, etc., as I have not yet added that DVD to my collection.
The only caveat about these releases is, of course, that you have to have a regionless, PAL converting, DVD player – and in many cases, especially on the French DVDs, there are no English language tracks or subtitle options. This has never bothered me – as noted the plots are fairly obvious.
I love these films and their soundtracks – the Digitmovies series devoted to these scores is superb stuff.
