In the 1960s, the Italians made a variety of films starring the character Maciste. However, depending on who was terribly dubbing it, the character became 'Atlas', 'Samson', 'Goliath' or 'Hercules' or just plain ol' Maciste. This is really sloppy, as Atlas is a Titan and nothing like Hecules--a demigod (half human/half god). In fact their mythology is very, very different. And Samson and Goliath are Old Testament characters--and are absolutely nothing alike. Considering how cheesy the dubbing was, it's not surprising that they played fast and loose with the names of the character. By the way, what is the best translation of Maciste? Well, I did some research and found that it would be Maciste!! He was none of these other people--just a guy named Maciste who is a very buff hero of the classical period. And, oddly enough, despite the word Atlas in the title, he's referred to as Maciste throughout! Aye, aye, aye!
The film begins with an attack by the wicked queen's men on a poor defenseless city. A man manages to escape with a child--a child the queen wants dead along with its mother (who is also a queen). The soldiers did try hard and even managed to wound the man, but the evil queen was a crazed idiot and killed the soldier who told her about the escape upon his return! You just can't keep doing that to your minions until eventually they rebel--good henchmen and minions are hard to find! And, to make things worse, she finds out AFTER she kills the guy that he was the only person who knew the identity of the lady the evil queen was also trying to kill!
Maciste comes into the film when he meets the dying man with the baby. He takes the baby to a trusted friend to watch while he goes back to free the baby's mother and the other prisoners. But after kicking some butt, the evil queen drugs him and gets the secret of where the baby is hiding out of Maciste. Can our hormone-drenched hero save the day or will he and the baby end up as sacrifices to the evil queen's equally evil god?! Tune in yourself to find out--though the answer probably won't come as that big a surprise!
So is this film any good? Well, yes and no. Yes--if you need a good laugh or if you want to see Gordon Mitchell's bulging muscles! No--if you want intelligent or well made entertainment! I personally like how silly and poorly made the film is. The sets are rather poor and the plot is very typical of one of these films. I loved such wonderful scenes as the fight with the lion where one moment it was obviously a lion and the next it was obviously a dead stuffed lion!!! Talk about cheesy. The very stilted dialog was also a hoot with such lines as:
"Go. Free them from the cruel and perfidious queen. Go. Go now". My question is what does 'perfidious' mean?! I think it's bad. Well, actually I looked it up and it apparently means 'faithless'. Then why not just say faithless?!?
"Forget what I said before. I am now a prisoner...a prisoner of your beauty."
"How long the night is when one is alone."
"Liar! I hate you!! (Machiste to the evil queen)" "Yes, and I love you, Machiste!"
In addition to being a rather dopey film, the DVD copy is extremely poor (with the color completely lost in the final twenty minutes of the film) and the sound is the same--sounding, at times, like there is some sort of wind storm going on in the sound booth! Now remember that my score of 2 is for the version I saw. I better dubbed or better yet, the original film might be a heck of a lot better...or perhaps not.
The film begins with an attack by the wicked queen's men on a poor defenseless city. A man manages to escape with a child--a child the queen wants dead along with its mother (who is also a queen). The soldiers did try hard and even managed to wound the man, but the evil queen was a crazed idiot and killed the soldier who told her about the escape upon his return! You just can't keep doing that to your minions until eventually they rebel--good henchmen and minions are hard to find! And, to make things worse, she finds out AFTER she kills the guy that he was the only person who knew the identity of the lady the evil queen was also trying to kill!
Maciste comes into the film when he meets the dying man with the baby. He takes the baby to a trusted friend to watch while he goes back to free the baby's mother and the other prisoners. But after kicking some butt, the evil queen drugs him and gets the secret of where the baby is hiding out of Maciste. Can our hormone-drenched hero save the day or will he and the baby end up as sacrifices to the evil queen's equally evil god?! Tune in yourself to find out--though the answer probably won't come as that big a surprise!
So is this film any good? Well, yes and no. Yes--if you need a good laugh or if you want to see Gordon Mitchell's bulging muscles! No--if you want intelligent or well made entertainment! I personally like how silly and poorly made the film is. The sets are rather poor and the plot is very typical of one of these films. I loved such wonderful scenes as the fight with the lion where one moment it was obviously a lion and the next it was obviously a dead stuffed lion!!! Talk about cheesy. The very stilted dialog was also a hoot with such lines as:
"Go. Free them from the cruel and perfidious queen. Go. Go now". My question is what does 'perfidious' mean?! I think it's bad. Well, actually I looked it up and it apparently means 'faithless'. Then why not just say faithless?!?
"Forget what I said before. I am now a prisoner...a prisoner of your beauty."
"How long the night is when one is alone."
"Liar! I hate you!! (Machiste to the evil queen)" "Yes, and I love you, Machiste!"
In addition to being a rather dopey film, the DVD copy is extremely poor (with the color completely lost in the final twenty minutes of the film) and the sound is the same--sounding, at times, like there is some sort of wind storm going on in the sound booth! Now remember that my score of 2 is for the version I saw. I better dubbed or better yet, the original film might be a heck of a lot better...or perhaps not.