Starring Richard Harrison, Anna Ranalli, Arturo Dominici, Leo Anchoriz, Antonio Molino Rojo
Directed by Alberto De Martino
(actor & director credits courtesy IMDB.com)
The cruel rulers of Argos use a savage dragon and the Medusa, whose gaze turns men to stone, to cut off the city of Serifo's trade routes, but the young hero Perseus leads a challenge against them.
This Italian film, originally titled Perseo l'invincibile was one of several films dubbed and repackaged for American television in The Sons Of Hercules series, which is the source I was able to see this from. Ironically, according to Wikipedia, Perseus was actually a half-brother of Hercules, but that's hardly worth quibbling about, when the film is only a very loose adaptation of his mythic adventures. Harrison, although per IMDB starred in a number of sword & sandal films, is an interesting choice here. He's far from the musclebound hero of other films of this type, and in fact never takes his tunic off. The film's entertaining enough but focuses more on the conflict between the cities than the monsters or the mythology. As for the monsters, they're portrayed by men in suits and are very distinctive looking, with the toothy dragon rising from the sea to attack its victims, and Medusa resembling a giant walking plant with a single glowing eye. They might not pass muster by today's standards, but I certainly found them fearsome and unique. There's also a number of interesting names in the cast and crew, according to IMDB, with Black Sunday's Arturo Dominici playing the villainous King Acrisius, The Good, The Bad, & The Ugly's Antonio Molino Rojo playing Tarpete, Carlo Rambaldi (who later worked on Alien and E.T.) providing the special effects, and Amando de Ossorio (a writer & director of several Spanish horror films) credited with visual effects.
No comments:
Post a Comment