"The Mighty Saga of the World's Mightiest Man!"
Thanks for the kind words, everyone. My aunt just died today, but she didn't suffer very much, and she died at home with her family around her. I wish I could have gotten to see her one more time before she died, but my mom let her know that I was in her thoughts. I'm more or less at a stage where I'm able to write now. I'm mainly working on non-fanfic stuff, but I do have a Fourth Doctor story which I started ages ago and am trying to complete.

I'm Netflixing a bunch of old-school Who to get in the mood, as I agonize over whether to wait until the US DVD set comes out or shell out 75 American dollars for the Canadian DVD set. I've seen The Aztecs and Tomb of the Cybermen and have strongly enjoyed both. More thoughts on them later.



Several of my local drug stores have bins selling ultra-cheap DVDs of obscure movies that have either fallen into the public domain (like the 40's Sherlock Holmes movies that had Holmes fighting Nazi spies in WWII, which are pretty fun) or are so obscure that the rights for them cost almost nothing. (Like "Abraxas, Guardian of the Universe," starring Jesse Ventura, the less said of which the better.) This week, I ran across a movie that looked very interesting: The 1958 Italian movie "Hercules, starring bodybuilder Steve Reeves and Sylvia Koscina. It was actually apparently quite a hit in its day, spawning a whole genre of pseudo-mythological "sword-and-sandal" movies.

This movie's original tagline (quoted on the IMDB page) makes it sound like it's a classic B-movie: See the seductive Amazons lure men to voluptuous revels and violent deaths! SEE the heroic Hercules rip down the Age of Orgy's lavish palace of lustful pleasure! SEE the Mightiest of Men fight the Mightiest of Beasts, the killer Cretan Bull! SEE Hercules fight off the savage love-starved Amazon women! SEE the seductive Amazons lure men to voluptuous revels and violent deaths! SEE the powerful Hercules crush the savage ape-men who guard the shrine of the Golden Fleece! Did it actually say "See the seductive Amazons lure men to voluptous revels and violent deaths!" twice? I guess that's the kind of thing you want to emphasize.

So far, though, it's kind of a letdown. (I'm 30 minutes in right now.) It's more like "SEE a lot of confusing poorly-telegraphed exposition! SEE Hercules standing around talking with people!" Is this Brian Michael Bendis's Hercules or something? In a movie called Hercules, you expect fight scenes!!! Also, it's impossible to tell what the names of the characters are. And the DVD has the worst pan-and-scan I've ever seen. Still, while it's no Drunken Master or Star Crash, it's quite enjoyable for several reasons (and it's a heck of a lot better than the Disney version):

1. The scenery is gorgeous. This is an Italian B-Movie, so its makers can take advantage of the amazingly beautiful Italian scenery, as well as the authentic Roman landmarks. (Never mind this is supposed to be in ancient Greece...) The set design is pretty nice too.

2. Sylva Koscina, who plays Hercules's designated love interest of the week, is gorgeous. I mean seriously:



3. The bizarre electronic science-fiction-y sound effects. One of the high points of the movie so far is when Hercules throws a discus and it makes a UFO-like electronic humming noise. There's also this witchy Oracle who makes an electronic whoosh sound when she moves her arms. Is she secretly part of the Sisterhood of Karn, I wonder?

4. The best part of this movie, so far, is the sheer amount of mythological fanwank involved in it. The main plot involves Jason and the GOldne Fleece (though it isn't about the quest for the Golden Fleece at all, but a MacBeth kind of setup where Jason' was kidnapped and his uncle, who happens to be Iole's father, was killed by his brother to claim the throne, and the Golden Fleece is the mark of his kingship). That's already kind of pushing it. But in the scene where MacBethocles's evil son challenges Hercules, when the other young men of Macbethocles's generic kingdom are trying to emulate Hercules by doing various macho-man Greco-Roman athletic things, one of them is told that he's too sick to participate in the marathon by his doctor, whose name is... Aesclepius. And then, three men are complaining about how people are neglecting intellectual pursuits to follow the example of Hercules, and one of them turns out to be Orpheus! And then, Hercules is advising some young men who are learning how to pole vault, and Castor and Pollux are standing beside him! And to top it all off, he then teaches a young man how to use the bow, and it's Odysseus! And Hercules tells him that one day his life will be saved by a bow! I swear, it's like the Greek mythological equivalent of a Star Trek novel.

5. The DVD mispells the title of the movie on the menu! They call it "Hurcules." They're certainly sparing no expense for this DVD.

Best line in the movie: Designated Love Interest to Hercules: "You know that my family is strange." I'd say that by Greek mythological standards her family is strange because they only practice murder and not incest.

Also: You can download this movie from the Internet Archive. Their print is probably significantly better than my DVD's.

Also also: According to the AMG review, "it it also may well have planted the pop culture seed through which Marvel Comics was able to spawn the Mighty Thor in comic books three years later". That makes the movie rise several notches in my respect. I say thee, yea!

Also also also: I just found out from Goodle that this movie was also MSTed! (As were its sequels, Hercules Unchained and Hercules Conquers the Moon Men) I have to see that.