Hercules and the Captive Women (1963)

Who payed the critics

I gave it a 7.5 out of 10

An action-packed slog

Blistering performances.

I'm probably just so used to seeing movies shown on MST3K being awful that I found this to not be that bad. It probably helps that it actually does get good near the end with all the explosions and stuff. The special effects get better. I still wouldn't recommend it of course. This was the time when most movies were in color. You can kind of see how gaudy it looks. It's not as bad as some other movies, but still pales in comparison to even older movies like the 1940 "The Thief Of Baghdad". I guess the atmosphere wasn't bad.Of course, I haven't been following the Hercules films in this series that much, so I didn't really care what was going on. I thought Atlantis was supposed to be underwater? What's the deal with that? A lot of the acting is pretty corny too. I guess this series as a whole wasn't as awful as most. It starts so abruptly. There's just all this action out of nowhere. Well, at least there was something going on at the beginning. **

Passable Peplum thanks to robust Reg Park and expert filmmaker Vittorio Cottafavi . Mythological epic with a magnificent he-man as is Reg Park and set in Greece and Turkey . The Greek council of the 30 (formed by a nice Italian cast such as Ivo Garrani , Enrico Maria Salerno , Ettore Manni and the notorious Gian Maria Volonte , previous his Fistful of dollars) assigns Heracles (Reg Park) a dangerous mission to go to Orient country to investigate a terrible enemy foreseen by the augur (Nando Tamberlani) . Heroic Hercules along with his son (Luciano Marin) , Androclo, Re Di Tebe (Ettore Manni) and a midget battle the seductive powers of the wicked Queen of Atlantis named Antinea (Fay Spain) . Strong yet sleepy Hercules discovers that the Queen of Atlantis is plotting to take over the world with superhuman warriors . The bouncing Maciste helps the Atlantis citizens and reunites an army of rebels to take on the queen headquarter . But Maciste is captured , locked and become a slave . Our protagonist unhesitatingly goes into action and must use his strength to save the Atlantis townsfolk from villain Queen Antinea . Then Maciste becomes inextricably involved in a war between rebels under his command against an army of automat . Along the way Maciste or Hercules or Goliath frees slaves , moves rocks , fights weird creatures and nasty masked hoodlums . Italian/French co-production with haunting scenarios , wonderful outdoors and functional production design , including a city similarly designed to mythical Atlantis . Lavishly-produced , sometimes tongue-in-cheek , plenty of action and results to be pretty entertaining . This is a good spaghetti , myth-opera with action , battles , luxurious landscapes and a love story between Hercules' son and a princess . The movie has not mythological accuracy neither expecting historical . Breathtaking scenes when Maciste moves a giant rock , thrown from a cliff , and overwhelming final with surprising and spectacular scenes , including the explosive spotlight when ground shaking , volcano erupts and the town blows its top . In the picture turns up Peplum ordinaries as Ivo Garrani as Re Di Megalia , Mimmo Palmara as Astor, Il Gran Visir , Mario Petri as Zenith, Prete Di Urano and veteran Nando Tamberlani as Tiberiades , the soothsayer. Reg Park is perfect as the mythical hero who encounters many dangerous situations while trying to save his son of numerous odds and taking on the mythical Queen Antinea from Pierre Benoit novel . Reg Park himself became something of a cult personality in the Italian epic genre . Reg was a personal fitness trainer in South Africa . His friend and protégé Arnold Schwarzenegger considered Park to be the best of the "peplum" heroes. Reg Park who played the mythic Maciste in a few movies was randomly assigned the identity of Hercules , Goliath , Samson or Aron for U.S. viewing . Bouncing and strong Reg was the third American actor bodybuilder , after Steve Reeves and Gordon Scott, to be recruited by Italian producers to star in Peplum films . Reg Park played reserve team football for Leeds United before turning to body-building in 1946 . He finished Mr Universe runner-up to future film rival Steve Reeves in 1950 , then won the title outright in 1951, 1958 and 1965. After marrying South African-born Mareon Isaacs in Johannesburg in 1952, the Parks moved permanently to South Africa . Reg used the amount of money he made acting as hero and gladiator films in Italy to fitness . As the muscle-man Reg Park left allegedly the sword and sandals genre for the gymnasium in South Africa where Reg ran a chain of fitness studios . He was one along with Ed Fury , Dan Vadis , Brad Harris , Alan Steel , Rock Stevens , Gordon Scott whom to seek fortune acting absurdly as muscle mythological figures but nobody topped Steve Reeves in popularity . Reg only starred 5 Peplum such as : La Sfida Dei Giganti , 1964 Ursus, terror of the Kirguisos , 1961 Ercole Al Centro della terra Hercules , 1961 The conquest of the Atlántida and ¨Maciste in King Solomon's Mines" - USA (TV title) or "Samson in King Solomon's Mines" which , handily for Park, was filmed on location in South Africa .Interesting screenplay by Sandro Continenza and Ennio De Concini , a prolific writer/director who wrote a lot of Spaghetti , Gialli and Peplum . This spectacular Sword and Sandal movie displays a colorful and glowing cinematography by Carlo Carlini , filmed on location and Incir De Paolis Studios, Rome, Lazio, Italy . Atmospheric and evocative musical score by Gino Marinuzzi and Armando Trovajoli . The motion picture was professionally directed by Vittorio Cottafavi who also wrote many tales of this kind ,as he continued to realize and write films in similar style , at which he developed a considerable skill and mastery . He began his professional career in the film industry as clapper boy . After progressing to write motion picture screenplays and working as assistant director under Alessandro Blasetti and Vittorio De Sica, he became a director in his own right in 1943. Many of his films have been "sword-and sandal" epics, dealing with mythological subjects involving the Roman Empire or Ancient Egypt such as "The Warrior and the Slave Girl" , "Amazons of Rome¨ , "Goliath and the Dragon" , Messalina¨ and "Cleopatra's Legion" . From the mid-60's, Cottafavi concentrated exclusively on directing TV series and mini-series, under contract to RAI . Rating : Acceptable muscle-men fodder and better than most muscles operas-spaghetti , thanks to Reg Park and by Peplum specialist as is the director Vittorio Cottafavi . Rating : 6,5/10 , Well worth watching and better than average Sword and Sandals movie .

In the late 1950s and through the 1960s, an odd sort of film became very popular--Italian strong-man tales set during the classical period. The characters were usually named Hercules, Maciste, Ursus or Samson--and often, due to HORRIBLE dubbing, the same movie might be dubbed so poorly that in one version he's Samson and in another he's Hercules. It seems that the names weren't really that important, nor was the dubbing. What was important is that, at the time, it was cheap to make films in Italy and with some less than expert dubbing, you could sell the film to many different markets...and people, surprisingly, came to see the films even though most of them are pretty terrible. If you see this particular one, you might think it's among the worst--it isn't. In fact, it's pretty typical of the crappy strong-man films.Like so many of these films, a foreign guy stars as the strong dude. However, Reg Park hails from the UK and South Africa--most of these men were Americans in these films. I assume back in those days, Italian men must have been pretty wimpy, because they didn't just use Italian leading men for these roles! Most of the leads were body builders in real life (Park had been Mr. Universe--though I doubt if other planets sent representatives to the competition).As for the plot, this one involves an insane and power-mad queen (also a pretty typical plot--it's the third film like this I've seen and I've only seen about 8 or 10 of the films). And, like the others, she had designs on taking over the entire world and serves an evil god. However, Hercules and his buddy Androcles don't know this--all they know is that they are on a rather pathetic expedition (with practically no men--just a rag-tag group that includes a midget and Herc's son who is a stowaway). The journey is prompted after some soothsayer announces that there is a threat from an army overseas. And, of course this takes our friends to the evil queen--who rules in Atlantis!! The evil queen has three goals. First, to kill her own daughter and anyone else if the mood strikes--including her own henchmen (good henchman are hard to come by--this seems very wasteful). Second, to take over the world. Third, to see if what's inside Hercules' tunic is of Olympian proportions!! It's a pretty standard cliché that the evil queens ALWAYS want a piece of the Herc-meister! Hercules' goal is to find his friend Androcles. Once he does, oddly, Andy doesn't recognize him and even tries to kill him. I'd much prefer if he'd tried to kill the midget. I am NOT anti-midget, but this guy (like the dumb satyr or 'goat boy' from the awful Hercules cartoons of the same era) was just annoying--mostly because his dubbed voice was so dreadful. Eventually, after LOTS of fighting, the city of Atlantis is destroyed by an exploding volcano--and THAT'S how the lost city apparently became lost.Overall, the dubbing was by far the worst part of the film. However, the costumes, sets and action were all pretty lame. In particular, I loved the lameness (or is it 'lamitude'?) of the reptile man who attacked Herc on the first island he came to in the movie. It's so dumb you can't help but laugh. My score of 3 is probably way too generous...but compared to many others in the genre, believe me, it could be MUCH worse (such as "Maciste Vs. the Moon Men"). Perhaps it's good for a laugh, but make sure not to watch too many of these films--your brain probably can't take THAT much!

"Hercules returns just in time to save a gorgeous damsel in distress from the clutches of a wicked monster. The grateful beauty takes him to her home in Atlantis. Hercules must intervene again to save her from her murderous mother and some unfriendly inhabitants. Hercules, his son, and the maiden escape before the city and its population are destroyed," according to the DVD sleeve's synopsis.Dubbed "Hercules and the Captive Women" from the original Italian, this one features Reg Park's debut as one of the exported "sword and sandal" strongmen. Don't watch for the numerous scenes involving Hercules rescuing "Captive Women" because there are none. Instead, you get to see him save one captive, or rather, less than half of her. There are some nicely dressed scenes, though.*** Ercole alla conquista di Atlantide (8/19/61) Vittorio Cottafavi ~ Reg Park, Fay Spain, Ettore Manni, Luciano Marin