Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind, a production of
Speaker 1: My Heart Radio. Hey, welcome to Weird House Cinema. This
Speaker 1: is Rob Lamb and this is Joe McCormick and Rob.
Speaker 1: I am so excited for the movie you picked today
Speaker 1: because it is our very first Weird House Cinema leather
Speaker 1: diaper barbarian movie. Uh that I can't believe it's taken
Speaker 1: us this long to do one, because the LDBM is
Speaker 1: a almost perfect subgenre, well suited to two. I think
Speaker 1: our sort of knowledge bases and and tastes and and
Speaker 1: one of my favorite things about the leather diaper movies
Speaker 1: of the eighties is yes, they you know, they have
Speaker 1: a basis in the sort of Conan thing. You'll have
Speaker 1: a strong guy with muscles wearing a loincloth. He carries
Speaker 1: a sword or an axe, or maybe he just wrestles
Speaker 1: or something. But what I love about the movies like
Speaker 1: this from the eighties is that they so will often
Speaker 1: start mixing genres in a in a bizarre, haphazard, almost
Speaker 1: blindfolded way. So the pinnacle of this, I think I've
Speaker 1: mentioned on the show before is a movie called Your
Speaker 1: Hunter from the Future, in which a Conan type guy
Speaker 1: muscle dude in leather diaper uh does battle at the
Speaker 1: end of the movie with Darth Vader. But this one
Speaker 1: we're going to be talking about today is in fact
Speaker 1: a Hercules movie where Hercules fights robots. Yes, this is
Speaker 1: um okay, so it's definitely a sword in Sandals muscleman movie.
Speaker 1: But it is also very spacey in a way that
Speaker 1: that doesn't quite uh, it doesn't go so far as
Speaker 1: to say this is science fiction Hercules. Um it. It's
Speaker 1: still grounded in some sort of mythic sensibilities and in
Speaker 1: an idea that we're we're in antiquity, but everything is
Speaker 1: also just totally Oh I was thinking of it. It's like,
Speaker 1: what if Hercules in stories of Hercules were just totally
Speaker 1: Italian space disco, but without the Italian space disco music,
Speaker 1: but just that sense of like glittering, sparkling cosmos and
Speaker 1: sweat and uh yeah it's in sexuality and and so forth.
Speaker 1: That's that's what this movie feels like. It also has
Speaker 1: that Italian disco sci fi sense of it's a movie
Speaker 1: where they don't even try to hide the strings and
Speaker 1: the special effects shots, so you'll see, like, you know,
Speaker 1: there's the jar from which all creation emerges when it
Speaker 1: explodes in space. And so they have a special effects
Speaker 1: shot where there's a jar floating in the starfield and
Speaker 1: then it blows up, but then you see pieces of
Speaker 1: it are just dangling from strings and they leave it
Speaker 1: in the shot, and yeah, I high five for that. Yeah.
Speaker 1: The the effects in this film are ambitious but often imperfect,
Speaker 1: but in a way that has a real charm to it.
Speaker 1: You know. Um, I won't say that many of the
Speaker 1: effects in this movie look great, but I did enjoy them. Yes,
Speaker 1: they're very enjoyable there, and they're often different from like
Speaker 1: you go into a film like this and you expect, uh,
Speaker 1: you know, special effects that don't quite knock it out
Speaker 1: of the park. But but this one, it goes in
Speaker 1: some directions you don't really expect. There's a lot of
Speaker 1: sort of transparencies and a lot of things sparkling and
Speaker 1: sort of exploding with electronic synth that you you're not
Speaker 1: expecting to explode like that. It's uh, it's a lot
Speaker 1: of fun. Oh but there's another thing we haven't even
Speaker 1: mentioned yet. So so this is Hercules three, starring lou
Speaker 1: Ferrigno as Hercules. Uh, you might know from from playing
Speaker 1: the Hulk on the old TV show, though I never
Speaker 1: saw him in that. I think I know him mainly
Speaker 1: from the movie Pumping Iron, which is a documentary in
Speaker 1: which he just plays himself at a like the you know,
Speaker 1: the weightlifting competitions, and in that he's sort of the
Speaker 1: underdog character and he's squaring off against Darnald Schwarzenegger and
Speaker 1: they're both pumping and explaining why they pump better. And uh.
Speaker 1: But anyway, so this is Hercules starting loufer Rigno. But
Speaker 1: this is also a Canon Films picture. This is a
Speaker 1: Golden Globus movie. Uh. And so whenever you see the
Speaker 1: Cannon Films logos, certain things that suggests something about the
Speaker 1: flavors that are going to follow. You know. Canon Films
Speaker 1: is famous for in this period in the eighties, making
Speaker 1: movie after movie that are in the genre that I
Speaker 1: would call poster. First, you have a poster before you
Speaker 1: have a script. And the poster is almost always a
Speaker 1: guy with a machine gun and then some other things
Speaker 1: in the background, right right, Yeah, there's often a very
Speaker 1: very macho feel, a very just just all things eighties. Uh.
Speaker 1: Wound up in again a Cannon film, and I can't
Speaker 1: remember if we've actually covered a cannon film on here before. Um,
Speaker 1: but I'm sure if this is the first, it won't
Speaker 1: be the last. Oh surely not. Oh but okay, so, yes,
Speaker 1: hercules three cannon films. It is at its heart, Yes,
Speaker 1: it is a muscle guy movie, absolutely a shining jewel
Speaker 1: and the long cinematic tradition of muscle man movies. The
Speaker 1: basic principle of these films is, of course, you usually
Speaker 1: have just a a bare chested muscleman hero who must
Speaker 1: battle evil and save the day, generally with just his
Speaker 1: brute strength. Um. The flavor is generally mythic, you know,
Speaker 1: sword and sandal, comic book stuff. Uh. You know, sometimes
Speaker 1: it goes in more of a sci fi direction. For example,
Speaker 1: uh movies we have covered on Weirdolt Cinema, Hands of
Speaker 1: Steel and Arena. Those are both, to a certain extent
Speaker 1: muscle man movies we both have, especially Hands of Steel.
Speaker 1: But but for the most part we're dealing with stuff
Speaker 1: that's more more sword and sandals, sort of strongman uh shenanigans.
Speaker 1: You cast a bodybuilder and then you just watch the
Speaker 1: movie come to life around that. Zeke right, Um, I
Speaker 1: do agree that that is the heart of it is
Speaker 1: like a character who must use their brute string in
Speaker 1: order to defeat the villain. So they're swinging a sword,
Speaker 1: or they're wrestling, or they're wielding a hammer. You know,
Speaker 1: it's the barbarian type, the Hercules type. But there was
Speaker 1: a strange phenomenon in the eighties. I'm sure you'll know
Speaker 1: immediately what I'm talking about, where the Muscleman movie and
Speaker 1: the guy with the machine gun on the poster movie
Speaker 1: sort of merged. A great example of this is Commando
Speaker 1: starring Arnold Schwarzenegger, where the premise of the movie is
Speaker 1: that the hero is a man who shoots guns at
Speaker 1: the bad guys, but they also just get a bodybuilder
Speaker 1: to play him. So the main characteristic of the hero
Speaker 1: is that he is, you know, eight hundred pounds of
Speaker 1: stiff beef, but he also just like you know, uses guns.
Speaker 1: Yeah yeah. And it's important to to note the sort
Speaker 1: of bodybuilder turned actor thing, the the sort of non
Speaker 1: actor that's brought into play the character in these roles. Um.
Speaker 1: I feel like it is really vital to the whole
Speaker 1: recipe for success here. Like you you don't want uh,
Speaker 1: you know, too much of a as being in there,
Speaker 1: no matter how muscular they are. You know. That's why
Speaker 1: I just I could only be so interested in the
Speaker 1: idea of the Rock playing Hercules, and the more recent
Speaker 1: Hercules movie, The Rock is great. Dwayne Johnson is a
Speaker 1: is a really really solid action star, and he's huge.
Speaker 1: He's huger now than ever before physically. But I feel
Speaker 1: like he's too good of an actor to play Hercules.
Speaker 1: You know that that's kind of yeah, that's a good point. Um.
Speaker 1: I think you could make a case that Arnold Schwarzenegger also, though,
Speaker 1: has a lot of natural screen charisma. But one thing
Speaker 1: about this movie, uh, that I like is that so
Speaker 1: you got lufer Igno as Hercules, and he I don't
Speaker 1: want to be mean, but he's not good. He's not
Speaker 1: acting really in this and but he works in the
Speaker 1: role because I think somehow, the worst the actor is like,
Speaker 1: the less screen charisma they have, the easier it is
Speaker 1: for them to come off like an underdog, even though
Speaker 1: they are eight hundred pounds of hard beef. So this guy,
Speaker 1: you know, he's just a wall of muscle, and he
Speaker 1: might look kind of like a bully beating up on
Speaker 1: the bad guys, except that he's kind of awkward and
Speaker 1: and doesn't say his lines in a very natural way,
Speaker 1: and that gets you on his side somehow. Yeah, you
Speaker 1: don't want him to be too confident or you know,
Speaker 1: to have that confidence actually shine through in the performance.
Speaker 1: So yeah, a lot of these don't mention a few examples. Yeah,
Speaker 1: a lot of these movies come about with a non
Speaker 1: actor muscle man. It's you know, pulled out of generally
Speaker 1: out of the bodybuilding world, and and is you know,
Speaker 1: they strapped the rockets to him, and sometimes they assent
Speaker 1: like Arnold as an example of that. Arnold, I guess
Speaker 1: arguably gets better at acting as his career uh proceeds.
Speaker 1: But I was looking back at Michael Weldon's um in
Speaker 1: the Psycontronic video and film Guides his right up for
Speaker 1: the original Conan movie, and he referred he he kind
Speaker 1: of pans it. He's kind of like, it's you know,
Speaker 1: it's it's it's it's another Dino film. It's you know,
Speaker 1: it's all excess. It's um, it's non actor Arnold Schwarzenegger
Speaker 1: punching a camel. And that's the only memorable moment in
Speaker 1: the film. I mean, it is hard to forget the
Speaker 1: camels yeah, I mean, ultimately, ultimately I disagree with with
Speaker 1: with Welton in this, but he was looking at it
Speaker 1: like more or less around the time of the release too.
Speaker 1: But but another great thing about Hercules is that it
Speaker 1: doesn't require the hero to do much acting. I mean,
Speaker 1: Hercules doesn't really need to say a lot in this movie.
Speaker 1: Many of the scenes are him sort of being led
Speaker 1: around by other characters and and instructed to do things,
Speaker 1: and then he does them right, you know, usually brute
Speaker 1: strength pretending to pick up a giant syrophone boulder, but
Speaker 1: doing so in a way that really like shows off
Speaker 1: the muscles and uh. And of course as a director
Speaker 1: you have to make sure all those muscles are are
Speaker 1: are lit and and oiled appropriately, so there's a real
Speaker 1: art to it. What was the lotion budget for this movie? Yeah? Um. Now,
Speaker 1: if you're interested in a deeper dive into the history
Speaker 1: of muscle than I have to recommend a book I
Speaker 1: was looking at. I didn't get a chance to to
Speaker 1: to pick it up and read it and do a
Speaker 1: deeper dive. But it's titled Descended from Hercules, Biopolitics and
Speaker 1: the Muscled Male Body on Screen by film scholar Robert
Speaker 1: a Rushing, Um, this looks like a really interesting read
Speaker 1: because I think it it looks like it gets into
Speaker 1: a lot of the questions, not only the history of
Speaker 1: these movies, but also what does it mean when you
Speaker 1: take a body like this and you you you you
Speaker 1: put it on the big screen and you make it
Speaker 1: be like the center of like truth and justice and
Speaker 1: you know, all admirable qualities in hypertrophy. Very tas Yeah, alright,
Speaker 1: So the muscleman movie eventually grows to include such films
Speaker 1: as Conan the Barbarian Beast Master. H three hundred would
Speaker 1: be a more recent muscleman movie. It's not centered so
Speaker 1: much around one muscle man, but like all muscleman I guess, uh,
Speaker 1: and you might well guess that. Well, I guess all
Speaker 1: of this began with the mythic Hercules, right, I mean
Speaker 1: he's been a popular figure, uh you know since antiquity.
Speaker 1: I mean he was he was you know, a Roman sensation.
Speaker 1: He's the equivalent of the Greek Heracles. But the interesting thing, um,
Speaker 1: and this is something that the Rushing points out in
Speaker 1: his book, of course, is that muscleman movies begin actually
Speaker 1: with another figure, one that I'd never heard of. Until
Speaker 1: I started reading Michael Weldon's psychatronic film Guides, and that's
Speaker 1: um uh Machista this, um this, This is the original
Speaker 1: Italian cinema muscle man. So a lot of the movies
Speaker 1: that I've always thought of as Hercules movies were actually
Speaker 1: uh Maschist or mashi ste movies that were like retitled
Speaker 1: for American audiences with with Hercules or they give him
Speaker 1: some other muscleman name like Sampson or something. Right, Yeah,
Speaker 1: but Motista was the original. And apparently this just means
Speaker 1: it's kind of like machiese mo, you know, so it
Speaker 1: basically means the macho man. The film that apparently kicked
Speaker 1: all of this off was nineteen fourteens Uh Ken Area.
Speaker 1: This was directed by Giovanni Pastrone. This is an epic
Speaker 1: set during the Second Punic War, based loosely on Gustav
Speaker 1: Laberts eighteen sixty two novel Uh Salambo, which I've never read.
Speaker 1: I have a beautiful paperback copy of it on myself
Speaker 1: that I've never actually read it. Oh interesting, some nineteen fourteen.
Speaker 1: This goes way back. This goes way back. This is like,
Speaker 1: this is legitimately one of the oldest and most popular
Speaker 1: figures hero figures in cinematic history. So this wouldn't make
Speaker 1: sense though, that muscle man movies would go back to
Speaker 1: silent film times or even this far back. But you know,
Speaker 1: back to a time when I mean in the early
Speaker 1: days of film. A lot of what they were putting
Speaker 1: on film was not like dialogue driven narratives, but it
Speaker 1: was something that they thought would be interesting to look at. Yeah. Yeah, Now,
Speaker 1: this first film, though, um Caberria, was apparently a huge
Speaker 1: hit and was also highly stylish. You look at you
Speaker 1: can look up skills with this or even footage of it,
Speaker 1: I believe where you see like these epics sets. It
Speaker 1: was a true sword and sandals epic that influenced a
Speaker 1: number of different filmmakers of the silent era. It's regarded
Speaker 1: as a Silent era classic. But it also had this
Speaker 1: character who I don't even think it's like the central character,
Speaker 1: but he's the He's the huge muscular slave to the
Speaker 1: Roman spy of Fulvious who is on a spying mission
Speaker 1: to Carthage. I believe in this film, and uh, and
Speaker 1: people really connected with this here, like who is this
Speaker 1: big muscular guy. He's the breakout character. He's the Boba
Speaker 1: fette of this movie. It's like I want, I want
Speaker 1: to know more about Mashi Stay. I want the muscle guy,
Speaker 1: so Maschi Stay in. This was played by um um
Speaker 1: Barto Lomeo Pagano who lived eighteen seventy eight through ninety seven.
Speaker 1: Um he was a stevedore who was like discovered, Like
Speaker 1: they see him and they're like that guy that is
Speaker 1: our our machis day. Uh. They hauled him in and
Speaker 1: they cast him in the role, and he goes on
Speaker 1: to play Machies Stay almost exclusively for the rest of
Speaker 1: his career. All told, we're talking thirty films in which
Speaker 1: he plays ms she Stay out of a thirty two
Speaker 1: film filmography over the course of fourteen years, I believe. So. Also,
Speaker 1: when this guy hits it big, no previous acting experience, right,
Speaker 1: no previous acting experience, and and he just started like
Speaker 1: he stuck with what works here, I'm seeing a trend
Speaker 1: of like nearly a century now. Yeah. So uh, Pagano
Speaker 1: becomes get those muscles in front of the camera. So
Speaker 1: Pagano he becomes an international film starck. These ma She
Speaker 1: Stay films are a big hit, though they're often retitled
Speaker 1: in foreign markets. So the character becomes known, at least
Speaker 1: for subsequent films as Hercules or Samson, you know, the
Speaker 1: the biblical character or the other Biblical character that you
Speaker 1: might think of when you think of intense physical strength Goliath.
Speaker 1: That's a strange choice because wasn't Goliath the villain of
Speaker 1: the story in the Bible that he was the philistine
Speaker 1: and soldier who David had to defeat. Even though David
Speaker 1: was smaller, he beat him by using his wits by like,
Speaker 1: I mean weakness. It's only one of the you know,
Speaker 1: the most famous um like Old Testament stories, right, I mean,
Speaker 1: it's always makes for a great great illustrations and works
Speaker 1: of art, cinematic treatments. George Eastman played Goliath and one
Speaker 1: adaptation we might remember huh, but so but it didn't matter, like,
Speaker 1: oh yeah, Goliath, he's our hero now, yeah, yeah. I
Speaker 1: mean when a character is that muscular, I guess, and
Speaker 1: that's strong, how can he be anything other than the
Speaker 1: hero of a picture. By the way, this also reminds
Speaker 1: me of how in so many of the Al Santo
Speaker 1: movies were were relabeled as Samson for foreign markets. So
Speaker 1: just I don't know a strong name, I don't know
Speaker 1: if they just won't want to get people in there. Now,
Speaker 1: the character machis Day would live on long after Pagano retired,
Speaker 1: appearing throughout the sixties and even the seventies. I think
Speaker 1: he shows up in some Jeff Franco movies. But Machistay
Speaker 1: w basically just going to fight various villains and monsters.
Speaker 1: He doesn't need to be part of a more epic plot.
Speaker 1: He's just here to do good and fight evil. He
Speaker 1: travels to the underworld. Like I think, there's basically a
Speaker 1: much he Stay Inferno movie. I don't know how much
Speaker 1: um of of Dante's original text is actually involved there
Speaker 1: and in that, but but he he apparently goes to
Speaker 1: the inferno. But he's often played in subsequent films by
Speaker 1: bodybuilders turned actors. Now as far as the muscleman movie
Speaker 1: Timeline goes. I could be wrong about this, but I
Speaker 1: remember having an impression that these got huge in Italy
Speaker 1: and then subsequently around the world and like the sixties.
Speaker 1: Am I right about that? Yes, And that's where we
Speaker 1: actually see the first Hercules movies where it's not just
Speaker 1: a retitle at Hercules, but let's make a movie about Hercules.
Speaker 1: Um So you have you have an actor who had
Speaker 1: also played Muchi's stay, Mark Forrest take on the role
Speaker 1: in nineteen sixties Revenge of Hercules, and this was an
Speaker 1: Italian film. And after that, more and more herk movies
Speaker 1: get made, including oh, this one is attractive given all
Speaker 1: that we've talked about. Nineteen sixty four's Hercules, sampson Um
Speaker 1: Machista and Ursus the Invincibles. So you get like four
Speaker 1: different strong men all teaming up to battle evil. And
Speaker 1: that one and this was sixty four. It is the
Speaker 1: Expendables of nineteen sixty four. Yeah, And of course from
Speaker 1: then on we have various actors up, generally like very
Speaker 1: very often bodybuilders turned actors playing the role Alan Steele,
Speaker 1: Steve Reeves already mentioned, Mark Forrest, uh and various others.
Speaker 1: You know, Brian Thompson would go on that would would
Speaker 1: plaim at least once. This is of course, the big
Speaker 1: muscular dude who was one of the Punks and Terminator
Speaker 1: and also played Shao Khan in the second Mortal Kombat movie.
Speaker 1: Um oh, that one was good. You get you get
Speaker 1: Kevin Sorbo of course playing him on screen. You get
Speaker 1: the rock taking a shot at it, and also it
Speaker 1: should be should be noted Arnold Schwarzenegger. Oh yeah, so
Speaker 1: this was an interesting coincidence we were pointing out. So
Speaker 1: in this movie, Hercules is played by Luferigno, and I'm
Speaker 1: right in saying this is his first movie. This was
Speaker 1: Luferrigno's first feature film, I believe. So, yes he had
Speaker 1: of course, he had done Hulk already, so he'd done
Speaker 1: Hulk in various TV appearances. But this was this was
Speaker 1: the rocket that was going to propel Luferignou into the
Speaker 1: cinematic stratosphere. And also Arnold Schwarzenegger's first screen role was
Speaker 1: playing Hercules in the nineteen seventy movie called Hercules in
Speaker 1: New York, which I have seen but I remember almost
Speaker 1: nothing about except that it was almost unwatchable boring. Did
Speaker 1: have Robert England in it? Am I remembering that? Correct? That?
Speaker 1: If so, I've forgotten about that. I watched this in
Speaker 1: college and I remember it being like hard to hear
Speaker 1: what anybody was saying in it. But yeah, but oh,
Speaker 1: but the premises, Arnold Schwarzenegger is a muscle guy and
Speaker 1: he's Hercules, and the gods send him down to New
Speaker 1: York for some reason. So he's just running around in
Speaker 1: modern New York at the Fish out of Water, Fish
Speaker 1: out of Time, Shenanigan's inside. I'm sure. Yeah, all right, Well,
Speaker 1: shall we go ahead and hear the trailer for Hercules.
Speaker 1: From the depths of Space comes the Strongest Man on
Speaker 1: Earth in the super adventure Odyssey, Hercules. The Incredible Loon
Speaker 1: for Rigno is Hercules in the battle with unearthly teachers. Hercules,
Speaker 1: the superhuman human with the strength of an army, Hercules
Speaker 1: facing love and the bewitching forces of evil. The Incredible
Speaker 1: Moon for Rigno is Hercules. Go Lion Globus production from
Speaker 1: the Kinnon Group. This is a pretty good trailer. I
Speaker 1: have to admit, I don't think I actually watched it,
Speaker 1: so I don't know what you just heard. We'll take
Speaker 1: my word for this one. This one is Zeus approved. Well,
Speaker 1: if it's the Zeus in this movie, I don't know
Speaker 1: if it's going to be that hard to get approved.
Speaker 1: Because this is a kind of a kind of groovy,
Speaker 1: hands off Zeus who who may be about to take
Speaker 1: a nap? Yeah, yeah, this is a this is a
Speaker 1: snoozer of a Zeus. All right, let's start at the
Speaker 1: top with this one. Uh. The writer director on this
Speaker 1: one is Luigi Cotzi, writer and director still making films today,
Speaker 1: Italian director, probably best known for this film and also
Speaker 1: it's sequel, as well as his frequent work with Dario Argento.
Speaker 1: I did not know this movie had a sequel. Is
Speaker 1: lufer Igno also in it? Yes? And I was reading
Speaker 1: like mixed counts on whether he was like sort of
Speaker 1: tricked into doing a sequel, Like they were filming stuff
Speaker 1: for another film and they're like, let's make it a
Speaker 1: sequel sequel. I'm not sure. I can imagine them just
Speaker 1: repurposing his shots from this movie and and making a
Speaker 1: sequel around them, because a lot of the scenes with
Speaker 1: Louferigno in this movie primarily feature Luferigno doing reaction shots
Speaker 1: rather than talking. Uh so you so it's another character
Speaker 1: talking and then him just making a blank face into
Speaker 1: the camera. Yeah. So I'm saying you could use that
Speaker 1: with pretty much anything. Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. He looks at something,
Speaker 1: he reacts, he runs down a tunnel, and then he
Speaker 1: lifts something. Um now, uh, let's talk a little bit
Speaker 1: more about Cozy here. His first film was the nineteen
Speaker 1: six nine low budget adaptation of Frederick Paul's novella The
Speaker 1: Tunnel Under the World, which apparently got Dario Argento's attention,
Speaker 1: and he subsequently worked with our Gento on Four Flies
Speaker 1: on Gray Velvet, earning a story credit. He also has
Speaker 1: a story credit on Argentos three action comedy The Five Days.
Speaker 1: He goes on to direct his own Jalo film with
Speaker 1: ninety five The Killer Must Kill Again. But then from
Speaker 1: there he really goes on to cement his place in
Speaker 1: cinematic history, writing and directing such epic Italian B movies
Speaker 1: as of course this, uh, but also nineteen seventy nine
Speaker 1: Star Crash in nineteen eighties contamination. Oh, I did not
Speaker 1: make the connection to Star Crash, but that makes so
Speaker 1: much sense. This movie has extremely powerful Star Crash flavor,
Speaker 1: just waves of Star Crash aroma wafting off of it.
Speaker 1: Even in the scenes where they talk about raise, I
Speaker 1: was repeatedly reminded of Star Crash. Uh. You know, there
Speaker 1: were at least like five dialogue moments that were that
Speaker 1: were akin to uh, you know, nothing can stop these
Speaker 1: deadly rays. These deadly rays will be your death. Yeah,
Speaker 1: there's a lot of shared DNA between this film and
Speaker 1: Star crash Um Now Coacy also worked in various other
Speaker 1: roles on other Argento projects, so you just seems to
Speaker 1: be a frequent collaborator and helper uh to Argento. But
Speaker 1: he was also second assistant director on the notorious klas
Speaker 1: Kinski Nosferatu sequel. So this is the sort of unofficial
Speaker 1: sequel to Werner Herzog's nos Ferrato movie titled Vampire in Venice.
Speaker 1: This is the one where basically Kinski reportedly like showed up.
Speaker 1: He was supposed to have had his head shaved to
Speaker 1: play Nosferrato, and he says basically no, I'm not shaving
Speaker 1: my head. And also I am directing this film now.
Speaker 1: So I've never seen it, but it has something of
Speaker 1: a reputation. Well, I bet that would have in a
Speaker 1: roma all of its own, a somewhat different one. Yeah,
Speaker 1: all right. The star of this film is, of course,
Speaker 1: as we've mentioned, louver Rick no born nineteen fifty seven,
Speaker 1: former professional bodybuilder um uh and pumping iron contemporary of
Speaker 1: Arnold Schwartzenanger seen here at what feels like just peak
Speaker 1: condition and just peak mass. He is voluminous in this movie.
Speaker 1: He is just he is just an absolute Skyscraper of meat. Yes,
Speaker 1: uh yeah there, And like I said, they do a
Speaker 1: lot of showing off of his physique and and you know,
Speaker 1: you hear jokes about people skipping leg day. For Regno
Speaker 1: did not skip leg day. He has just legs, like
Speaker 1: just muscular tree trunks. I feel like this movie has
Speaker 1: a lot of scenes of like close ups of those
Speaker 1: uh you know in the I guess somebody's got big
Speaker 1: muscles and low body fat in their veins are just
Speaker 1: poking out through the skin and while they're flexing. There's
Speaker 1: a lot of that. Absolutely now Ferregno again is probably
Speaker 1: best known to many as the original green skinned Hulk
Speaker 1: from TV is The Incredible Hulk, which began as a
Speaker 1: two hour pilot in nineteen seventy seven and ran five
Speaker 1: seasons eighty episodes until two and was then followed by
Speaker 1: three TV films, one of which featured Thor and another
Speaker 1: one had the character Kingpin and it played by John
Speaker 1: Reis Davies. Um Anyway, for Farigno played the Hulk in
Speaker 1: all all of those as well. He ultimately didn't achieve
Speaker 1: the same level of fame as Arnold, but he still
Speaker 1: played hercules in this film and its sequel, and he
Speaker 1: also played Sinbad in Zog Castellari Sinbad of the Seven Seats.
Speaker 1: So uh, there we get we get a double dipping
Speaker 1: of the mythic there. Oh wow, I've never seen that one,
Speaker 1: And that's funny because I have a deep appreciation for
Speaker 1: the for the in many ways quite bad but in
Speaker 1: other ways wonderful. Uh Ray, Harry Housing sindbad movies which
Speaker 1: have had great stop motion monsters in them. I did
Speaker 1: not know that Frigno was in any later Sinbad adaptations.
Speaker 1: Definitely a later Sinbad, not the not the classic Harry Housing.
Speaker 1: I can only imagine this seems like it would probably
Speaker 1: be bad. Now, every every hero needs a villain, and
Speaker 1: so we have one in this film. And if you're
Speaker 1: going to choose a villain out of the catalog of
Speaker 1: of Greek mythology, I feel like this is a good choice.
Speaker 1: They'd decided to go with King Minos. Oh yes, and
Speaker 1: he makes it a wonderful villain in this movie, though
Speaker 1: mostly what he does is apparently stand around on the
Speaker 1: moon talking about which robots will next be sent to
Speaker 1: kill Hercules, yes, and explaining the plot a little, explaining
Speaker 1: his plans, and sometimes just just asking that the the
Speaker 1: evil robots that are gonna be sent down be made
Speaker 1: bigger just so he can look at them. Yeah, can
Speaker 1: you make it a little bit bigger. He's more of
Speaker 1: a he's a bit more of a project manager in
Speaker 1: many ways. But anyway, fun villain played by the actor
Speaker 1: William Burger, who lived Austrian American actor who pops up
Speaker 1: in a lot of spaghetti westerns uh and just plays
Speaker 1: a lot of villains in general in eurocinema. Um. He
Speaker 1: he appears in the films of such directors as Jess
Speaker 1: Franco and Zogi Castellari, Mario Bava, Lomberto Bava and and
Speaker 1: also ron O'Neil. Uh So he's yeah great in this
Speaker 1: As the evil King Minos, he has one of these
Speaker 1: um uh you know, mustache lest beards that looks particularly
Speaker 1: evil on his face. For some reason, it could in
Speaker 1: another context look rather Mennonite, but no, in his context
Speaker 1: it does look like a beard of of ill intent. Yes,
Speaker 1: all right. And then playing the daughter of King Minos,
Speaker 1: we have the we have the character Adriana played by
Speaker 1: Sybil Danning, who is another Austrian American actor of note.
Speaker 1: Born nineteen fifty two. She was an actor and model,
Speaker 1: best known for a whole string of B movies in
Speaker 1: the seventies and eighties. Some of her probably most famous
Speaker 1: roles include Roger and Roger Corman's Battle Beyond the Stars
Speaker 1: from eighty. She's also in Howling to Your Sister Is
Speaker 1: a Werewolf from five. But but she she appears like
Speaker 1: randomly and just films you wouldn't expect her to, Like
Speaker 1: she's pops up in the Musketeer films from the seventies,
Speaker 1: the ones that you know had like Michael Yorke and
Speaker 1: Oliver Read and Christopher Lee and them. So she's a
Speaker 1: villain in this Mostly she she sort of walks around,
Speaker 1: scheming and whispering in people's ears to get them to
Speaker 1: do bad things. I read I don't know if this
Speaker 1: is true. I read that in an earlier version of
Speaker 1: the script she was maybe going to be hercules love interest,
Speaker 1: but like that she and lou Ferrigno did not get
Speaker 1: along and the script was rewritten so that she was
Speaker 1: a villain. Did you read that? I didn't read that.
Speaker 1: I had read that an early version of the script
Speaker 1: was was more provocative, and that Luferigno especially it was like, Nope,
Speaker 1: I'm not filming this. It needs to be cleaner, and
Speaker 1: so they made what is it essentially a G rated film.
Speaker 1: Like one of the reasons I ended up putting this
Speaker 1: on was that it was you know, it was a
Speaker 1: long weekend. There was you know, some some snowy weather,
Speaker 1: and I was like, I need something that I can
Speaker 1: play with the family moving around the house. And this
Speaker 1: looks like a good selection. Yeah, I mean, I think
Speaker 1: it was a rated PG. It's in some areas I
Speaker 1: think they're pushed in it. Well, in some areas they're
Speaker 1: really pushing these outfits. Uh, these outfits are pushed to
Speaker 1: the limits by the various male and female actors wearing them. Yes,
Speaker 1: Like at one point it seems like that they went
Speaker 1: out of their way to put like when Luferrigno is
Speaker 1: first birth out of the Cosmos and they show him
Speaker 1: floating in space in his ideal form, it looks like
Speaker 1: they went out of their way to match the color
Speaker 1: of his speedo to his skin tone so that it
Speaker 1: was exactly the same. Yeah. I have to say another
Speaker 1: thing about Lufigno in this is that he pretty much
Speaker 1: has the physique of one of the old masters of
Speaker 1: the universe. He Man Toys. So I remember catching parts
Speaker 1: of this on like TBS or t n T back
Speaker 1: when I was a kid, and this just felt natural
Speaker 1: because I'm like, well, yes, that that is that there
Speaker 1: it is. That is the body of a he Man
Speaker 1: action figure. I have a whole bunch of these in
Speaker 1: a in a box, so it makes sense that this
Speaker 1: is our hero. But wait, I have a I have
Speaker 1: a note about Sybil Danning's character. Okay, so this character's
Speaker 1: name is all over the place. When when I watched
Speaker 1: the movie, I watched on HBO Max, And so the
Speaker 1: character that Sybil Danning is playing, and this corresponds to
Speaker 1: the actual mythology, is Ariadne or Ariadna. That's usually spelled
Speaker 1: A R I A D n E. Then in the movie,
Speaker 1: it seemed like the characters were saying her name out
Speaker 1: loud as Arianna, like it would be A R I
Speaker 1: n A. And then in the in the subtitles and
Speaker 1: some text for promoting the movie, her name is Adrianna
Speaker 1: or a D R I A n A. So there's
Speaker 1: like three different versions of what her name is, and
Speaker 1: the movie itself doesn't seem to agree. I don't know,
Speaker 1: maybe that's nitpicking. But well, not not the first or
Speaker 1: last time we've encountered, um, you know, pronunciations being all
Speaker 1: over the place for a character. Well, and spellings. But
Speaker 1: never mind. All right, let's move on to some of
Speaker 1: the supporting characters here. UM. We have, of course, the
Speaker 1: the god Zeus, pops up frequently in this played in
Speaker 1: this film by Claudio Casanelli, who lived five You might
Speaker 1: remember him from our discussion of the post apocalyptic film
Speaker 1: Hands of Steel. He is the actor who played one
Speaker 1: of the villains in that film that died in a
Speaker 1: tragic helicopter crash during the filming of Hands of Steel.
Speaker 1: Now he was a frequent UM. He was frequently popped
Speaker 1: up in in various Italian films, often playing Uh. I
Speaker 1: think kind of kind of villains here and there. Um. Now,
Speaker 1: when you cast it an actor as Zeus, I mean,
Speaker 1: that's a that's a big acting ask. I mean, to
Speaker 1: my mind, I instantly think of of Laurence Olivier playing
Speaker 1: Zeus in the Clash of the Titans, which came out
Speaker 1: a few years before this, and I think definitely UM
Speaker 1: influenced uh this film in some ways that will discuss.
Speaker 1: I think of Liam Neeson's playing Zeus in the remakes
Speaker 1: of the Clash of the Titans films. You know, so
Speaker 1: there's a there's a grandiose presence that needs to be
Speaker 1: there to be Zeus, and you think about like who's
Speaker 1: who's is in the mythst like he's a powerful and
Speaker 1: dangerous figure, Like you don't want to get on the
Speaker 1: bad side of Zeus. Uh. The Zeus in this film
Speaker 1: is a different experience, Yes, yes, totally. You want that
Speaker 1: combination of like authoritative and irresponsible, somebody who is simultaneously
Speaker 1: like when he talks, everybody turns and listens and people
Speaker 1: are afraid of him, but also he's unpredictable, undependable and dangerous.
Speaker 1: Right in this he's more a little sleepy. Yeah. Well,
Speaker 1: but also the actor who plays him. Once I noticed this,
Speaker 1: I couldn't unsee it, and he just looked like him
Speaker 1: in every single shot. He looks like Jon Stewart of
Speaker 1: The Daily Show. He looks like Jon Stewart in a
Speaker 1: Santa Claus wig and beard. Yes, and he I didn't,
Speaker 1: I did. I didn't put this together to you, you interning.
Speaker 1: You sent me this picture and I'm like, oh my god,
Speaker 1: he does and he looks like he's doing that sort
Speaker 1: of John Stewart um sort of shock confusion face that
Speaker 1: he often pulls in bits, so totally looks like a
Speaker 1: John Stewart bit. It looks like it's like John Stewart
Speaker 1: playing a satirical take on Zeus. So will be fuddled Zeus. Right, Um,
Speaker 1: let's see who else do we have in this we
Speaker 1: have we have King a Gs played by Brad Harris.
Speaker 1: Harris live thirty three through two thousand seventeen, American bodybuilder
Speaker 1: turned actor uh turned European acting mainstay, and he played
Speaker 1: a lot of strong men in his career, including Goliath
Speaker 1: and Samson. So this few kind of feels like like
Speaker 1: like a wink to the muscle man um cinema fans
Speaker 1: of the day. M Uh. Then we have um an
Speaker 1: Israeli actor by the name of Jehuda Ifrani who plays
Speaker 1: the character dor Con, who is I believe the uh,
Speaker 1: the advisor to the to to this King. He's an
Speaker 1: Israeli actor again who player appeared in nine Phantom of
Speaker 1: the Opera starring Robert England. This is the Robert the
Speaker 1: Nightmare on the Elm Street inspired Fantom of the Opera film. Uh.
Speaker 1: He pops up in the Delta Force American Ninja three. Uh.
Speaker 1: And in the film The Omega Code. Oh, The Omega Code.
Speaker 1: That's a Christian apocalypse movie, one of my favorite genres. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Starting with Michael Yorke, I think was a villain in that,
Speaker 1: right he was. He plays the Antichrist. And it also
Speaker 1: has Michael Ironside as a hinchman of the Antichrist and
Speaker 1: Casper van Deen as like a self help author who
Speaker 1: in the end he gets converted and becomes a good guy. Uh.
Speaker 1: Let's see who else is in it? I think those
Speaker 1: are all the main Oh, Katherine Oxenberg is in it.
Speaker 1: She was in like Lair of the White Worm and stuff.
Speaker 1: All right. Um, now we have the character Cassiopeia is
Speaker 1: essentially the damsel in distress in this film, and she
Speaker 1: is played by Ingrid and Sin born nineteen sixty American
Speaker 1: actor making her film debut here. She mostly did television
Speaker 1: after this. Another important female character in this is um
Speaker 1: is Searcy Cerci is of course the witch, the sorceress. Uh.
Speaker 1: And in this she has played by Marella D'Angelo born
Speaker 1: n six Italian actor whose credits also include Caligula and tenebrae. Oh.
Speaker 1: She She's actually pretty great in this, especially because when
Speaker 1: we first meet her, she's in like um, she's in
Speaker 1: the krone form. And then she drinks hercules Is blood.
Speaker 1: Am I right about that? She like cuts him and
Speaker 1: drinks his blood so she can rely like regain her
Speaker 1: youth and strength and magic powers. Uh. And then there's
Speaker 1: like a long middle section of the movie where it's
Speaker 1: just like Searcy bossing Hercules around and it's great. He's
Speaker 1: following her around doing everything she tells him to do.
Speaker 1: She's like, I need you to reach inside this glowing
Speaker 1: egg and he's like, okay, it burned my hand. He's
Speaker 1: like you must reach He's like no, no, it's freezing
Speaker 1: my hand. It's it's a great state. Oh your hands
Speaker 1: in there again. Yeah. So Sarcy is great in this,
Speaker 1: and it's definitely one of the many characters who's who's
Speaker 1: again wearing their outfit to the absolute limit. Oh my
Speaker 1: god that the tassels on her outfit or hilarious. Alright,
Speaker 1: another character, So we mentioned King Minos. Now we have Minos,
Speaker 1: we have Minos's daughter, uh, and yet we have no
Speaker 1: maze or labyrinth in this film, and we have no Minotaur.
Speaker 1: So don't get excited about the prospect of either of
Speaker 1: those standard um uh features of a King Minos story
Speaker 1: popping up. But we do have the character who is
Speaker 1: of course credited uh in in the in the various
Speaker 1: myths as creating the Labyrinth and creating various other works
Speaker 1: of of of of artistry and technical craftsmanship in h
Speaker 1: in the mythological canon, and that is the character data Us.
Speaker 1: Now in this movie, Daedalus is not a human craftsman.
Speaker 1: She is like a figure who is birthed out of
Speaker 1: the chaos of the universe and then like takes form
Speaker 1: and where's this strange costume that has these big ears
Speaker 1: uh and and talks about how she hates magic and
Speaker 1: hates the gods and only love science, right, yes, And
Speaker 1: they're plotting, let me basically plotting the destruction of the
Speaker 1: gods via science. They're talking about how much better than
Speaker 1: than the gods science is. Uh, it's it's pretty fabulous.
Speaker 1: This is where the robots come into play. They are
Speaker 1: the the the automatons of data list here. Yeah, she
Speaker 1: makes the robots that Minos greedily begs her descend against Hercules. Yes, so,
Speaker 1: in in this film, Datus is played by Eva Robbins,
Speaker 1: transgender Italian actress, model, and activists who appeared in Dario
Speaker 1: Agento's Tenebre as Women on the Beach. She played the
Speaker 1: famed inventor of Greek mythology in both of the coatsy
Speaker 1: Hercules movies. So she does pop up in the sequel,
Speaker 1: and I should mention dressed in a just absolutely bonkers
Speaker 1: costume here that feels like part comic book villain from
Speaker 1: space and also part Christmas tree ornament. Yeah. I was
Speaker 1: trying to her helmet. Yes, I don't know how to do.
Speaker 1: It's like it's a little bit Planet of the Vampires
Speaker 1: but spray painted gold and then with these big ears
Speaker 1: popping off of it. It reminded me a little bit
Speaker 1: of some of the like diamond shaped ear ornaments popping
Speaker 1: off of I think I remember from the acrobats in
Speaker 1: the Star Wars Holiday special to pop up in the hologram. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: that's a fair comparison. Robbins continued to act in European
Speaker 1: indie films after this, uh, sometimes appearing alongside such actors
Speaker 1: as Charlotte Rampling. So um so she apparently wanted to
Speaker 1: have quite an interesting career well, I loved every one
Speaker 1: of her scenes in this movie. The Minos datalst scenes
Speaker 1: are are highlights of the film. Yes, um oh, this
Speaker 1: is a character who sadly doesn't really do much, but
Speaker 1: we have this character show up at one point to
Speaker 1: challenge Hercules by the name of Kings and Odama uh
Speaker 1: and it in. This character is played by Big Bobby
Speaker 1: Rhodes born from Demons. Yes, black Italian actor who pops
Speaker 1: up in a number of Italian action in B movies.
Speaker 1: Probably best known yeah for playing Tony the Pimp and
Speaker 1: Hank the gym instructor in Lomberto Baba's Demons and Demons Too,
Speaker 1: but he can also be found in the Island of
Speaker 1: the Fishmen a k a. Screamers. Uh. He was in
Speaker 1: Sergio Martino's The Great Alligator, which features a story credit
Speaker 1: by Georgie Eastman, and he also did stunts. He's credited
Speaker 1: with underwater stunts in the underwater monster movie Leviathan. So
Speaker 1: he's great, but he's kind of wasted in this film.
Speaker 1: Oh well, yeah, he's He plays a small role. He
Speaker 1: plays like the king who uh he what is it? He? Um?
Speaker 1: Hercules and Cercy needs something from him and in order
Speaker 1: to get it, Hercules has to has to like grow
Speaker 1: huge and then like push apart the the street of Gibraltar,
Speaker 1: the pillars Hercules. Yeah, and basically, um Bobby Rhodes character
Speaker 1: just watches on from a litter and it doesn't really
Speaker 1: do anything but just actimized. At this I thought they
Speaker 1: were going to fight or something. I was getting excited. Well,
Speaker 1: the litterally that he's being carried in, though, is a
Speaker 1: mammoth skeleton that was pretty so he's like within the
Speaker 1: ribs of a mammoth um. The mammoth skeleton made me
Speaker 1: think of now Wolf in Santa Fe. And I have
Speaker 1: to say that several of the sets in this movie
Speaker 1: just feel like now Wolf, Like I'm just straight up
Speaker 1: back in now Wolf and except there are various Greek
Speaker 1: gods standing around. Alright, one more credit on this before
Speaker 1: we move onto the plot, and that is, of course,
Speaker 1: coming back to the music here. The music is by
Speaker 1: Pino Donaggio Borne. The music here is rather traditional for
Speaker 1: the most part, but Pinot is a rather big name,
Speaker 1: noted for working with such directors as Joe Dante, Uh,
Speaker 1: Luccio fulci Uh, Terence Hill, Charles band Uh and probably
Speaker 1: most famously Brian de Palma. He worked with Diploma on
Speaker 1: eight different films, carry Home Movies, Dressed to Kill, Blowout, Body,
Speaker 1: Double Raising, Cane, Snake Eyes, Passion, and Domino Wow. I
Speaker 1: honestly gotta say, I don't remember much about the music
Speaker 1: in the movie. It didn't It didn't really strike me
Speaker 1: one way or another. I mean, it's it's one of
Speaker 1: those scores that I feel like it did the job.
Speaker 1: It did exactly what it needed to do. It doesn't
Speaker 1: stand out, It certainly doesn't doesn't overshadow anything going on
Speaker 1: with the Farigno's muscles on the screen, so it's in
Speaker 1: a perfect supporting role. All right, Well, let's dive into
Speaker 1: the plot of this baby. All right. Well, I think
Speaker 1: this is one where we're not going to do the
Speaker 1: whole story beat by beat, but focus on some sections
Speaker 1: that were interesting to us. And I do want to
Speaker 1: start right at the beginning, because I love the way
Speaker 1: this movie begins. I love a movie that where the
Speaker 1: prologue goes all the way back to the beginning of
Speaker 1: the universe, or actually, in this case, before the beginning
Speaker 1: of the universe, because it starts off just by showing
Speaker 1: you slow motion fireworks exploding, and then it says, in
Speaker 1: the beginning, before creation, there was darkness. Uh. And then
Speaker 1: we learned that from the primordial explosion emerged the fire
Speaker 1: of chaos, and then the chaos merged with the darkness,
Speaker 1: and from this union were born the elements. Rob, do
Speaker 1: you have a notepad ready to record what the elements are? Okay,
Speaker 1: let's go. There's four of them. Okay. The elements are night, day, matter,
Speaker 1: and air. Okay. Oh, and I like that when it's
Speaker 1: telling us this, So the you know, the chaos merged
Speaker 1: with the darkness, there is like a uh, it's just
Speaker 1: this long series of sort of cause vaguely cosmic looking
Speaker 1: special effects shots, and this one is something that's on fire,
Speaker 1: bathed in red light, moving toward the camera. Yeah. Yeah,
Speaker 1: we're we're in just total cosmic mode for for several
Speaker 1: minutes here. There are no humans, there's just space stuff
Speaker 1: going on, right. Okay. So, so we got the four elements, night, day, matter,
Speaker 1: and air. And then after this we find out that
Speaker 1: out of the misty radiance of the cosmos there came
Speaker 1: forth a jar, golden and glittering Pandora's jar. But then
Speaker 1: it shows us the jar and it looks like a spaceship.
Speaker 1: It's got different like multicolored windows. Yeah, it's pretty fair
Speaker 1: like it's is. It's as close to looking like a
Speaker 1: spaceship as it could be without just blatantly being a
Speaker 1: space like they I think like they manage it rather nicely,
Speaker 1: like they're you know, they're they're they're not going too
Speaker 1: far with the sci fi, but they're going right up
Speaker 1: to the line. Uh huh. We we find out it
Speaker 1: is filled with the essences both good and evil, of
Speaker 1: life itself, and then we see the jar explode. It's
Speaker 1: clearly this is one of the parts they talked about
Speaker 1: where like they kind of don't even care with the
Speaker 1: special effects, where so it explodes and then you just
Speaker 1: see a couple of parts of it don't fly off
Speaker 1: and fall fall down there like hanging from threads. But
Speaker 1: then we learned that from the fragments of the jar.
Speaker 1: Remember this was the jar, Pandora's jar that contained all
Speaker 1: of the essence of life, both good and evil, And
Speaker 1: from the fragments of that jar, it says that the
Speaker 1: planets and the Solar System were formed. And then you
Speaker 1: see the jar fragments zooming through space like like the
Speaker 1: fighter ships on Battlestar Galactica. And so it starts explaining
Speaker 1: planets to us. It's like, here are some of the planets. Uh.
Speaker 1: It tells us about Saturn, the world of mystic Rings,
Speaker 1: and then it says other fragments became the flaming Energies,
Speaker 1: gave shape to Mercury. Yet another fragment gave birth to
Speaker 1: the colossus Jupiter, the Titan of the Skies. Any Greek
Speaker 1: mythology nerds want to pick a bone with that one,
Speaker 1: I'll leave it there. But then it goes on. So
Speaker 1: we're getting closer to Earth. It says the worlds of
Speaker 1: the universe were created along with the moons that accompanied them,
Speaker 1: and then Earth, and then it says, and on Earth
Speaker 1: there was life everywhere. And then we get like a
Speaker 1: zoom in shot to what looks like a like a
Speaker 1: satellite photo of one of the shores of Michigan or something.
Speaker 1: But then finally, okay, we need we need some some
Speaker 1: beings to populate these worlds, right, So it says that
Speaker 1: the first beings that the Creation brought forth were not men.
Speaker 1: They were of the Supreme essence and became gods. They
Speaker 1: claimed the moon as their home. So In this version
Speaker 1: of Greek mythology, the gods were the first creation, not
Speaker 1: not the Titans, so that it doesn't do the multiple generations. Uh,
Speaker 1: they were the first creation. And they live on the moon. Yeah,
Speaker 1: there's no Mount Olympus, it's the moon instead. Instead of
Speaker 1: this this planet that's filled with life, they're gonna live
Speaker 1: on this just desolate moonscape. And what do the gods
Speaker 1: do there on the moon, Well, there are only three
Speaker 1: of them. There's Zeus, Hera and Athena, and and they
Speaker 1: sit there on the moon. And it says they decide
Speaker 1: the ultimate fate of mankind and of all that lived. Yeah,
Speaker 1: they're simplifying the pantheon somewhat here, right, And so the
Speaker 1: thing about the gods in this movie is that they
Speaker 1: are severely on drugs. When when we get zoom ins
Speaker 1: of all three of the gods, I would say especially
Speaker 1: Hera and Athena, but all three of them really seem
Speaker 1: to be in a kind of potent pharmaceutical realm. Like
Speaker 1: their pupils are a mile wide, right, and they're yeah,
Speaker 1: they're they're they don't have a lot of emotion in
Speaker 1: what they're saying and what they're doing. They don't really
Speaker 1: have the the the characterizations that you're you're more accompanient,
Speaker 1: you're more accustomed to with say um Zeus and then uh,
Speaker 1: and then also Athena are just not going to be
Speaker 1: found here. I would say the one that actually feels
Speaker 1: the most out of character of all three of them
Speaker 1: is Athena. Athena, I feel like should be a a
Speaker 1: sharp and powerful presence. She is she You know, there's
Speaker 1: so much that Athena is. Athena's wisdom, Athenas warfare, Athenas
Speaker 1: all these things in this movie. She is zonked. She's
Speaker 1: just kind of aerily delivering lines as if I'm not
Speaker 1: even sure if she's aware whether anybody is listening or not.
Speaker 1: And really, these whole sequences kind of feel like sportscaster sequences,
Speaker 1: like let's let's go back and hear the commentary and uh,
Speaker 1: and here they are just sort of very, very detached,
Speaker 1: talking about a game happening, you know, somewhere else across
Speaker 1: the city. That's right. So they're in this They're in
Speaker 1: this set that has these weird pillars coming up off
Speaker 1: the surface of the moon. And then Zeus says, Okay,
Speaker 1: Pandora's jar has been broken. The forces of evil have
Speaker 1: been let loose. The world of mortal men is facing
Speaker 1: its our decision, it will go down to destruction or
Speaker 1: else it will survive. And then Harra says, of course,
Speaker 1: Harra is always making kind of a nasty face. I mean,
Speaker 1: Hara is often the villain of of these stories. Certainly
Speaker 1: she's the enemy of Hercules. That that is true to
Speaker 1: the myth, I think. But Harra says, this is their
Speaker 1: moment of trial. They have to show themselves worthy of
Speaker 1: everything we gods have given them. But it hasn't made
Speaker 1: clear that they've given them anything. But anyway, here is
Speaker 1: so Finally Athena comments, She's like, but evil is dark
Speaker 1: and strong. It may be that the scales of fate
Speaker 1: are not equally balanced. H So Zeus takes all this
Speaker 1: into consideration and he decides that there needs to be
Speaker 1: a way to equalize both sides of the struggle. It's
Speaker 1: not entirely I think this means the sides of the
Speaker 1: struggle are on one side it's humans and on the
Speaker 1: other side it's the destruction of humans. Uh. So he's like, Okay,
Speaker 1: we need to make this air. So he asks Athena, like,
Speaker 1: how can we make it fair? How can we do it? Yeah?
Speaker 1: And it was Zeus, again known for his fairness, right. Uh.
Speaker 1: And so Athena has an amazing idea. She says, if
Speaker 1: you don't want to increase the powers of all men,
Speaker 1: why don't you increase those of one so that he
Speaker 1: may fight for all the others. What a weird capitalist
Speaker 1: approach to um to orchestrating the affairs of men. Uh.
Speaker 1: But Zeus his reaction, he's clearly enthralled by this idea.
Speaker 1: It's like, uh, if you ever seen when somebody mentioned,
Speaker 1: you know, somebody's really hungry, and then somebody else suggests
Speaker 1: a delicious food they could eat, and then their eyes
Speaker 1: sort of like go off somewhere like they're just imagining it.
Speaker 1: That's the way Zeus reacts. He's really grooving with it.
Speaker 1: He goes a man who is stronger and more intelligent
Speaker 1: than all other men, just gazing like at his lap.
Speaker 1: So anyway, they decide, yeah, that's what we'll do. We'll
Speaker 1: get a hero, as they say, it will be a
Speaker 1: hero with the body forged in the furnace of a
Speaker 1: thousand sons, a body capable of undergoing every labor, every pain,
Speaker 1: practically invincible, made from the purest of all energies light.
Speaker 1: I like how he kind of totally spaces on the
Speaker 1: idea of the superior intellect and just focuses on the body,
Speaker 1: which is again what you want in a Hercules movie. Right.
Speaker 1: So they start off as saying that this will be
Speaker 1: a man who is stronger and more intelligent than all
Speaker 1: other men. This is not a comment about about lou Ferrigno.
Speaker 1: This is like in the script, there's really not much
Speaker 1: to indicate that this Hercules is even of average intelligence.
Speaker 1: And again that's that's just part of it. I mean, yeah,
Speaker 1: Hercules in the midst you do have more of a
Speaker 1: like there's the cunning of Hercules, but we don't really
Speaker 1: see the cunning of Hercules in this film. It is
Speaker 1: the brute strength of Hercules. And when cunning things need
Speaker 1: to be done, well, that's where Circe or some other
Speaker 1: character is going to apply some some some cunning thought.
Speaker 1: Like multiple of the labors of Hercules involved not brute strength,
Speaker 1: but him coming up with like an outside the box
Speaker 1: solution to a problem. Uh, now you know he does
Speaker 1: come up he does. They do actually reflect one of
Speaker 1: the cunning moments of Hercules in this um, but that's true.
Speaker 1: The cleaning of the stables, yeeah, theah, the agean stables, which,
Speaker 1: of course is this this whole sequence in the it's it's,
Speaker 1: it's it's fascinating because I was, I want, I watched
Speaker 1: the film and I had to to quiz my my
Speaker 1: wife and son. I said, you guys know the the
Speaker 1: Trials of Hercules, Guess which one they did in this film?
Speaker 1: And I think I quiz you the same way, like,
Speaker 1: which is the ultimately the last one you would choose
Speaker 1: for for for a cinematic portrayal. You know, it doesn't
Speaker 1: feature a monster. It just features the cleaning of some
Speaker 1: just awful, um poop filled stables. That's the one that
Speaker 1: they choose. Though. It's a great sequence as well, because
Speaker 1: the stable, like everything in this film, the stables look
Speaker 1: like they are on another planet, Like every location in
Speaker 1: this film feels like a different cosmic location. That the
Speaker 1: stables look like horses, like these twin horses, and uh
Speaker 1: and and he diverts the whole river to flood it.
Speaker 1: It's a it's it's a great scene. It is, yeah,
Speaker 1: but but that comes much later. We're still the phase
Speaker 1: here where they're they're talking about sending this being made
Speaker 1: of light to Earth, and then it shows him, so
Speaker 1: it like fades in on Hercules wearing a speedo, posing,
Speaker 1: flexing his muscles amidst the stars. Yes, uh, greased and
Speaker 1: and and lit from above. And I guess the problem
Speaker 1: is that they can't send him to Earth like this.
Speaker 1: You're I don't know why they can't, but they just can't,
Speaker 1: you know, you know, he can't arrive at Earth as
Speaker 1: an adult being made of light. Instead. I think the
Speaker 1: deal is they have to slot his his her soul,
Speaker 1: which is made of light, into the body of immortal baby.
Speaker 1: And then that makes me wonder, Wait, what happened to
Speaker 1: the baby's original soul? I mean, maybe there was no
Speaker 1: original soul like this one was already slotted for this
Speaker 1: vac they like they they they birthed a soulless baby
Speaker 1: in preparation for inserting the hercules soul, the muscle soul
Speaker 1: made of light from the stars into the baby. Yeah, okay,
Speaker 1: well anyway, lou ferrig No, he goes down. He possesses
Speaker 1: a baby. This baby is this part I think is
Speaker 1: sort of according to the myth, is the child of Infitrion.
Speaker 1: And alca Many and uh, and this is at the
Speaker 1: City of Thebes. It tells us this is the City
Speaker 1: of Thebes and the Bronze Age four thousand years from
Speaker 1: this moment. But then I'm like, wait, is Thebes also
Speaker 1: on the moon? Because they show Thebes and it looks
Speaker 1: like it's in space. It's this stone city with these
Speaker 1: big walls. I mean, it looks kind of like a
Speaker 1: I don't know, a cross between a medieval castle and
Speaker 1: like Chattel Hoyak. But it's in space with like comet
Speaker 1: sipping around. Oh yeah, it's like that with with every location,
Speaker 1: isn't it. Like later on we go to Atlantis and
Speaker 1: it's like green. It looks like another at it, And
Speaker 1: then I was asking myself, is this supposed to be
Speaker 1: another planet? And then they showed the sky and it
Speaker 1: has like three moons or something, and they're also they're
Speaker 1: traveling through space at various times to get from one
Speaker 1: location to the other. Um so very cosmic without characters
Speaker 1: actually coming out and and and referring to these as
Speaker 1: different planetary locations. Yeah, I did not know what to
Speaker 1: make of that, but you know what it I enjoyed
Speaker 1: looking at it, so okay, but immediately Hara is trying
Speaker 1: to kill this baby, because you know that's what Harrod does.
Speaker 1: She doesn't like Herchiles and she wants to destroy him,
Speaker 1: so she sets events in motion to uh to lead
Speaker 1: to the death of baby Hercules. UH. And then we
Speaker 1: get an escape in infancy narrative, you know, like the
Speaker 1: I mean, I guess this is there in some of
Speaker 1: the original Hercules myths, but it's also like you know,
Speaker 1: the stories of Moses or Jesus in the Gospel of Matthew,
Speaker 1: where like there's uh, there's a chosen baby and then
Speaker 1: like the forces are aligned against to him and he
Speaker 1: has to be secreted away. So in this case in Thebes,
Speaker 1: there's like there's a usurper king who comes in and
Speaker 1: he kills herciless parents, and he's trying to kill Hercules.
Speaker 1: He's being urged on by one of the recurring villains
Speaker 1: of the movie played by Sybil Danning, who is the
Speaker 1: She plays the daughter of the wicked king Minos of
Speaker 1: Thea who will get to in just a minute. But
Speaker 1: so there's like a rebellion against the king's forces and
Speaker 1: it's the narrator comes in. I think it says like
Speaker 1: and the wicked rebels turned thebes into a war zone,
Speaker 1: and it just shows you know, fire and a bunch
Speaker 1: of people going. Meanwhile, I should also say, like when
Speaker 1: we see the soldiers and stuff in these scenes, it
Speaker 1: is just a feast of weird fake gold armor and
Speaker 1: cod pieces. Oh and there's also a thing this actually
Speaker 1: turns out to be important later. I mean, we're not
Speaker 1: gonna try to explain every in and out of the plot,
Speaker 1: but there is an important theft at the beginning where
Speaker 1: like a thief sneaks into a temple and steals a
Speaker 1: sacred sore this kind of sword in the stone, he
Speaker 1: pulls it out of its resting place, he kills a
Speaker 1: couple of guards and with some hilarious bow and arrow action, right,
Speaker 1: and then that Yeah, that sword is basically never mentioned
Speaker 1: again for the rest of the film till we get
Speaker 1: to the very end, and then it becomes extremely important
Speaker 1: and it's re established. Yeah, And so little Hercules gets
Speaker 1: taken away by a nursemaid to protect him from from
Speaker 1: the evil rebels, and she puts him on a river,
Speaker 1: puts him on a boat and sets it down a river,
Speaker 1: and then Harrod tries to kill him multiple ways. I
Speaker 1: think at one point he's going over a waterfall, but
Speaker 1: then Zeus, in this hilarious special effect, reaches out and
Speaker 1: catches the boat from the waterfall, and you see this giant,
Speaker 1: pale hand reaching out from the water that gets the
Speaker 1: boat and then pulls him to the moon where he's
Speaker 1: like this tiny little thing in his hand and shows
Speaker 1: Zeus looking at the boat. He's like, oh, and then
Speaker 1: he him back in the river. Here is like, you
Speaker 1: can't do that, that's cheating. You have to put him
Speaker 1: back in the river. And then he does, but he
Speaker 1: puts him downstream of the waterfall and he's like, you
Speaker 1: didn't tell me which part of the river to put
Speaker 1: him in. But then also Hara tries to send a
Speaker 1: couple of snakes to kill Hercules, and baby Herk just
Speaker 1: strangles them. Oh yeah, it's a great sequence because they're
Speaker 1: super fake monster snakes and uh and this this baby
Speaker 1: is not a good actor and just not very convincing
Speaker 1: at all, So it makes for hilarious sequence. One thing
Speaker 1: I wanted. And so of course Hercules gets rescued by
Speaker 1: by a nice old couple and they take him in
Speaker 1: and raise him, and uh, you know, they're very sweet
Speaker 1: they're sweet pastoral lists and uh, and we get a
Speaker 1: montage of him growing up and growing stronger. And how
Speaker 1: do you think so, Conan the Barbarian came out in two,
Speaker 1: this movie came out in night three. How do you
Speaker 1: think they're gonna show young Hercules growing and getting stronger? Oh?
Speaker 1: You to strap him to that millstone? That's right, So
Speaker 1: they have a montage of him turning a millstone. The relation.
Speaker 1: The fun thing about this, though, I was reading, is
Speaker 1: that there is a millstone scene I think in the
Speaker 1: first Motista movie. So I believe Milius was may have
Speaker 1: actually been referencing the history of muscleman movies by including
Speaker 1: that ian Conan the Barbarian. Well, that would make sense. Okay,
Speaker 1: I'm back on board now, every every movie should have it. Then,
Speaker 1: it's just that they're all calling back to the original.
Speaker 1: How else are you getting to know that he's strong
Speaker 1: and that time is passing, like this is the logical
Speaker 1: way to do it, one of the things. So once
Speaker 1: he grows up, he is of course lufer Igno then
Speaker 1: and we get to see him being very strong, you know,
Speaker 1: chopping wood, pulling trees up out of the ground with
Speaker 1: his arms and Uh. One of the great scenes once
Speaker 1: he's finally an adult is the bear scene Robbed. You
Speaker 1: could you describe the bear scene? So it is your
Speaker 1: basic bear wrestling scene, and I think it possibly reuses
Speaker 1: some bare footage from another movie. I forget which one,
Speaker 1: but you know, it's Hercules versus a bear. You know
Speaker 1: who's gonna win. It's gonna be Hercules. Um, but but
Speaker 1: what what do you expect to happen when Hercules defeats
Speaker 1: the bear? You think he might just you know, either
Speaker 1: he whips the bear and says, all right, go back
Speaker 1: to the wild you or you know, or puts a
Speaker 1: sleeper hold on it and just you know, just puts
Speaker 1: it to sleep and walks off. No, that's not good enough,
Speaker 1: that's not epic enough for this Hercules. Well, first of all,
Speaker 1: also so yeah, it intercuts between stock footage of a
Speaker 1: real bear and then one of the worst bear suits
Speaker 1: I've ever seen on a in film, like unbelievable. It's
Speaker 1: it's worse than the than the wicker Man remake bear suit.
Speaker 1: I didn't even notice that. I mean, I don't know,
Speaker 1: I didn't think too long and hard about it being
Speaker 1: a fake bear. I mean, it's it's a guy wearing
Speaker 1: a bunch of carpet samples basically, but he grabbed but
Speaker 1: he so he defeats the bear. Oh and the bear
Speaker 1: kills his kills his father him. Yeah. Uh, so he
Speaker 1: kills that guy. That guy's laying dead on the ground,
Speaker 1: and Hercules is like, oh, you bear, and then he
Speaker 1: grabs him and he throws him into space. Yes, it's
Speaker 1: a great sequence because it's just as goofy as it sounds.
Speaker 1: But oh but of course, uh, of course the bear
Speaker 1: thrown into space by Hercules. You know, here's your mythic
Speaker 1: connection thrown up into space by Hercules and becomes the
Speaker 1: constellation Ursa that you know, the bear in the sky,
Speaker 1: the first of many constellations, right right right? Well yeah, actually,
Speaker 1: because so after this, Athena and Hara like taunt each other.
Speaker 1: Athena's like, ha ha, all your heroes are going I
Speaker 1: guess this means Harris sent the bear. She's like, all
Speaker 1: your heroes are going to end up getting thrown into space.
Speaker 1: Is like, don't worry, I have many other are people
Speaker 1: waiting to fight for evil? Uh and here's oh, here's
Speaker 1: the part where we get into one of my favorite
Speaker 1: things in the movie my favorite recurring characters, Minos and Dadalus. Uh. Now,
Speaker 1: I can't remember what we already said about where Minos
Speaker 1: is where they are in this scene. I don't know
Speaker 1: how to even begin to describe where they are what
Speaker 1: is happening, But it looks like they are. Minos is
Speaker 1: like in space in a I don't know, on the
Speaker 1: Moon or on some other planet, standing among a bunch
Speaker 1: of rocks on top of a giant stone head that
Speaker 1: has a mustache and is glowing from the inside. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's it's ball. I have no idea what you're supposed
Speaker 1: to be. I think they're in space somewhere, I guess,
Speaker 1: which is weird because we get the impression that he's
Speaker 1: based on Earth, right, like why the island of theory? Yeah? Yeah,
Speaker 1: So I don't know if he's come out here to
Speaker 1: meet data list like you have to meet data is
Speaker 1: halfway or what I really I don't know, but this
Speaker 1: is where they meet and scheme. Right, So Minos calls
Speaker 1: out Minos is like dattle Us, embodiment of knowledge, reasoning, curiosity,
Speaker 1: great genius of invention, master of science, I King Minos
Speaker 1: of the calling you to step into time and space
Speaker 1: that's great, materialize out of chaos. So he tries that
Speaker 1: looks around no datals. So then he tries again and
Speaker 1: he goes daddle and then she finally does appear. Is
Speaker 1: she wearing a cellophane cape? Uh? It does have some
Speaker 1: some clear Yeah, it looks cellophane. And then there's like
Speaker 1: this netguard that is like clear plastic. It's a it's
Speaker 1: a lot this costing. Well, there's immediately conflict between them
Speaker 1: because Dadalus is afraid that Minos wants her to serve
Speaker 1: the gods, but she hates the gods, so nothing to
Speaker 1: do with them. And she's like, one day, Minos, you
Speaker 1: will have to choose between the gods and science. And
Speaker 1: he says, you know me, I'm dedicated to science. I
Speaker 1: do not believe in the gods, but doing them a
Speaker 1: little favor can't hurt, can it. And uh so he
Speaker 1: you know, he's gonna be working for hera because she's bad.
Speaker 1: And this is setting up one of the major themes
Speaker 1: of the movie, which is truly deeply bizarre. It makes
Speaker 1: no sense whatsoever in the context of this story, and
Speaker 1: it makes no sense on its own terms, but it's
Speaker 1: the science versus magic theme. I think this is basically
Speaker 1: a dynamic like we saw in the Thing from Another World.
Speaker 1: It's like a Jocks versus Nerds movie, with the Jocks
Speaker 1: representing magic and goodness and the Nerds representing science and evil. Yeah,
Speaker 1: so it's like it it seems like in some respects
Speaker 1: it's a weirdly anti science movie. It's just like like
Speaker 1: like God's rule, science rules kind of a thing. Well,
Speaker 1: and it's not an argument over like whether science is
Speaker 1: good or not. It was it's like, yeah, science of
Speaker 1: course is evil, and that is why we support it
Speaker 1: because we like evil. Yeah, it is interesting, how like
Speaker 1: I feel like a less imaginative film might have gone
Speaker 1: with this and been like, okay, we'll have data List
Speaker 1: being here, and you know, Data's will be just kind
Speaker 1: of like a mad scientist, you know, a well established
Speaker 1: trope clearly by this point in cinema. Yet they didn't
Speaker 1: go in that direction at all. Instead, we have this
Speaker 1: data Lists agent, embodiment of chaos who doesn't even live
Speaker 1: in our normal space time, kind of appearing to minos Um. Yeah,
Speaker 1: like an ambassador of another world. Very strange step into
Speaker 1: time and space. But anyway, Datalyst is eventually like Okay,
Speaker 1: I've already kept stepped into time and space. We can
Speaker 1: kill lufer rig No, that is that is doable. Uh.
Speaker 1: And she says, this is my solution to Hercules, and
Speaker 1: then she pops up three like Erector set toys. Yeah,
Speaker 1: these director sets are a good reference. They're these very
Speaker 1: very interesting looking small automatons. There's a dragon looking creature,
Speaker 1: there's a sort of bug looking creature, and there's a
Speaker 1: kind of a center looking creature and um they Yeah,
Speaker 1: they're strange looking. There's a definite, uh, definite direction here
Speaker 1: in in the way they decided to portray these I
Speaker 1: wonder to what extent they were clearly influenced by Clash
Speaker 1: of the Titans, which had come out, you know years before,
Speaker 1: that had some you know ahead of the mechanical owl
Speaker 1: in it. That's just a real, a real hoot, uh,
Speaker 1: certainly one of the fun parts of that film. And
Speaker 1: they're like, well, we one mechanical owl, we can have
Speaker 1: three mechanical villains, and maybe it'll simplify the whole stop
Speaker 1: motion monster thing. Like we're not going to really be
Speaker 1: able to bring the full hairy house and game to
Speaker 1: this film. Uh, so maybe we can do something that
Speaker 1: is a little less fleshy but also cool to look at, right,
Speaker 1: so Minos oh, but he reacts by being He's like,
Speaker 1: such a small solution to such a big problem. And
Speaker 1: then he looks sadly directly into the camera. But Dadalus
Speaker 1: is like, uh, Minos, my dear size like time and
Speaker 1: space is relative um, and then he's he realizes he's like, oh,
Speaker 1: relative to atmospheric conditions, right, and on hitting Earth's atmosphere
Speaker 1: it will grow big, huge, immense, terrifying. Is he programmed
Speaker 1: to destroy Hercules? They talk to these little mechanical toys.
Speaker 1: They talk about the colossal exterminator that you really are.
Speaker 1: So they send a giant robot B to kill Hercules,
Speaker 1: and then Hercules defeats it by poking it with a stick.
Speaker 1: To be fair, he pokes it very hard and multiple times.
Speaker 1: But he does defeat the giant robot by poking it
Speaker 1: with a stick. Oh, and at this point her well.
Speaker 1: So his father has been killed by a bear, his
Speaker 1: mother is killed by a giant b robot during the
Speaker 1: giant b robot out attack, and Hercules is just bereft.
Speaker 1: So he must strike out on his own to answer
Speaker 1: the riddle of his life, which and there's a great
Speaker 1: moment where he looks off in the distance and says,
Speaker 1: why am I stronger than other men? Uh? So? Here? Yeah,
Speaker 1: here he goes onto a series of adventures and labors
Speaker 1: that will of course end with him facing the evil
Speaker 1: King Minos and his wicked daughter Sybil danning to to
Speaker 1: kill science once and for all and save the world.
Speaker 1: And along the way, they're all kinds of weird adventures
Speaker 1: and encounters. Again, we're not going to hit all the
Speaker 1: points on there, but rob are there are there any
Speaker 1: ones that you want to mention in particular? I maybe
Speaker 1: it would be good to start with the contest of
Speaker 1: strength and tire. What do you think, Oh, that's a
Speaker 1: great sequence because there's um like he he wrestles like
Speaker 1: a dozen men who have a log. He battles like
Speaker 1: multiple swordsmen, I think. And then he goes up against
Speaker 1: two chariots with blades on the on the on this
Speaker 1: like spokes of the wheels. And this was a sequence.
Speaker 1: I remember seeing this on TV for sure. I don't
Speaker 1: think I've ever seen this film and its entirety before,
Speaker 1: but I remember this part because the chariots make two
Speaker 1: swipes at him, the first time they come at him,
Speaker 1: we go to a side view and he super Mario
Speaker 1: jumps over them, and and then when they come back
Speaker 1: to get him the second time, he just stands there
Speaker 1: and the blades break against the just the brutal beef
Speaker 1: of his of his legs like this, so muscular that
Speaker 1: blades cannot cut him. And then he like grabs the
Speaker 1: chariots and pulls back defeats So you know, four horses
Speaker 1: with his with his awesome strength. Right, the most important
Speaker 1: thing about a warrior is that he have indestructible shins.
Speaker 1: That's what we learn from this. And uh and of
Speaker 1: course Hercules wins the contest. He is the greatest warrior
Speaker 1: competing entire and so the uh oh, the whole thing
Speaker 1: is that the winner of this contest is going to
Speaker 1: be given an important mission. So Hercules wins, and he
Speaker 1: finds out what the mission is, and so the king
Speaker 1: comes up to him and he's like, okay, you won.
Speaker 1: So your mission is you have to take my beautiful
Speaker 1: daughter Cassiopeia to Athens and you have to protect her
Speaker 1: along the way, because he explains there is a whole
Speaker 1: lot of evil and mischief about out on the roads
Speaker 1: and this is due to the wicked king minos from
Speaker 1: the isle of theory, like monsters are coming from the island. Uh,
Speaker 1: and because of his evil daughter Sybil Danning. But but
Speaker 1: then I love, we get the intervention by the king's
Speaker 1: scheming advisor. Who is this stammering nerd named dor Con. Yes, yeah,
Speaker 1: kind of a kind of a Donald pleasancy um uh
Speaker 1: presence to this guy. Oh yeah, he's got a really
Speaker 1: great objection. So that the king is like, yes, you
Speaker 1: will escort my beautiful daughter. And then the advisor is like,
Speaker 1: this man is a great warrior, yes, but how can
Speaker 1: we be sure he isn't part of the evil and
Speaker 1: mischief you mentioned. The King's like, oh, that's a good point.
Speaker 1: We can't. But so they they decided to test him further,
Speaker 1: and this is where we get the famous you know,
Speaker 1: labor of Hercules, the cleaning of the stables, and it's
Speaker 1: the Stables of Sibilly. Oh but so if if you're
Speaker 1: not familiar with the myth, rob what's what's the basic
Speaker 1: outline of the Cleaning of the stables labor? Well, this
Speaker 1: is this is a clever Herk moment where you think, oh, well,
Speaker 1: this is just gonna be a whole bunch of shovelin
Speaker 1: poop for old Hercules, and surely he's up for it.
Speaker 1: But there's a time constraint here. Even Hercules can't shovel
Speaker 1: this much poop. Well, what Hercules does instead is he
Speaker 1: diverts the rivers through the stable and uh and clears
Speaker 1: out all the poop. And this is truly This would
Speaker 1: not have been my first pick for a cinematic portrayal
Speaker 1: of one of the Trials, but it's pretty awesome because again,
Speaker 1: the stables look otherworldly and weird, and they look pretty foul.
Speaker 1: He diverts the river through it, and it's just you know,
Speaker 1: it's one of those great shots where you have the
Speaker 1: miniaturized set but full scale water, so everything looks looks
Speaker 1: a little fake. Uh. And then and then we get
Speaker 1: the before and after. Right, here's water going through these
Speaker 1: these awful looking stables, and then when the waters are done,
Speaker 1: everything is just sparkling white right. Uh. Yeah, yeah, it
Speaker 1: looks like a like a locker room or something. Oh.
Speaker 1: And of course along the way, Herchiles falls in love
Speaker 1: with Cassiopeias. You might imagine he's like, uh, and he
Speaker 1: he gets her to agree he's like, um, hey, if
Speaker 1: I get all the poop out of these stables, you're
Speaker 1: gonna agree to marry me. And she's like, well, okay uh.
Speaker 1: And then he does it and they kiss, and then
Speaker 1: Zeus shoots lightning out of his head and makes them
Speaker 1: fall asleep. Don't I don't recall why if Zeus explained
Speaker 1: why he did that. I think he just wanted to
Speaker 1: move the plot along, right, So he shoots the lightning,
Speaker 1: the forehead lightning at them. They they're knocked out, and
Speaker 1: then they get captured by the bad guys and at
Speaker 1: this point they're split up. Cassiopeia is taken off to
Speaker 1: the evil island of Theora to be a human sacrifice,
Speaker 1: and Hercules, oh, they're they're like, oh, take him out
Speaker 1: to the ocean. I think it's Sybil Danning who's like,
Speaker 1: we'll throw him in the ocean. He'll be eaten by sharks.
Speaker 1: But come on, he's hurt, he's fine. He just swims
Speaker 1: for a week and then gets to shore. It doesn't
Speaker 1: even encounter a shark for a second. Here, it feels like, oh,
Speaker 1: we're gonna get hurt at risk of a shark. Now,
Speaker 1: they don't even mess with him. Oh, and here's where
Speaker 1: we get that series of adventures with Hercules and the
Speaker 1: sorceress Cercy. Uh. Well man, that's a tongue twister sorceress Cercy.
Speaker 1: But anyway, when we first meete her, she's in like
Speaker 1: gnarly witch form. But then she regains her her youth
Speaker 1: and vitality by drinking some of HER's blood, which is great. Uh.
Speaker 1: And then we get all this backstory of how she
Speaker 1: lost some of her powers because the evil King Minos
Speaker 1: of Thea took away her magic and she's got to
Speaker 1: get hurt to help her, I think I don't like
Speaker 1: recover some artifacts or something that will give her power back.
Speaker 1: But there's just one screenshot I pulled out for you
Speaker 1: to look at, Rob here, because it's just an example
Speaker 1: of one of the many side splitting lee unfortunate reaction
Speaker 1: shots of lufer Igno where some other character is talking,
Speaker 1: but it's just showing us Lufigno's face. And I'm not
Speaker 1: sure if anybody was actually talking when they filmed this,
Speaker 1: because he's not reacting. Yeah, but even when he's not
Speaker 1: reacting again, there is a certain charisma to Ferrigno in this,
Speaker 1: and it it does shine through, but not in a
Speaker 1: way that makes the character feel too confident, right, No,
Speaker 1: it's more of a Forigno in this movie. I think
Speaker 1: is likable, but like we said earlier, it's and somehow
Speaker 1: it grows more out of his lack of screen charisma.
Speaker 1: He's just kind of he's kind of all buddy, yeah,
Speaker 1: And just even though he is created by the gods
Speaker 1: and has all this power, yeah, he's up against some
Speaker 1: really scheming elements here. He's up against evil kings and
Speaker 1: and the manipulations of rival gods and beings from outside
Speaker 1: of space and time, and and of course three giant robots.
Speaker 1: Um there are going to be two additional robot battles.
Speaker 1: All of them basically have the same energy of her,
Speaker 1: like poking things that are not on screen. It really
Speaker 1: may to you value even more just how amazing the
Speaker 1: work of Ray Harry How's it was. You know, he
Speaker 1: could have these amazing models that had this life to them,
Speaker 1: but also they were able to shoot these sequences in
Speaker 1: ways where it felt like human beings and monsters were
Speaker 1: occupying the same space. You never get that illusion in
Speaker 1: this picture. No, the effects in this movie are not good,
Speaker 1: but I do think they're fun despite being bad. Uh.
Speaker 1: And so there's more. There's more scheming by Minos and
Speaker 1: Dadalis leading up to the next big robot battle. Uh. Dadalists,
Speaker 1: I think this says like, well, we're gonna kill Hercules
Speaker 1: with my three headed metal metal monster, and Minos is like,
Speaker 1: oh another robot. Huh, well the last one didn't do
Speaker 1: too great. The dentalist is like, this one spits cosmic
Speaker 1: rays of deadly fire. And then uh oh and she
Speaker 1: says do you know what that means? Oh? And he's
Speaker 1: very impressed. He's like, oh, cosmic rays of deadly fire.
Speaker 1: Well in that case, great. She's like do you know
Speaker 1: what that means? And then he says they will be
Speaker 1: they will be eliminated, disintegrated, not a trace, Yes, yeah
Speaker 1: they Darth Vader says no to disintegrations, but Minos is like, yes,
Speaker 1: let's have some disintegrations. Oh and this is one of
Speaker 1: the funny parts where Minos is for some reason, he
Speaker 1: just wants to see the monster grow just a little bit. Yeah,
Speaker 1: He's like, I'm paying for it. I want to see
Speaker 1: the monster go a little bit before we send it
Speaker 1: down to Earth where naturally, again, we kind of skipped
Speaker 1: over this but entry into Earth's atmosphere will cause the
Speaker 1: robot to grow, because that's just that's just the natural
Speaker 1: order of things. That's that's science, and these guys love science.
Speaker 1: Oh but so Hercules and Cercy have to face off
Speaker 1: against this monster and so they sort of defeat it
Speaker 1: with something akin to the Perseus method going up against Medusa.
Speaker 1: They use a reflective shield to shoot the deadly cosmic
Speaker 1: rays back at the robot. And I think this is
Speaker 1: one where this is Hercules, this is not Herk's own cleverness.
Speaker 1: Cearcy has to tell him what to do. Yeah, but
Speaker 1: you have a lot of cool flashing lights in this sequence.
Speaker 1: It's very very visually appealing. Yeah, they're in a cave.
Speaker 1: There's a big three headed metal dragon attacking them, shooting
Speaker 1: rays and he's using the shield to reflect them. But anyway,
Speaker 1: after they win that battle, um, they get Oh, they
Speaker 1: end up moving on to what is one of my
Speaker 1: favorite visual moments in the movie, which is when Herk
Speaker 1: and Cercy have to cross the river Sticks to go
Speaker 1: to the Temple of Eternity, which is this giant skull
Speaker 1: mountain with caves for eyes and a mouth, and so
Speaker 1: you get the river, the boatman Karen, who's this creepy
Speaker 1: skull face? This scene I thought was actually pretty atmospheric
Speaker 1: and effective. Yeah. I mean our characters are going to
Speaker 1: hell here, they're going to hades, and uh it feels
Speaker 1: it feels good. Like a number of sequences here could
Speaker 1: be a you know, like a straight up metal album
Speaker 1: cover after this. Let's see, there are a number of
Speaker 1: other adventures. There's the one where Herchilles has to push
Speaker 1: the pillars of the now so called pillars of Hercules
Speaker 1: apart to to open the Mediterranean. See. Uh, there is
Speaker 1: there's a great scene of bootstrap physics where they somehow
Speaker 1: access a a chariot that I think would be pulled
Speaker 1: by a pegasus, but the pegasus isn't there. So Hercules,
Speaker 1: well what does he do? Oh this is great? Yeah?
Speaker 1: They yeah, they strap uh what a boulder to the
Speaker 1: to the chariot, and then Hercules heaves the boulder through space.
Speaker 1: They jump into the chariot and and the boulder that
Speaker 1: Hercules just through pulls the chariot that they're now riding
Speaker 1: through space. Brilliant. I love it. Oh, and also so
Speaker 1: they they like fly through space and then they fall
Speaker 1: in an ocean and then they swim to the harbor
Speaker 1: of theory the Bad Guys Island, and the harbor there
Speaker 1: has what looks like a robot Colossus of RhoD bestride
Speaker 1: the entrance to the harbor. So if you like zoom
Speaker 1: in on it, it's it's like the colossus. Um. I
Speaker 1: think the actual colossus probably was not straddling the entrance
Speaker 1: to the harbor, but it's often shown in art straddling
Speaker 1: the entrance. Uh, and so it's doing that in this
Speaker 1: image here. But it's a robot, yes, and their pyramids
Speaker 1: back there and everything's green. It looks like we're at
Speaker 1: the like on the Necron home world or something. It's
Speaker 1: it's trippy and they're like again like three moons or
Speaker 1: or suns in the sky in the background. So uh
Speaker 1: it is this is clearly not even Earth. I don't know.
Speaker 1: This movie is very vague again with where things are happening.
Speaker 1: But this does not feel at all like our planet. No,
Speaker 1: but I do love the way this part looks. And
Speaker 1: so we get a bunch of final confrontations. Hercules has
Speaker 1: to battle the third robot, which is like a robot centaur.
Speaker 1: I don't remember that battle being all that notable except
Speaker 1: that poking. Yeah. Unfortunately, Searcy is unceremoniously killed and she
Speaker 1: has one of those really funny lucid death things where
Speaker 1: she's like, oh, I'm dying and then she just lucidly
Speaker 1: delivers some some final dialogue and then goes, oh, yeah, well,
Speaker 1: remember she was depowered. She lost her powers, because when
Speaker 1: a sorceress falls in love, they lose her powers. So
Speaker 1: ultimately it's it's Hercules is fault for being just so
Speaker 1: lovably handsome. And there's a final confrontation where Herchiles has
Speaker 1: to rescue Cassie Upeia. He has to go into a
Speaker 1: volcano and fight the evil king Minos, so that sword
Speaker 1: comes back into there's oh my god, this sequence is
Speaker 1: so great because they're fighting on like a platform over
Speaker 1: the volcano where a phoenix is said to be captured,
Speaker 1: and Minos whips out like a rainbow light sword with
Speaker 1: which to murder Hercules and at the time and he's
Speaker 1: also like, also, hey, that's the sort of thieves back there.
Speaker 1: It's holding the phoenix in place, no b at touch it.
Speaker 1: It's super important. So of course Hercules draws the sword
Speaker 1: of Thieves, and then they get the sword fighting up there.
Speaker 1: Who do you think wins? I mean, of course Hercules wins.
Speaker 1: And then who is it who like ages rapidly and
Speaker 1: then turns into dust like in the Last Crusade? Is
Speaker 1: it Cibil Danning? It is civil Danning? Yes, because after
Speaker 1: Minos is defeated, she's like, you may have one, but
Speaker 1: I'll kill you. And she's gonna throw a spear, but
Speaker 1: instead her throws throws the sword. Uh, she's impaled, falls
Speaker 1: and we get that yet that that slow motion disintegration sequence,
Speaker 1: which is nice. Oh yeah, but it's such a happy
Speaker 1: ending because Hercules rescues Cassiopeia. Uh, they kill Science once
Speaker 1: and for all, and then they escape from the burning
Speaker 1: island of Theory and it's happily ever after. Yeah, they
Speaker 1: embrace on the shore and then they become a constellation
Speaker 1: in the sky. It's perfect, absolutely perfect. Take that Science,
Speaker 1: all right, Well, this one, this one was super fun.
Speaker 1: And yes, this is a very viewable film if you
Speaker 1: subscribe to HBO Max, at least in the States. I'm
Speaker 1: never sure how these things work. You can currently find
Speaker 1: the first Hercules movie, uh, the one we watched on
Speaker 1: HBO Max and all of its beautiful, colorful Glory. Uh.
Speaker 1: It has also come out on Blu Ray in recent years.
Speaker 1: Uh So there's a very nice looking Blu Ray edition
Speaker 1: of that. And I think you can also still pick
Speaker 1: up a Hercules double feature DVD that includes both this
Speaker 1: film and the sequel, both lutherig No Hercules films, uh
Speaker 1: in one DVD package. Wait, if he already turned into
Speaker 1: a constellation, what's he gonna do in the second one?
Speaker 1: Just twinkle? I think they have to battle all the
Speaker 1: same characters again like it had. Basically has the same
Speaker 1: cast minus Sybil Danning. So I'm not sure exactly how
Speaker 1: it goes down, but I have to bet I'm kind
Speaker 1: of interested to check it out now. All right, well,
Speaker 1: we're gonna go ahead and close it out here, but
Speaker 1: we'd love to hear from everyone out there, your thoughts
Speaker 1: on Hercules, your thoughts on oh, just any Hercules movie
Speaker 1: or muscle Man movie in general, the legacy of muscle
Speaker 1: Men movies, all of that is fair game. If you
Speaker 1: would like to check out other episodes of Weird House
Speaker 1: Cinema that publishes every Friday. In the Stuff to Blow
Speaker 1: Your Mind podcast feed were primarily a science podcast with
Speaker 1: episodes core episodes coming out on Tuesdays and Thursdays, but
Speaker 1: we do listener mail on Mondays. We do an artifacts
Speaker 1: short form episode on Wednesdays, and on Fridays we put
Speaker 1: most of the serious concerns aside and just talk about
Speaker 1: a weird film. Um I tend to blog. I blog
Speaker 1: about these episodes at smooda music dot com and if
Speaker 1: you use Instagram, I have set up in an Instagram
Speaker 1: account for Weird House Cinema is just Weird how Cinema,
Speaker 1: so you can follow it there. Huge thanks as always
Speaker 1: to our excellent audio producer Seth Nicholas Johnson. If you
Speaker 1: would like to get in touch with us with feedback
Speaker 1: on this episode or any other, to suggest a topic
Speaker 1: for the future, or just to say hello, you can
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