Movie Review: Hercules (1983)

Hercules (Ercole)
Cannon Italia Srl, Golan-Globus Productions, Italy, USA, 1983.

The film begins with the creation of the world when Pandora's Jar appears in space. Jar jar breaks and forms the planets. The breaking of the jar releases also evil forces which is bad. In the battle of good and evil the humans must show what they're made of. The Gods living in Moon prepare to watch how the battle will end (only popcorn is missing). Hera (Rossana Podestà) roots for evil and Athene (Delia Boccardo) roots for good. To balance the battle, Zeus (Claudio Cassinelli) creates powerful hero Hercules (Lou Ferrigno)! He is raised in Thebes as son of King. 

Hercules

Zeus

Hera's Sacred Sword is stolen and traitors working for King Minos (William Berger) murder Hercules' parents. One of the maids puts baby Hercules into boat (and so Golan-Globus tied this story to the legend of  Moses). Zeus offers a helping hand to keep the boat safe. Hera does not like that and plans to destroy Hercules. And so baby Hercules does his first heroic act by destroying two big rubber snakes. 

Athene

Hera

A couple of farmers (let's just call them Uncle Owen and Aunt Beru) (Stelio Candelli and Gabriella Giorgelli) find the baby and raises him as their own son. Hercules grows up and trains his strength using Conan's Wheel of Pain Fitness Method(TM). Muscles are useful for farm jobs as the family does not need an ox to plow the field. Also uprooting trees with bare hands is a good workout. Hera's bear kills Uncle Owen (as Hercules' unlucky foster parents are short-lived), so the muscleman throws the pesky teddy into space. And so the constellation of Great Bear was born. 

We do not need ox!

It becomes common that Hercules throws a lot of stuff into space. Here's a log flying through space. 

Space log

King Minos (William Berger) believes in science (Science for the sake of Science!) and asks Daedalus (Eva Robins) to help kill Hercules. Daedalus sends mechanical monsters after Hercules but Minos is clearly unhappy to see how small they are. The first monster does not hurt Hercules but manages to kill Aunt Beru and that makes Hercules angry.

Daedalus

King Minos

There's nothing to gain from farm life, so Hercules seeks to do heroic deeds. Hercules has to prove his strength to King Augeias (Brad Harris). After that he has to clean the stables of 1000 horses. Princess Cassiopeia (Ingrid Anderson) falls in love with him but the gods have other plans. Hera's favourite, naughty Minean Princess Adriana (Sybil Danning) kidnaps Cassiopeia with help from traitorous advisor Dorcon (Yehuda Efroni).

Cassiopeia

Not at all suspicious looking King's Advisor Dorcon

Hercules swims to Sorceress Circe's (Mirella D'Angelo) island. Old granny offers some warm tea, then demands to get a small amount of Hercules' blood. It is a fair trade as the granny turns into beautiful sorceress. Hercules and Circe visit many places and even detach continent of Africa from Europe.

Xenodama, King of Africa (Bobby Rhodes)

After adventuring with Circe, the final quest is rescuing Cassiopeia from Thera. Thera is actually built above Atlantis, so Hercules contributes to the destruction of Atlantis too as collateral damage. Oops!

Nice granny offers some tea

Circe

Golan-Globus- duo produced a wacky mythical adventure with awesome cheese, vintage special effects and gorgeous women in skimpy dresses. Freely interpreted mythical story is combined with scifi-elements. It is nice that although being often clumsy, the special effects are still old school stop-motion effects. It is not Ray Harryhausen, but it has its moments. Fans of B-grade peplums find a lot of fun in this movie. Hercules fighting a laser-shooting metal centaur on a green planet with three moons shining on the sky, how awesome is that? Interestingly there is a lava pit sacrifice attempt oddly similar to "Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom" that was made year later. "The Incredible Hulk"-star Lou Ferrigno has Herculean physique, being one of the bulkiest actors to play Hercules, and the script gives him every opportunity to use his muscles. As often in Hercules-movies, the hero has several scenes where he is chained and the he breaks the chains. Lovably camp movie experience throughout.

Metal centaur vs a man with a club

Adriana and Cassiopeia

Saved from the lava pit

Rating: Very good

Starring: Lou Ferrigno, Brad Harris, Sybil Danning, Rossana Podestà, Ingrid Anderson, Mirella D'Angelo, William Berger, Bobby Rhodes, Gianni Garko (as John Garko), Yehuda Efroni, Delia Boccardo, Claudio Cassinelli, Franco Garofalo (as Frank Garland), Gabriella Giorgelli (as Gabriella George), Raf Baldassarre (as Ralph Baldassar), Stelio Candelli (as Steven Candell), Valentina Montanari (as Valerie Montanari), Rocco Lerro (as Roger Larry), Eva Robins (as Eva Robbins, Giovanni Cianfriglia, Anthony La Penna, Edward Mannix, Mindi Miller, Marc Smith, Susan Spafford
Director: Luigi Cozzi