Category: Adventure

Ator: The Fighting Eagle (1982)

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Ator, an amazon, and a bear walk into a bar. Is that the opening line to perhaps the greatest joke ever told in the ancient world? Or is it merely one of about fifty great moments in the film biography of the greatest warrior to never have lived?

Let’s let it play out and then make the call. The amazon tries to steal some money for horses and gets into a confrontation with the bar patrons (calling it a bar fight would be much too generous), Ator sees a guy he knows and wanders away, and the bear just continues to eat. So it was both the greatest joke ever and one of Ator’s greatest adventures! Those ancients were tricky devils! Continue reading “Ator: The Fighting Eagle (1982)” →

The Raiders of Atlantis (1983)

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I worry about Atlantis. A lot. In all the discussions about all the cool ways civilization will end (gamma ray burst, nuclear war, plague, cows farting too much), there is a strange, unsettling silence about the possibility of the reemergence of Atlantis ending life as we know it!

And it isn’t like Atlantis is some brand new threat just thought up by liberals trying to raise your taxes. It’s been around for 2400 years since Plato invented it to make some political/philosophical point no one cares about!

So how come we aren’t seeing a bunch of specials on the PsuedoHistory Channel about the danger of Atlantis to Mankind? It’s always alien invasions when the deadliest invasion of them all is going to come right out of the ocean (and stinking to high heaven, no doubt!) with all their superior technology and angry antipathy toward us dimwitted surface dwellers! Continue reading “The Raiders of Atlantis (1983)” →

When Time Ran Out… (1980)

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Along with Meteor and The Concorde… Airport ’79, When Time Ran Out… is often as listed as one of the reasons that time ran out on the star studded 70s disaster film.

While it unfortunately hewed to all the worst conventions of the genre (multiple one note characters each with a personal issue we care nothing about combined with large scale disaster that utilizes decidedly low scale special effects), it further tormented the audience with a villain who was moronically stubborn and a lengthy climax involving Burgess Meredith breaking out his ancient tight rope walking skills to ferry a child across a destroyed foot bridge. (That doesn’t count as a spoiler since it was randomly revealed early in the movie that William Holden’s Shelby Gilmore saw the high wire act years ago in Vienna thus alerting the audience that a sweaty-faced Meredith would surely be dramatically putting one foot in front of the other on a narrow beam near the end of the film while the rest of the cast worked on their tense and gasping reaction shots.) Continue reading “When Time Ran Out… (1980)” →

War-Gods of the Deep (1965)

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How’s this for a pitch? The star of Mary Poppins gets mixed up with Tab Hunter and Vincent Price and has an adventure in a city under the sea. And brings his pet chicken with him in a picnic basket.

There’s also some guys dressed up in bargain basement Creature From the Black Lagoon costumes. And the sets look like random left overs from other lost city/ancient Egypt/Biblical epic films. And Price is crushed by a giant stone hand before crawling into the sunlight and turning into a really old painting of himself. You know why this is a sure fire thing? It’s all “based” on an Edgar Allen Poe poem! Continue reading “War-Gods of the Deep (1965)” →

City Beneath the Sea (1971)

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While there are no official records to confirm it, it’s pretty obvious after watching City Beneath the Sea that it was the cause of the great jumpsuit shortage of 1971.

The film takes place in one of those movie futures where almost everyone wears monochromatic onesies while puttering around banks of flashing buttons and pretending that repurposed office furniture are some sort of advanced gear specially designed for the rigors of undersea urban life.

The jumpsuits are apparently used to designate rank or job classification with chocolate seemingly one of the most elite (next to the Admiral’s not unexpected white one) since it was modeled by special guest star Robert Wagner. (Perhaps it’s no surprise that the stunningly unflattering mustard yellow is worn by many of the faceless extras.) Continue reading “City Beneath the Sea (1971)” →

Valley of the Kings (1954)

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Their quest was for more than simple riches! The journey was beset by the very fury of the gods! The discovery of an ancient tomb would reveal the ultimate betrayal! And confirm a great truth! But even more importantly, men would die, camels would snort and a rabbit would cower in a sandstorm for some reason!

Hitch your tan pants up to your nipples and strap on the big brimmed safari hat because it’s time to saddle up the dromedary for another 1950s desert adventure where women embark on a tomb raiding mission in their Sunday finest and perfect makeup and archeologists come equipped with the only things a real scientist needs – a smart mouth and a pistol! Continue reading “Valley of the Kings (1954)” →

The Glass Sphinx (1967)

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While some may laugh at Karl Nichols, the old leathery Texas millionaire moonlighting as an amateur Egyptologist being used by the sexy showgirl Paulette (Anita Ekberg) as part of a scheme to screw him out of the titular gaudy treasure (seriously – the glass sphinx looks like something you’d pass up at a flea market if it was more than a fiver), if I was him, I wouldn’t even know you were laughing at me because I would be too busy having sex with a hot woman half my age! Continue reading “The Glass Sphinx (1967)” →