One could hardly believe Leone directed this thrilling film about ancient pagans, swords and sandals. It has everything that Leone later couldn't give, until "Once Upon a Time In America".
The only thing recognizable with Leone is the far fetched story line and ridiculous History. In the Leone world, humans are extinct, because every man kills every other man, woman, and child.
Here, at least the men aren't killing beautiful young women, so maybe the human race won't be extinct.
Those who have seen Leone's spaghetti disasters will be pleasantly surprised by the excitement and spectacle here, and also by the more complex characters in this work. These are not the one dimensional cardboard caricatures of Leone westerns. The characters are two and three dimensional.
And that's what makes this so much better than anything Leone ever did. For some reason, he directed with a contrived hatred in later works. One must admit that his westerns made no sense, because the characters had no motivation. They just killed everything in sight.
Here, we have a lead character who is an authentic anti hero, instead of the fake anti hero that the crack heads of the sixties and seventies tried to force down our throats.
Rory Calhoun does a great job in emulating a Victor Mature playboy character. He has faults, and is a reluctant hero, but he's not the rich brat's hate mongering psychopath that Eastwood portrayed. No, this is a more three dimensional character, and that's why we can care about him and the story.
He's aided by a great comic relief character in his uncle, who at first glance doesn't seem to be used enough, but the film looks like a lot had to be cut. In fact, the final half hour looks very rushed. There is some confusion in the plot as to what the "Colossus of Rhodes" does. It opens prison doors for bad guys, or for good guys? It spills fatal molten lead that can wipe out fleets, or does it just cover a few guys with burns? These are minor faults, because this is not a film for "fact finders". It is a film for fun. A good adventure film is "credible characters in incredible circumstances". That's what we get here.
If one looks for a Leone trademark, one can see it in his philosophy of appeasing the rich kid who never leaves his cubicle. Leone's world is the old pagan world of Homer, a Republican propaganda machine, where some men are gods, some are demigods, and some are cannon fodder. This is the myth that the elite need to keep the "cannon fodder" in check. One sees it here. Only a god can kill another god. Only a demigod or god can kill a demigod. We see a trickle of that here. In his spaghetti westerns, he shoves it in our faces.
It's hard to believe that a director can sink to such depths, from a great work like this, to making every possible mistake one can make. It's a difference of directing with style, such as here, or directing with pure hate. For those who didn't live in the sixties and seventies, it is hard to understand, but that was the era of "hate", when complete psychopaths decided that movies were supposed to be depressing and hateful, to make people want to commit suicide. And this hate was fostered by the equally psychotic movie critics.
Make no mistake, that the control freaks who praise Leone's control freak westerns probably won't like a film this good, but also make no mistake that those control freaks have a short shelf life. In 50 years, they will be gone, or brain dead, or silly sounding invalids no one understands, and the spaghetti garbage will be forgotten and seen for the crap it was, while this will be heralded as Leone's true masterpiece.
The only thing recognizable with Leone is the far fetched story line and ridiculous History. In the Leone world, humans are extinct, because every man kills every other man, woman, and child.
Here, at least the men aren't killing beautiful young women, so maybe the human race won't be extinct.
Those who have seen Leone's spaghetti disasters will be pleasantly surprised by the excitement and spectacle here, and also by the more complex characters in this work. These are not the one dimensional cardboard caricatures of Leone westerns. The characters are two and three dimensional.
And that's what makes this so much better than anything Leone ever did. For some reason, he directed with a contrived hatred in later works. One must admit that his westerns made no sense, because the characters had no motivation. They just killed everything in sight.
Here, we have a lead character who is an authentic anti hero, instead of the fake anti hero that the crack heads of the sixties and seventies tried to force down our throats.
Rory Calhoun does a great job in emulating a Victor Mature playboy character. He has faults, and is a reluctant hero, but he's not the rich brat's hate mongering psychopath that Eastwood portrayed. No, this is a more three dimensional character, and that's why we can care about him and the story.
He's aided by a great comic relief character in his uncle, who at first glance doesn't seem to be used enough, but the film looks like a lot had to be cut. In fact, the final half hour looks very rushed. There is some confusion in the plot as to what the "Colossus of Rhodes" does. It opens prison doors for bad guys, or for good guys? It spills fatal molten lead that can wipe out fleets, or does it just cover a few guys with burns? These are minor faults, because this is not a film for "fact finders". It is a film for fun. A good adventure film is "credible characters in incredible circumstances". That's what we get here.
If one looks for a Leone trademark, one can see it in his philosophy of appeasing the rich kid who never leaves his cubicle. Leone's world is the old pagan world of Homer, a Republican propaganda machine, where some men are gods, some are demigods, and some are cannon fodder. This is the myth that the elite need to keep the "cannon fodder" in check. One sees it here. Only a god can kill another god. Only a demigod or god can kill a demigod. We see a trickle of that here. In his spaghetti westerns, he shoves it in our faces.
It's hard to believe that a director can sink to such depths, from a great work like this, to making every possible mistake one can make. It's a difference of directing with style, such as here, or directing with pure hate. For those who didn't live in the sixties and seventies, it is hard to understand, but that was the era of "hate", when complete psychopaths decided that movies were supposed to be depressing and hateful, to make people want to commit suicide. And this hate was fostered by the equally psychotic movie critics.
Make no mistake, that the control freaks who praise Leone's control freak westerns probably won't like a film this good, but also make no mistake that those control freaks have a short shelf life. In 50 years, they will be gone, or brain dead, or silly sounding invalids no one understands, and the spaghetti garbage will be forgotten and seen for the crap it was, while this will be heralded as Leone's true masterpiece.