Yes, it's a feast of campy nonsense, but it's also better than the reviews would indicate and a clear notch or two above most of the "Hercules" movies which would be coming along just a few years later. The sets may be a stylistic mishmash but some of them are surprisingly impressive and most of the action scenes -- particularly a brawl inside a watering hole -- are well handled. The dialog's on the level of -- "I will wait for you in the old tavern by the marketplace" -- but it fits the overall tone of the proceedings. One complaint, however: a bit of editing would be welcome since the movie runs a few minutes longer than necessary. (The tape under review came in at 107 minutes.)
Rhonda Fleming may be utterly implausible as a Babylonian goat-herder but she, as usual, looks great in color. Ricardo Montalban plays most of his scenes in mini-skirt and earrings but to prove his masculinity, he repeatedly displays his chest which looks much hairier than it does in some of his other movies. Curiously, his dialog seems to have been dubbed in by another English-speaking actor.
Midway through the movie we see Montalban spreadeagled against the wall of a dungeon and whipped across his bare chest. In "The Saracen Blade," he was whipped across his bare back. This makes him, along with Steve Reeves, just about the only leading man in the movies to suffer both a chest whipping and a back whipping. (His flogging in "Babylon" ranks 65th in the book, "Lash! The Hundred Great Scenes of Men Being Whipped in the Movies," whereas his flogging in "Saracen" ranks 94th.)
Rhonda Fleming may be utterly implausible as a Babylonian goat-herder but she, as usual, looks great in color. Ricardo Montalban plays most of his scenes in mini-skirt and earrings but to prove his masculinity, he repeatedly displays his chest which looks much hairier than it does in some of his other movies. Curiously, his dialog seems to have been dubbed in by another English-speaking actor.
Midway through the movie we see Montalban spreadeagled against the wall of a dungeon and whipped across his bare chest. In "The Saracen Blade," he was whipped across his bare back. This makes him, along with Steve Reeves, just about the only leading man in the movies to suffer both a chest whipping and a back whipping. (His flogging in "Babylon" ranks 65th in the book, "Lash! The Hundred Great Scenes of Men Being Whipped in the Movies," whereas his flogging in "Saracen" ranks 94th.)