Der Stein des Todes

The inglorious end of the GERMAN ADVENTURE FLICKS with Elke Sommer and Brad Harris

In 1986, what was left of the West German film industry dared once again to revive a genre that had been successful twenty years previously. But it was just an attempt! Theo Maria Werner produced the CCC film in Sri Lanka with Artur Brauner, and the veteran Franz Josef Gottlieb directed it. But the time for GERMAN ADVENTURE FLICKS was simply over in the face of competition from "Indiana Jones" and "Romancing The Stone".

The cast was and is promising in itself: Brad Harris, Tony Kendall and Siegfried Rauch as old comrades in arms; GOLDEN GLOBE winner Elke Sommer, Heather Thomas (The Fall Guy), Katja Flint and Birte Berg as female eye-catchers and also the karate-tested pop singer Christian Anders. However, the acting performances can be described as rather lackluster. The main actor Albert Fortell, who doesn't play very convincingly, is particularly bad. The story about an amulet of death and dark drug dealings on the island is also completely crazy. And the action? It was just getting a bit old.

What remains is a final reunion with such deserving genre stars of West German cinema as Elke Sommer, Brad Harris and Tony Kendall. And that can be nice for nostalgic reasons.

"Death Stone" has quite a cast: on the male front, a reunion of the two leads of the 1960's Eurospy "Kommissar X" films, Brad Harris and Tony Kendall; on the female front, a "mature" Elke Sommer and a lean, sexy Heather Thomas. But the women don't really have much to do, and for some reason Harris (a - relative - goodie) and Kendall (a baddie) share only one short scene in the entire film! It is a thoroughly routine but still watchable low-grade exotic (shot in Sri Lanka) adventure, with just a hint of the supernatural (the "death stone" of the title, which one character finds on a beach, and which apparently brings a curse on whomever possesses it). There are moments of enjoyable action, but they are few and far between. It's not really worth going out of your way to see, unless of course you have a special interest in the work of any or all of the above cast members. ** out of 4.

The only reason i bought this movie is because i think Heather Thomas (FALL GUY) is very beautiful. I cant understand how she got a role in a German low budget B-action movie with bad effects. Its fun to see how Heather tries to move her lips so it looks like german. Anyway this movie is above average german low budgets and its quiet good if you understand german, but the only reason you should try to get this really really hard to find movie is if you are a fan of Heather otherwise its not worth seeing. The only place you can find this movie is in Germany.

Heather Thomas 4ever!!!!