Le géant de la vallée des rois

Most peplums with a Yugoslavian partner in the international co-production tend to have interesting location photography and a different visual style, and this one is no exception. The setting is the 11th century BC Egypt, where the nation is controlled by Persian occupiers who have enslaved the people. A well-intentioned pharoah who tries to defend the people is killed and his evil, manipulative wife (well-played by Chelo Alonso, in the tradition of over-the-top female villains in old Republic serials!) takes over and sells out the nation. On his return home to straighten things out, the pharoah's son, Kenamun, runs into Mark Forest (as Maciste, the Son of Samson) and the plot kicks into action. The plot also includes a mystical necklace that makes the wearer a zombie ready to be ordered around (shades of old serials once again!), and of course there is some romance. Mark Forest is as handsome as, say, James Darren, his physique is well-used in a number of difficult "tasks", and he is believable in the romantic scenes as well as the fights. I've seen 11 of his 12 1960s films and enjoy all of them. Interesting visuals, a unique setting, a fine female antagonist, Mark Forest's exciting presence--definitely an above-average sword-and-sandal opus for fans of the genre. Director Carlo Campogalliani was involved with many excellent historical films with American stars: Ed Fury's first Ursus movie; Steve Reeves in Goliath and the Barbarians; Lex Barker in Captain

Falcon; Jack Palance and Guy Madison in Sword of the Conqueror (that's one crying out for a DVD transfer--the circulating copies are very splicey). Check some of them out. A copy of this film was shown at UCLA recently at a peplum festival-- if there's a copy good enough quality to be screened there, it needs to be transferred to DVD now!

Well for the first half of this entry the acting is very wooden but somewhere down the line the cast start to look interested, I feared the worst when I bought this on DVD but was surprised just how good it is (in parts!), our hero saves a bunch of babes...sorry slaves from capture and unites with the people against the tyrants...well you should get the idea by now if you watch these kind of movies,as always Mark Forest looks superb as Machiste son of Samson and his muscular frame has the ladies in question in a spin, one word of warning though, some battle scenes are incredibly brutal and gory, this surprised me greatly as I don't think this would have been passed by British censors but as these epics come and go a good entry into the genre.

Could be a good time to Maciste if the producers adjust some ridiculous scenes along the picture, the screenplay is terrible to start and the storyline is lack of creativity apart all this, the greatest sets ever done weren't enough this time, also my copy from VHS was dubbed to english version became worst the whole thing, l'm a great fan of those semi-gods of greek mitology, I have a lot of these good movies of the Hercules, Sansom, Goliah and Maciste, they are amazing characters who deserves an appropiate good productions to make those magnificents movies, further Chelo alonso overcame all this mess and share us your glorious beauty!!!

Resume:

First watch: 1987 / How many: 2 / Source: TV-DVD-R / Rating: 4.5.

Ancient Egypt is being ravaged by Persia. The men are killed while the women are sent into slavery. Pharaoh Armiteo I gets betrayed by his Queen Smedes and murdered. His son Kenamun becomes the new Pharaoh, but the Queen brainwashes him with a magic amulet. While on his desert journeys, Kenamun had saved the life of strong man Maciste (Mark Forest). Maciste is dismayed by Kenamun's apparent turn against the people and intends to sneak into the palace to talk to the new Pharaoh.

This is an Italian sword and sandal flick. The production is pretty big and they did film a few scenes in Egypt. Surprisingly, muscle man Mark Forest is not necessarily the worst actor. He's not good, but he's not the worst. The problem is that there is plenty bad acting all over the place. This is safely secured in B-movie territory.

Mark Forest (bodybuilder Lou Degni) provides the beef in this relatively lavish Egyptian-style muscleman movie, whose production design is quite good for a low-budget, Italian potboiler. But for those who enjoy the genre, the highlight is the voluptuous Chelo Alonso, whose elegantly stiff performance as the evil empress is supplanted by the delightful belly dance she performs to seduce our lifeless hero midway through the picture. Adolescent kitsch working extraordinarily well as a fetishistic flesh fantasy. Terrific.