Les Mongols

When Jack Palance signed on to do The Mongols an Italian produced epic shot in Yugoslavia he merely took out his former performance of as Attila The Hun ratcheted it up exponentially. When you're in a turkey like this all you can do is gobble gobble at the moon.

The only names we Americans will recognize are that of Palance playing Ogatai son of Genghis Khan and his lovely blond amazon wife played by Anita Ekberg. I will say this the writers did make provision for the fact that she clearly does not look like a Mongol and did mention that she was from a captive people. Perhaps a Viking settlement somewhere in Eastern Europe might explain it. I'll say this with that massive endowment of her's Anita looks good even in that Mongol armor. One fill figured girl she was.

When Palance is on there isn't a stick of furniture left standing. He is having one great old time overacting against the background of these continental cast members who sound stiff as usual with their dubbed voices. The Europeans have decided to sue for peace and have sent the film's nominal hero Franco Silva playing Stephen of Cracow as a peace emissary.

But Palance really gets his jollies with all the blood and guts and he doesn't want to stop the fighting. In this he's aided and abetted by Anita. So nice when husband and wife have a mutual interest. He and Anita do what they can to sabotage a cease fire.

In the end it's pulled out and western civilization itself is saved by a seasoned soldier taking home town advantage of the elements.

Jack Palance fans should get a real charge out of this film watching their guy dine on the scenery. The Mongols will give you quite a few unintentional laughs.

The story of this movie takes place in the middle ages at a time when Genghis Khan's Mongolian army was threatening Europe. It centers around the adventures of a Polish knight who wants to save the town Kraków from being taken by the cruel enemy.

The creators of the movie put much effort into the scenery and even more effort into the costumes. But they did not put any effort at all into the script or into acting. The plot is as simple-minded as if it had been invented by some twelve year old boys, playing cops and robbers. The dialog consists of stupid, hollow phrases. This alone would already make the movie a bad movie.

However its weaknesses go beyond that. The background music is not only unbearable symphonic rubbish. It is also inappropriately matched to the atmosphere of the individual scenes. Even the optical aspects that seem to have been the film maker's only focus are flawed. I do not have sufficient historical knowledge to judge about the historical correctness of costumes, weapons and other equipment. But I am quite sure that ordinary Polish women in the middle ages did not possess a hairstyle, makeup, and manicure like models in the early 1960's, especially if they were hiding from the Mongolian army in the marshland.

This having been said, it is almost unnecessary to mention that even the main story line is far from telling a true story about Genghis Khan's time.

There is no reason to watch this film, as long as you do not want to see how much can go wrong simultaneously with a single movie.

During the Mongol invasion of Poland, a conflict between Mongol Emperor Genghis Khan and his oldest son Ogotai ensues when the former aims for peace and the latter itches for war and conquest.

Plenty of whipping, men hogtied to a wheel, great landscapes, arrows flying and more whipping can be found in this solid spectacle that has an engaging plot and some good action scenes (the battle scene at the end is well-staged and is quite violent with arrows piercing necks, face stabbings), but it's Jack Palance who steals the thunder as he lives up to his reputation as a scene chewing extraordinaire- he plays the battle-crazed son of Genghis Khan who has megalomaniac designs and wants to rage war. Palance plays him as a battle loving psycho with an apoplectic fit. Not slouching in the villain stakes is Anita Ekberg, who is beautiful yet deadly. She's a Lady Macbeth-like character, whispering sweet nothings consisting of causing mayhem into Palance's ear, not that he needs any more encouragement on that score! Interesting bit is that Palance had her family slain and she's obviously was a captive ... now his paramour. A devious and treacherous one to boot. Franco Silvo does well as the hero and so does Antonella Lualdi, who is quite a looker. The Mongols isn't a history film but a fun spectacle.

As many other American directors, Andre De Toth finished his career in Europe; this movie seems to be a response to Richard Thorpe's THE TARTARS, produced the same year, and starring Victor Mature and Orson Welles. Rudolph Maté, Hugo Fregonese, Vincent Sherman, Edgar G Ulmer, and many other film makers finished their filmographies in Italy or Spain. This one is a pretty good one, offering splendid settings, good pace, good scenes, a gorgeous Anita Ekberg as a villainess whom you won't forget. I saw it for the first time when I was just thirteen and have never forgotten it. I like this Andre De Toth's movie.

For those of you who got a kick out of Mr. Palance's Attila the Hun in SIGN OF THE PAGAN this film gives you a better, new improved version of his unique brand of barbarity. This man's GOT to have a war or he'll just be miserable. He'll lie, cheat, steal, connive- do just anything in order to HAVE THAT WAR. This is type A personality taken to it's most outer extreme. You can really feel the almost unbearable frustration he seems to experience when his old dad Genghis Khan tells him that they're going to try for a peaceful solution with the Poles. Well, anyhow, it all ends badly for Jack (and dad). Anita Ekberg as a truly ice cold partner/lover of Jack's is fascinating to watch as well in a sort a somnambulistic way; she's pure deceit. And I was also rather entranced by the head Polish knight's seeming death wish in his relentless, driven fixed idea of obtaining peace with the Mongols. Discouraged at almost every turn, the son of a gun just would not give up and finally came out on top in the end (and got the girl, too). A good lesson in superhuman determination.