La terreur des barbares

"Terror of the Barbarians" with STeve Reeves of "Hercules" fame, is a very enjoyable sword and sandal epic. Reeves stars as Emiliano, aka Goliath, a Italian in the 4th century who seeks vengeance on the Barbarians who killed his father and plundered his village. Reeves is just great in this type of picture. Chelo Alonso is the love interest here and she's a real knockout, sort of a Halle Berry type with a great figure. Bruce Cabot, of "King Kong" Fame, co-stars at Alboino but shares no scenes with Reeves. Sigh.

Emiliano is a one-man army at first, so he dons a lion's mask and basically scares the tar out of the barbarians by yelling at them and then beating them senseless! They manage to capture him, but unsure of who Goliath is, they put him to feats of strength. Terrific torture ensues as Reeves is stretched, pulled and finally put between two horses to be torn apart! Wowza! Reeves of course triumphs and the surprisingly fair leader of the horde lets him go. This sits not well with Igor, Alboino's right hand man.

Reeves, despite himself, falls for the barbarian princess Landa, played by Chelo Alonso, and uses all his resources and some loyal friends, to save the day for his village. Nicely paced and well shot, I finally saw this on DVD and its one of Reeves' best efforts. It makes one wonder what he could have done with a real director and a solid cast. The music is better than average too. The barbarians are shown raping and pillaging, but they're not cardboard cutouts here and some are given real personality, i.e. Landa's father Delfo and Igor's sometimes ally, well played by Arturo Dominici. A well done b-movie.

In 1960 I was a 13-year-old boy, undergoing the initial fires of puberty, pimply and awkward and ugly (well, STILL ugly), when I saw this movie. BONG!! Immediately wanted to BE Steve Reeves. Thought if I saw the movie enough times, I might metamorphose. Sigh. For me, this was THE Steve Reeves movie - didn't see "Hercules" till much later. Thrilled with the music, too, I wrote a letter to the studio (amateurishly addressed to "Hollywood") asking if an album was available. A few weeks later, a copy of the soundtrack album arrived, gratis! That album was damaged in a house fire, but the cover, a photo of the lead actress in arms-raised dancing pose (underarm hair!?!) is still largely intact. I dream of seeing this movie again before I die!!!! Pleeeeese, powers that be, DVD it for me!!

There were a lot of 50s and early 60s swashbuckling costume dramas that must have played in saturday afternoon double features in this country.I didn't get a chance to see a lot of them until the middle 60s,when they would show them on local tv on saturday afternoons.This is one that I didn't get a chance to see until December,1973.There isn't a whole lot more that I can add to what Dinky said.I think that Chelo,as the heroine,is simply ravishing,and,depending on how your tastes run,maybe Steve is quite delectable,too.And she's the only one in the film whose chest rivals his in size.

You have to wonder how smart or stupid the Hollywood movie studios in the late 1950 were....first of all they all passed on a cheaply made Italian muscleman movie named "Hercules" with Steve Reeves and then passed again on "Hercules Unchained" with Reeves again in the title role....independent producer Joseph E. Levine picked up the options on both of these films and waged a massive advertising campaign in newspapers and television and those two "Hercules" films became monster hits at the box office. Not to learn from their previous mistakes, Reeves then made a muscleman "epic" called "Goliath and the Barbarians".....independent American International picked up the option on the film and it made a monster amount of money for them. Go figure out Hollywood....In "Goliath and the Barbarians" Reeves is the leader of a band of Italian villagers hell bent on revenge against a massive horde of barbarian huns led by a maniac named Igor. After a massacre of his village including the murder of his father Reeves decides enough is enough. He secretly starts to wipe out the barbarian horde one by one until his methods are found out by Igor. Along the way the beautiful Chelo Alonso, a barbarian queen becomes his love interest. Talk about a beauty.....she is a dancer and a romancer. Reeves tries not to get too involved with her but that is a lost cause. Check out the scene with Reeves in a test of strength pulls two horses with his hands tied to a pair of ropes....then he pulls down a slew of barbarians trying to pull him into a sword pit on a wall.....great stuff for the kids and the Saturday afternoon matinée crowd. Reeves ripling, bulging muscles are shown to the max in those scenes. By the end of the film Reeves and his men wipe out the barbarians including their leader and all is well. Final scene shows Reeves riding off into the sunset with Alonso sitting on his saddle.....at that time Reeves was the king of the muscleman movies with three blockbusters to his credit. All the muscleman actors that followed were no match for the physique and looks of Mr. Reeves. He certainly was the king of the Italian muscleman flicks.

I was 11yrs. old when I saw this movie for the first time. I was immediately "hooked" on Steve Reeves. This is still the only movie 45 years later that I get excited talking about. Reeves had an on-screen presence that was mesmerizing. The scene in which he is strapped to two horses that are pulling in opposite directions designed to split him apart is breath taking. And this is one of many scenes that exploits the magnificence of Steve's fantastic physique. Along with Reeves is the beautiful actress, Chelo Alonso who plays Reeves' love interest. They are truly electrifying on screen.(If you can call anything filmed in 1959 "electric"). I've seen about every movie that Steve Reeves made...from HERCULES to LONG RIDE FROM HELL. Even though HERCULES is the movie Steve will most be remembered for, GOLIATH & THE BARBARIANS will always be a top 10 favorite of mine!!!