Les aventures d'Hercule

I have never seen a movie spend so much time trying to explain the incomprehensible story and still not make any sense. Just like the first movie they constantly talk about science, yet the movie has nothing to do with science. I doubt they even get any of the mythology right. Zeus is a god who has no powers without his thunderbolts. Which can easily be stolen by just about anyone. What is a thunderbolt? The sound that lightning makes has bolts? The only way this movie might be any fun is if you watch at 1.5x speed and take a shot every time someone says "Wait for me".

This movie is pretty awful. Not like the old Steve Reeves pictures were not great cinema to begin with, but at least they made some semblance of an effort to at least vaguely resemble the mythology on which they were based. The Ferrigno pictures, on the other hand, don't even bother at all for the most part, other than using the names of characters from Greek (and some Roman) mythology. Instead this picture takes a 'Star Wars' + video game sort of route, creating a nonsensical farrago of cruddy-looking back-projected setpieces and some of the lamest fight sequences you'll ever see (Ferrigno moves like a ground sloth on quaaludes and, consequently, all the people he fights have to be sure and not move any faster). The climactic animated neon showdown between Minos (a character who predated the Hercules of mythology by at least a generation and in no way resembled the fellow in this film) and Hercules is the pinnacle of Italian cheapjack cinema. Utter crap.

From the fertile imagination which brought you the irresistible HERCULES (1983), comes its even more preposterous (read goofier) sequel: right off the bat, we get another unwieldy "beginning of time" prologue which even contrives to completely contradict these same events as set up in the first film!; a condensed montage of highlights from same is soon followed by a SUPERMAN-like scrolling credits sequence. Narrative-wise, here we have four rebellious gods who steal Zeus' seven all-important (but poorly animated) thunderbolts – a crime which, for one thing, sets the moon careening on a collision course with Planet Earth! Faster than you can say "nepotism", Zeus (once again played as a white-haired bearded man by the relatively young Claudio Cassinelli) sends his champion – who has now rightfully taken his place among the elite thanks to, one presumes, the almighty tasks performed in the first film – to find his blooming thunderbolts and avert the calamities in store.

No sooner has Hercules (Lou Ferrigno – as if you didn't know) touched the earthly surface that he comes in contact with two attractive damsels (Milly Carlucci and Sonia Viviani) in need of his getting them out of distress!; the former (who would go on to become an Italian TV personality) seemingly has the ability to talk with the Little People(!) – which look uncannily like the tiny sisters from GODZILLA VS. MOTHRA (1964)!! Just so they can swindle as much unutilzed footage from the first film as is humanly possible, the divine quartet of villains resurrect good ol' King Minos (William Berger again) from his skeletal slumber and pit him once more against his eternal enemy. Typically, Hercules is made to encounter a number of potentially deadly foes including a Gorgon – an awfully underproduced sequence which ought to have led to a surefire plagiarism suit had the film-makers behind the much superior CLASH OF THE TITANS (1981) bothered to watch this flick (complete with the same "reflection in a shield" come-uppance and preceded by the muscleman letting the audience in on his tactics before executing them as if to show us how clever he is)!! And just to make it crystal clear that he wears his influences on his sleeve, Cozzi has Hercules and Minos turn into a cosmic version of "King Kong vs. Godzilla" for one of their battles and later still, Hercules gets to grips with a large snake, an encounter lifted straight out of the classic 1933 original. I swear it: this is the whole truth and nothing but the truth!

As had been the case with the first film, the cast is full of old reliables like the afore-mentioned Berger, Cassinelli and Venantino Venantini (as a sorcerer with a truly bad hair day) and up-and-coming starlets – not just Carlucci but also Maria Rosaria Omaggio (as a younger Hera!), Serena Grandi, Pamela Prati and, once again, Eva Robbins (whose costume here easily outcamps her appearance in the first film); for what it's worth, Pino Donaggio's score for this one is recycled from musical cues featured in his soundtrack for the previous film. If you have stuck with this review so far, you must have realized by now that this is one of those movies that is so unbelievably bad that a reviewer is forced to choose which course to take: either dismiss it in one unflattering sentence or spend an undeserving amount of time dissecting its flaws. I'm sure I've left out some of its ineptitudes but I wouldn't forgive myself if I failed to mention the single greatest laugh-out loud instance in the whole movie which almost made me fall off my chair (yes, it even surpassed the afore-mentioned animated titanic duel for me), namely the décor of the rebellious gods' lair which is in the shape of a giant marble…kettle!!

At this stage, one might well wonder why I gave this film (and its predecessor) a rating instead of a (not entirely unjustified) BOMB; in the past, I've had various protracted online discussions on whether one's star rating of any particular film should reflect the overall artistic quality or its sheer entertainment value… but these are two instances where I deemed it necessary to be consciously influenced by the latter in settling on my final rating. I don't know: maybe it's because I'm in a "sword-and-sandal" state-of-mind at the moment (with some 10 more respectable examples scheduled for the coming days!) but, after all, uncharacteristically for me, I decided to add these two films to my DVD collection simply based on the fun I had with them in this recent revisit – and that alone must count for something, no?

As awesomely bad as the 1st movie was, I did enjoy it. Not at all the case for Hercules 2. This borders on unwatchable for me.(which means for normal viewers, it may be preferable to get a root canal as an alternative to watching this!) With an extremely low budget, it's obvious that this was made extremely quick. This production makes Red Sonja(a personal favorite, by the way) look like Ben Hur. The story is lame, the execution of what's on the screen is inept. The Adventures Of Hercules is D level schlock that has less to do with Greek mythology and more to do with someone's weird acid trip that was called a script. I'm all about having a good time watching a cheesy flick, but this is well beyond idiotic. As I said before the 1st Hercules film was bad, but I found enough about it to enjoy it. This is just crap and a big waste of time.

Lou Ferrigno returns once again in this demented sequel to Luiggi Cozzi's earlier film; And believe it or not, this one is even more brazenly stupid than its predecessor! - Yes, I kid thee not! This time, our hero Herc is called back to earth on a perilous mission to retrieve Zeus's seven magic thunderbolts which have been stolen by some renegade Gods. Aiding our hero is a pretty, busty heroine who bears an uncanny resemblance to pop princess Kylie Minogue(!) - so much so in fact, that during one particular scene, I could have sworn I was watching the video to 'I should be so lucky'.

Um....anyway, in order to collect each of the thunderbolts, our man must first slay each of the monsters 'housing' them. But by gum, if this wasn't bad enough, Herc only has a limited amount of time to complete the task for, due to the cosmic imbalance caused by the absence of the thunderbolts in the heavens, the moon is now on a collision course for earth!!! Yes, the pressure is very much on and wouldn't you know it - just to add EVEN MORE to problems, King Minos from the first film is resurrected - a villain with an especial grudge against our hero after he defeated him previously.

Like its dopey forerunner, this effort makes the monumental mistake of combining ill thought out sci-fi elements with Greek myths - the end result being a bizarre mess and one rife for ridicule. Having said this however, such ridicule is of course the very reason to watch this in the first place; Yes, this is a gloriously bad film which goes down well with excessive alcohol intake.

Best/worst scenes? God, there's so many to poke fun at but undoubtedly the daftest is the final fight between Herc and Minos which takes place in space(!) and during which, both combatants transform themselves into cosmic manifestations i.e. poor looking animations! Bizarrely for reasons best known to himself, Minos transforms into a dinosaur(!) to which our hero immediately responds by transforming himself into a cosmic gorilla(!) Words sadly can't do this utterly ridiculous scene sufficient justice - you simply have to see it to believe it.

Yes, this is a truly terrible film, no two ways about it, but it is however quiet a hoot and is essential viewing for all self respecting bad movie lovers.