Le gladiatrici

In this unusual sci fi/ancient warriors flick, it is the women who dominate the Kingdom, enslaving the men and any women who disagree with their tyranny. Queen Nera is searching for the man destined to overthrow her if he outshines 101 Amazon warriors in a contest of sheer strength, who turns out to be Thor (Joe Robinson), accompanied by his sidekick, black slave Ubaratutu (Harry Baird). Both are muscle hunks. Lovely Tamar (Susie Anderson), whose father was the rightful ruler of the kingdom but like others was overrun and killed by the queen and her Amazon warriors, is seeking to restore his throne to her adolescent brother.

Women who disagree with the queen must fight each other as gladiatrices, while the men join Amazon warriors as guards or are kept dehumanizingly in caves. Tamar and her brother are captured, while Thor and Ubaratutu come to the rescue. The queen has her men as temporary husbands before disposing of them nastily when she is tired of them, and she seduces Ubaratutu after he is captured. We are treated to some amusing muscle displays by Ubarututu before the black queen (she reminds one of Eartha Kitt) preceding the sudden appearance of Thor, who insists to Ubaratutu that he should not trust her. Both are taken prisoner. The queen declares it is women who should rule, but a chief henchwomen confides privately to prisoner Tamar that she agrees with Tamar that rule and force are for men, that they deprive women of their softer side. It is up to Tamar and Thor to save the day.

Phew, such a plot could only be in an Italian-made movie! The visuals are excellent, with nice scenic backdrop, and the story does not drag. The acting may not be great, but the actors have only the wooden characters of the genre to put anything into. Despite the title, it is Tamar rather than Thor who is the chief protagonist, and she is a commanding presence throughout. Women don't have to feel cheated by the theme: to each his or her place, but the women become more human again. Fun to watch, not to be taken seriously.

Having just viewed this god awful movie I cannot go on without a comment. As a long term fan of sword and sandal movies I try to hunt down just about everything from that era, however this is the first time I have had to watch it bit by bit, yes it's so bad it's hilarious. Our hero Thor, a real bad acting performance from British actor Joe Robinson see's him up against Amazonian women who rule the land with an iron fist enslaving men and even having their own female gladiators to kill each other in the arena. From the very start it is quite clear that the writers of this nonsense must have came straight from a school play. Our hero Thor lives in a neat little underground cave with his black "servant", homo erotic overtones by the score when he gives his master an err...massage to sort his bad shoulder you know you are in for some fun, the servant...what ever his name is!, is portrayed as a bungling oaf and with the silly music that accompany's him is all there to see just how degrading it is, I will refrain from going over the plot but you really must see some of these scene's for yourselves, the first one is when Thor is discovered by the Amazon women and the line is "we are here to capture you Thor and take you back" or when his servant is captured by the queen who is luckily for him is also black puts him on a revolving pedestal and tells him to flex his muscles all over his body, she is so smitten by him in an instant he has some sort of African garb on and is to be her husband and king, the ensuing fight between him and Thor who is trying to change his mind on this is utterly hilarious.

This movie makes greats like Santa Clause Conquers The Martians and Plan 9 From Outer Space like cinema masterpieces!.

These women have 1960s hair and make-up on - way to modern for the time era this film is suppose to have taken place in. The stupid blue strap around their heads made it worse. And WTF are they wearing? Every single this about this film is ridiculous: acting, story, make-up, costumes, directing, cinematography - you name it.

The costuming looks extremely cheap... most all peplum films have outstanding costumes but his film looks like they raided a dollar store costume department at Halloween.

If you are a guy and want to look at some girls then you might like this film just for that reason alone. I have a feeling if the women were ugly the film would be rated 0.

1/10

Only reason I watched this today (on a tape from one of the usual online sources) was that I expected it might be a movie I remembered from my youth. And, by "youth," I mean when I was about 7 or 8. The movie is a pretty standard "strong-man" film, although the man appears in very few scenes. Mostly, it's about a bizarre society of "amazon" women (who, I suspect, have none of them ever been on the same continent as the eponymous river) who enslave other women and force them to participate in gladiatorial combat. The slaves wear delightfully short skirts and lots of facial make-up. I have this creepy feeling that this film may have set my notions of what "sexy" means for the 35 years that have followed my seeing it, as I _still_ think thighs and mascara are pretty neat. But, also, I have always remembered a couple of scenes in particular, especially a climactic tug-of-war between Thor and 100 of the amazons. Perhaps it must be conceded as some indicator of quality that, unseen by me again in all that time, I _still_ remembered this movie. (On the other hand, if I had remembered it better, I'd have saved my money and not bought the tape. Make of those facts what you will.)

In THOR AND THE AMAZON WOMEN, the men have been enslaved by the females of the title. A prophecy tells of a mighty testosterone-filled warrior who will arise to free these subjugated males.

Enter Thor (Joe Robinson), who, at first, refuses to engage this estrogenic army, and is nearly captured. Luckily, a fellow burly man, named Ubaratutu (Harry Baird) rescues him, so that they can hang out in Ubaratutu's cave home and chat in their colorful, polyblend loincloths.

In the meantime, Thor's girlfriend and her son are captured instead. While she is inducted into the Amazon's school of gladiatrixes, her son becomes a slave.

About this time we must ask TWO QUESTIONS: #1- How do all of these warriors keep their hair so soft, manageable, and oil-free? #2- Is there going to be any actual action in this movie? If this were a Hercules movie, many men, women, trees, boulders, etc., would have been flying around like Frisbees by now!

Meanwhile, Thor and Ubaratutu chat on.

Oh no!

Ubaratutu is caught by the fiendish, Smurf-hatted females, and forced to flex his muscles while rotating before their queen! Oh! The humanity! Can Thor deliver him, and every red-blooded man, before further indignities ensue?

Amazingly, though a lot seems to be going on, this movie still manages to be quite dull. Even the final, obligatory "test of strength" is no more rigorous than a "challenge" found on some survival game show! The big revolt also turns out to be less than exciting.

INTERESTING FACT: When men are enslaved by Amazon women, they all sleep together in huge, sweaty piles...