Ulisses Contra Hércules

Ulysess versus Heracles is a good example of Italian sword and sandal epics. Ignore the really bad dubbing, they don't seem to realize Mike Lane is playing Hercules and not his son, and you'll see a fun film. Georges Marchal isn't known to me, but he's quite good at Ulysess.

Ulisee has offended the Gods and Heracles is sent to punish him. They encounter some crazed bird-men who are ruled by a beautiful queen, check the outfits on this one! Then Ulisee is captured by a crazed Tyrant who rules over cave-men and its up to Herc to rescue him. The scene of ulisee nearly being crushed by a descending stone ceiling is very well done.

Near the end, Ulisee shows his honor and saves Herc's girl from certain death, even when he has the chance to escape and get back to his faithful Penelope. Impressed, Hercules implores his Father, Zeus, to forgive Ulysses. Its one of the most beautiful prayers I've ever heard in a movie like this. Lane and Marchal are excellent, the girls are pretty and the film moves rather well. Lane plays Herc as strong, but not invincible, which helps. A lot of fun.

Well there are a few well done scenes I will grant you, the story is a bit entertaining, acting is fine, costumes standard - overall an okay film. Not my favorite Hercules film but a little entertaining.

Ulysses/Ulisse has angered the gods, mainly Zeus/Jupiter, by binding the Cyclops. Hercules / Ercole is sent out to find Ulysses and bring him back for justice. Birdmen capture Herc and give him a time, he gets free and continues his search. King Lagos enters the picture and allies Ulysses, although they were once enemies. Herc comes to the rescue and saves Ulysses and it ends with a prayer to Jupiter/Zeus.

Not the best peplum of the 1960s I've seen, but not the worst.

3/10

Poseidon seizes the opportunity to exact revenge on Ulysses (Georges Marchal) for blinding his son, Polyphemus. Of course, he fails to mention that Cyclops wanted to eat Ulysses' men, but it doesn't matter, because no matter the circumstances, a mortal has no right to kill gods or their offspring.

So Zeus sends his son Hercules (Mike Lane) to capture Ulysses and bring him to Polyphemus' island so that he can take revenge on him. Ulysses and his men are on their way back from Troy to Ithaca, eager to finally see his wife Penelope again, when a Phoenician ship attacks them. Hercules is on board, having promised the Phoenician captain a large reward if Ulysses can be captured. The venture initially succeeds, and the hero of Troy is captured. In the ship's hold, however, Ulysses frees himself from his bonds with the help of a fire, setting the Phoenician ship ablaze.

Swimming, Ulysses, followed shortly after by Hercules, reach the mainland, where they fall into the hands of bloodthirsty bird-men and their mother hen/queen Aria (Dominique Boschero). Using flattery, the two heroes try to dissuade Aria from making a sacrifice to the bird god, and they manage to escape. Shortly thereafter, Ulysses tricks Hercules and continues his journey alone, but is captured by cavemen under the command of the half-mad King Lagos (Gianni Santuccio), who is terrorizing the neighboring kingdom of King Ircanus. Ircanus is, of course, the father of Hercules' beloved Helen, who is promised to the primitive Prince Adastro (Raf Baldassarre).

And so, Hercules hopes that by destroying King Lagos and his horrifying subjects, he will be allowed to marry Helen as a reward. In doing so, he will also be able to free Ulysses and hand him over to Polyphemus. But by now, the two heroes have developed a deep respect for each other, and when Ulysses finally frees Helen, who had been kidnapped by Adastro, can Hercules bring himself to abandon Ulysses to death and Polyphemus's stomach?

Hercules against Ulysses is one fun peplum, very well-paced, sharply shot in beautiful natural settings. The plot is constantly moving; it's very adventurous with one plot thread leading to one problem to another such as a burning ship, bird men and cave dwellers. There's a cliffhanger in the form of a wall coming down to crush the hero, and it's quite suspenseful. The sword fight between Ulysses and Prince Adrasto was energetically done, as was the battle scene, though a little clumsy in parts.

What sets this apart from other Hercules' films is its intelligence - theres more talking, engaging interplay between Hercules and Ulysses. Liked the battle of wits between Ulysses and King Lagos - found the flying attempts in which Lagos asks Ulysses to build a contraption so he can fly quite funny. He obliges and attaches the "wings" to Lagos, who realises it could be a way to kill him, so Lagos asks him to try the "wings", and Ulysses replies that he can but warns him that if it works he will escape and if it doesn't then he will die and Lagos will be deprived of his wisdom! Instead a cave dweller straps on the wings and doesn't fly. Lagos is angry, but Ulysses calmly replies he didn't flap his wings!

Also there's a dreamy atmosphere about the film, which I loved, and there's nary a dull moment. George Marchal is excellent as Ulysses, looks the part as does Mike Lane; their chemistry is very good.

ULYSSES AGAINST THE SON OF HERCULES is not an easy Peplum to review. It does stand out from the endless batch of Italian action films starring beefy actors. ULYSSES AGAINST THE SON OF HERCULES has a definitely different tone to it though, a more French feel to it than most Sword & Sandal films. There's a lot of action and there are monsters and weird creatures and such. You know, typical Peplum ingredients but the film is very wordy. It relies a lot on dialogue and word play between the characters, which is typically French. Also the actor who plays Ulysses, French actor Georges Marchal, is unmistakably French looking. These differences actually makes this one stand-out from the rest of the pack.

But even with these original aspects, is it great? Well, good but not great (maybe with a better DVD transfer, it would fall into the great category). It IS very entertaining, rarely boring and sorta admirable that these guys did try to do something different but the whole package is most definitely uneven.

The story is about Heracles(played by 6'8" tall Mike Lane) trying to bring Ulysses to justice, for some actions which took place before the film began. At one point, Heracles has Ulysses "handcuffed" to him and the two men go through their journey bound together, like in THE DEFIANT ONES.

There are some moments which are thrilling unto themselves but there are a lot cheesy ones too. The stand out "bizarre" scene here is a dance number (what's with Sword & Sandal films and kooky dance sequences?) where the two heroes, tied to a tree, are being terrorized by an army of effeminate looking men who are dressed up as birds and do these peculiar dance moves. Imagine those scary flying monkeys in THE WIZARD OF OZ grouped together and they start dancing like they're in a Buster Berkley number and they try to kill the beefy heroes by pecking and scratching them to death. The dance sequence is out of this world bizarre. One has to see it to believe it. It's so bizarre that I love it.

There are other stand-out scenes but nothing beats that one. As I already mentioned, some fighting scenes are pretty good. For instance, the one at the climax between Marchal and exploitation great Gabriele Tinti is remarkably effective. The one on the boats is also good (the special effects are obvious though). There's also a fairly suspenseful "walls coming down to crush the hero" bit. But even with all the action, the story relies more on dialogue than action. Some of the dialogue is pretty bad, certainly during love scenes. The two heroes trying to woe that beautiful but out-of-place playboy bunny Bird Woman; the romance scenes on a whole are embarrassing, including the one when Heracles and Ulysses talk about love. But other bits of dialogue are actually clever and even thought provoking (a Peplum that's thought provoking?). The battle of wits between Ulysses and King Laro is truly memorable and fun.

The production values are not the greatest. The makeup fx of the cavemen is pretty bad. There are only a few sets. The set for King Laro, with that huge face behind Laro's throne, is memorable. The continuity is filled with errors, but this might be due to US distributors editing the original version for US audiences. The direction sometimes creates suspense and tension, which is no mean feat considering we're talking about a Peplum here. The score is good. Another plus is Georges Marchal as Ulysses. I really like Marchal as an actor. He's one of the best actors to play a mythical hero and has a truly striking presence.

Like I said, not an easy film to review, ULYSSES AGAINST THE SON OF HERCULES is different than the usual Sword & Sandal stuff and I appreciated it for its many original aspects. Personally speaking, even with all of its obvious faults, at a certain level, I find this much more satisfactory than the much heralded COLOSSUS OF RHODES. It's worth watching.

Jupiter sends Heracles (yes thats right, its not Hercules) to get Ulysses and bring him to the cyclops for his little blinding trick. Its an odd film as what should be the adventures or two heroes are enemies for most of it. Somewhere along the lines they get captured by bird people and find their lady loves. The first 45 minutes constitute a pretty good, if cheaply made, adventure film. Unfortunately the second half spirals and then plummets into Mystery Science Theater 3000 territory as all sense is lost and technical errors, for example rock walls that ripple like cloth or hands appearing in empty holes, begin to over take any hope that the makers knew what they were doing. If you like off beat adventure films try the first half of this...I can't promise anything about the second.