A Fúria de Aquiles

One has to admit that this movie is found in a class of its own when compared to other Italian productions of the same genre. The plot is very true to Homer's epic and the film editing is very good. The only drawback is that the hero, portrayed by Mitchell is quite stiff - unfortunately acting is not his forte. However, fortunately, he is overshadowed by the acting of the other stars and so the result is entertaining in every respect.

"Fury of Achilles" is one of the few worthwhile films on the subject of "The Iliad." Achilles ( a fierce Mitchell) and Hector (a rugged Bergerac) both carry the film..and are well portrayed and the plentiful action is believable and well-staged. Like other fans of this film, I marvel at the superior product of a modest budget which far outshines the overblown "Troy." The only faults were the misrepresentation of the relationship with Patroclus and the fact that Queen Helen is neither seen nor barely even alluded to. And oddly, the audience doesn't get the fulfillment of the prophecy, the death of Achilles (by being shot in his heel) For these reasons, I would rank Robert Wise's "Helen of Troy" as number one and "Fury of Achilles" as a very close second. All other versions are not even contenders. Mitchell's portrayal of the conflicted Greek hero is a much more interesting and faceted one than has ever been rendered before...and the doomed Hector as played by Bergerac has a worthy rival indeed. It is to be hoped that this film will be restored to its original glory; the prints available on video and DVD currently are too poor a quality to do it justice.

Unable to support the war in Troy, the Greeks begin raiding along the coast. While the classic heroes are off raiding the Trojans try a sneak attack against those that remain behind. Just as the battle turns against the Greeks, Achilles arrives to save the day...so goes the first 20 minutes of the film. This is a telling of the end of the Trojan war just prior to the death of Achilles. Its a very strange film in that for a good portion of it you really can't stand the Greeks who are more interested in raping than fighting the war. They are shown to be petty people who are not really heroic and who spend more time fighting over women and gold than matters of state. This is a big movie with a cast of thousands so you really do get armies clashing. Unfortunately the movie is very unfocused and feels stretched by about 20 minutes, which is a shame since its one of the best made films of this genre, but its not the best told. I liked it but I wanted to love it.

In the tenth year of the Trojan War, both warring parties seem to have run out of steam. The Greeks fight over the most beautiful prey women (Cristina GAIONI, Maria FIE and Eleonora BIANCHI). Of course, the Greeks' best fighter, Achilles (Gordon MITCHELL), doesn't like the fact that old Agamemnon always claims the right to vote first. And the Trojans' fortunes are also going wrong. Hector (Jacques BERGERAC) and his good wife Andromache (Tina GLORIANI) have never liked the fact that his love-crazy brother Paris brought about war with the Greeks in the first place. Finally, Hector, the Trojans' best fighter, has to face the final battle with Achilles, who is considered invincible. The whole thing finally gets out of hand when Hector unknowingly kills Patroclus (Enio GIROLAMI), Achilles' best friend, in a duel. Achilles is beside himself with anger, so that the battle for Troy is about to take a decisive turn...

The story of Homer has been part of world literature for more than 2,000 years. The Italian director Marino GIROLAMI manages to create a thoroughly coherent ancient drama with many fight scenes that are quite impressive for the time they were made. Numerous scenes from LA GUERRA DI TROIA with Steve REEVES were also used in GIROLAMI's film. The American bodybuilder Gordon MITCHELL (1923-2003) cuts a very good figure as a battle-hardened hero with extremely dark character traits. Gordon MITCHELL was able to hold his own in other roles for almost three decades even after the sword and sandal film wave in the Roman film industry of CINECITTA had ebbed. The French actor Jacques BERGERAC (1927-2014) is also very interesting as his opponent. He was married to two ACADEMY AWARD winners, Ginger ROGERS and Dorothy MALONE, and in his second life became head of the French cosmetics company Revlon. As an actor he was also in GIGI (1958) with Leslie CARON, A GLOBAL AFFAIR (1964) with Liselotte PULVER and MISSIONE SPECIALE LADY CHAPLIN (1966) with Daniela BIANCHI.

This sword and sandal film based on Homer's ILIAS, which is well worth seeing, attracted at least 698,000 visitors (source: InsideKino) to West German cinemas.

It's kind of silly to realize that Achillies -- played here by Gordon Mitchell, one of the demigods of cult cinema -- was also personified at one point by twig-boy turned actor Brad Pitt (in Wolfgang "One-Shot" Peterson's TROY, which basically tells the same story), who's career zenith still remains the stoner roommate from TRUE ROMANCE. The two performers and the two performances are incomparable, as are the two films, made four decades and a couple of continents apart. One is a silly computer enhanced vanity piece for a number of special interest causes, the other a low budget yet undeniably powerful genre film that was far better than it ever had to be. I will let you figure out which was which.

One should never confuse movies or their content with the "real world" (hello, Michael Moore!) since movies are ultimately meant to entertain those who watch them rather than serve as literal interpretations of history, facts, even legend or myth. A good working example is the ongoing debate amongst fans of the Western as to who was a better shot -- John Wayne, Clint Eastwood, or Lee Van Cleef. The answer is of course neither (Anthony Steffen gets my vote) since they were all actors and the gunplay was special effects work. BUT, if there was one film from the Peplum era of Italian sword & sandal films that I would recommend to a history professor who wants to help make Greek mythological history come to life, I'd pick FURY OF ACHILLIES. This is such a well-written and well acted film -- even when dubbed into English -- that the history it tells really does come to life. Much of that credit should go to Marino Girolami (father of Enzo G. Castellari, god bless him) and his choice of muscle-man turned genre star Gordon Mitchell as Achillies. Standing 6'3" and about 225lbs of sheer attitude, Mitchell is quite believable as the invulnerable, ultimate warrior of Greek mythology, and I will hazard to opine that Mr. Pitt was too busy having his nails buffed to bother watching this film to realize that the trick is not just in Mitchell's bulk but the way that he carries himself that makes his character SO much larger than life. Mitchell really carries this movie, which might be his finest hour behind the shield.

And as any performer will attest, if it isn't on the page it isn't on the stage: writer Gino De Santis' surprisingly poetic and verse oriented script is wonderfully faithful to the literary traditions that gave birth to such names as Achillies, Hector, Troy, and Odysseus. Special mention should be made of familiar genre face Mario Petri's portrayal of the agonized King Agamemnon, driven mad for power by the sacrifice of his young daughter to the gods. It is Agamemnon's agonized vanity that results in the film's dramatic meat & potatoes, highlighted by a number of genuinely moving funerary scenes, dramatic speeches, fights to the death, vows of allegiance or damnation. Here actually is the stuff of legends, realized on film with a sort of restrained grandeur by director Girolami who worked within the modest budget allotted to create a masterful telling of myth that is still quite human.

Most of these Peplum thrillers are silly spectacle films centered around a muscle-man hero, special effects set-pieces, sexy Veil Dances and maybe a duplicitous scheming Caesar or sorcerer pulling the strings of our hero. This time our hero is on his own, sort of thrust into his role of savior of his army & people's with little or no regards to how he may feel about it. That is what is often referred to as "fate", and if Mr. Peterson's film had managed to capture such universal indifference to our own petty concerns as mere mortals it might be remembered as something more than the film where Gladiators finally came out of their collective closet. Another point missed by TROY, HANNIBAL, the LORD OF THE RINGS trilogy and some of the other epic sweeping historical budget/event films of the mid 2000's is that these Italian Peplum potboilers were made with such low budgets that their directors, writers, set designers and performers had to rely on their wits, imagination, resourcefulness and iron necks to make what could have and often did result in films that were absurd. Here is one that didn't, and might be the best example of the Peplum thriller as a take on history that I at least have ever encountered. And is a wonderful example of humanity's penchant for story telling without the need for computer animated effects, which for my money always take the fun out of stuff like this by allowing you to bypass your own sense of imagination. This one engages it and is almost as good as the myths upon which it was based.

9/10, and very worthy of a proper restoration.