Caçadores de Tesouro

I like this film, apart from being directed by the great Antonio Margheriti, it also features a great cast of B Movie stalwarts - Christopher Connelly, Lee Van Cleef, Luciano Pigozzi and Mike Monty - all with tongues firmly stuck in cheeks. The model effects may not be convincing, but I will take them over CGI any day. Margheriti directs with pure gutso and the cast look to be enjoying themselves. If I had to make a choice between Indiana Jones or Captain Yankee, Captain Yankee would win hands down.

I found an old VHS copy of this in a used book store. One look at the case and I knew I had to buy it. On the cover was an illustration of some guy, shirt unbuttoned, standing in the middle of the jungle holding a tommy gun, with a curvaceous woman clinging to his arm. You know you've got a terrible B-movie when you see a picture like that on the cover (i.e. the picture looks stupid, and you know the actual movie won't look anything like the picture anyway). Oh, and the best part: the title, "Jungle Raiders," was in the EXACT same font you'll see on the cover of "Raiders of the Lost Ark." Obviously, people were supposed to buy it thinking it was an Indiana Jones movie. Not realizing their mistake until they got home, and too lazy to go back for a refund, these sad individuals would then resign themselves with the knowledge that they had brought home Captain Yankee when they could have had Indy.

Upon inserting the video into a friend's VCR, I realized something. This wasn't merely a campy, low-budget, '80s action flick. No, it was a campy, low-budget, '80s action flick FROM ITALY! The Italians are crazy, of course, so I knew I was in for something wacky. I was right. My friend and I couldn't stop laughing until it was over, and even after that we were still chuckling about it. This was seriously the most fun I'd had watching a movie in a long time.

I don't know where to start talking about it! Okay, first of all, it is NOT a rip-off of "Raiders of the Lost Ark," as some other IMDb reviewers have said. Apart from a couple of tombs and some angry natives, the resemblance doesn't extend beyond the packaging.

"Jungle Raiders" is in fact a roller-coaster ride of extremely random action sequences, crappy special effects, and horrendous dubbing. The plot is rapid fire; one idiotic thing after another. This movie has everything! It has a boy who sends his pet cobra out to do errands for him! It has flame-throwers! It has pirates! It has a buck-toothed villain who wears a turban with a jewel in the middle of it! It has a Scottish sidekick who wears a plaid pancake hat! It has a fire-breathing mummy! It has Lee Van Cleef! All things which could only come from the sick mind of an Italian. The ridiculous booby traps that our heroes encounter are enough to send you into fits of laughter, and if that doesn't happen the hilariously bad film score will probably do the trick. And if you haven't died laughing by the time the ending credits roll, you'll get to hear one of the worst songs ever written.

Only seasoned veterans of bad movies should attempt to watch "Jungle Raiders." The viewing should not be done alone. Popcorn is optional. And...what more can I say? I don't understand how anyone could not love this movie.

I've got to say that the first 20 minutes of this film are admittedly excellent and show director Margheriti on top form. In a nut shell, Christopher Connelly plays the strangely named Captain Yankie who is running an amusing scam in the tropics for those with more money than sense. The good captain is leading mock expeditions into the jungle to recover 'lost artifacts' from 'savage natives' (in reality the friendly indigenous population who happen to be good friends with the captain) Accompanying our hero is also a worldly wise, jovial (and very drunken) Scottish guide (Margheriti regular Luciano Pigozzi) who is even 'killed' by the 'savages' early on in the shown scam for maximum effect!

News of these scams (or 'dreams' as our hero likes to call them) however gets out to an inspector (Lee Van Cleef) who, using them against our heroes, coerces i.e. blackmails them into undertaking a very real mission to retrieve a priceless artifact known as the Ruby Of Doom (a most unsettling name...) Needless to say, such a task proves to be anything but easy with our heroes having to fend off vicious Burmese pirates, avoiding various lethal traps and being betrayed from within their own ranks. Mix in some of Margheriti's always cool miniature work and a trademark explosive finale and you have on paper what should have been a great flick.

Unfortunately, after such a great introduction though, things go downhill with most of the action sequences being handled in a somewhat confused manner. Even the aforementioned finale whilst certainly pleasant to look at is handled with very little flair for Margheriti.

The good news is that the leads are tremendously fun to watch and the comedy present throughout is very welcome. One of the best bits is a scene in which the natives hear that Captain Yankie has arrived unexpectedly and thus perform a mad rush to hide all their westernised attire and accoutrement's to play the part of 'savages' as they have done previously for the captain so many times. They even put out some fake human skulls for good measure!!!

Overall: Not a bad film by any means but for fans of the genre I would recommend Margheriti's The Ark Of The Sun God as a much better watch.

Antonio Margheriti will forever remain - at least as far as I am concerned - the undisputed king of Italian rip-off classics! During the late 70s and first half of the 80s, this wonderful man blatantly imitated the biggest contemporary blockbusters and made them crazier, sleazier, more violent, and more exploitative. His masterworks include "Killer Fish" (= "Piranha"), "The Last Hunter" (= The Deer Hunter), "Yor" (= "Conan the Barbarian"), "Tornado Joe" (= "Rambo"), "Hunters of the Golden Cobra", and "Ark of the Sun God" (= both "Raiders of the Lost Ark").

"Jungle Raiders" is also a knock-off of Spielberg's "Raiders of the Lost Ark", but by the time of its release, in 1985, Margheriti's energy and inspiration had clearly watered down a lot. This is undoubtedly Antonio's least entertaining rip-off effort, and a sorely disappointing jungle adventure/actioner altogether.

Still, Margheriti - or Anthony M. Dawson, like he always prefers to name himself internationally - effectively tricked me (and probably everyone) with the first 10 minutes of "Jungle Raiders". Three men are on a dangerous rainforest expedition to recover a tribal statue, but it surprisingly turns out to be a complete scam! Two of them, Duke "Captain Yankee" Howard and Gin Fizz, run a profitable business where they make rich wannabe-adventurers believe they are on actual jungle missions, but everything is fake; - including the primitive tribes' attacks and death traps! Well-played, Antonio!

Sadly, it's all downhill from here. Yankee and Gin Fizz are recruited for a real mission, and it rapidly becomes a familiar stew of cartoonish villains, erupting volcanos, exploding barrels, and jumping down waterfalls to escape. In fact, the only original gimmick is the local kid with his super-intelligent (and obedient) Cobra. Lee Van Cleef receives top billing, but he must have had a clause in his contract that stated he didn't want to get his clothes dirty, because he only appears in a few dull and talkative sequences.

What more could you want than a talking cobra, Lee Van Cleef, untold numbers of explosions, and a movie that makes no sense? Well how about an actress that can act? Obviously Marina Costa was not up to it. How about action scenes in a cavern that are not so dark and filmed in such close range, that they are actually nauseating? My favorite quote "Don't just sit there, blow something up." Lee Van Cleef is totally wasted, and only briefly appears in the beginning and end of the film. One positive note is the first 15 minutes, which are actually pretty enjoyable, with Captain Yankee bilking wealthy would be adventurers. The rest is bad, and not good bad either, just bad. - MERK