L'Atlantide

I love old adventure/fantasy movies like this, where the acting is over-done, the Technicolor is glowing, the art direction flawless, and the costumes so over-decorated you'd think it was Shakespeare In the Park. This one is no exception! It concerns a group of explorers who become stranded in the desert when trying to help a lost countryman. They save his life and are `welcomed' into the city of Atlantis, which, prior to common belief, actually sank into the sand. Once inside, however, they have to fight for their lives against a malicious queen, her servants, and the threat of an atomic bomb testing site near by. Elegant to the last frame, this is a movie to savor! Leave it up to Something Weird Video to preserve weird gems like this for people who love classic cheese ball movies that are made with passion and style.

L'ATLANTIDE (aka JOURNEY BENEATH THE DESERT, 1961) certainly held promise -Hollywood director Frank Borzage may have started it but European émigré Edgar G. Ulmer finished up and it's his influence that's most apparent. Green, yellow, and blue lighting gave Atlantis an eerie look despite obvious budget restraints and the movie as a whole was well done of its kind but, unfortunately, it bore very little relation to Pierre Benoit's SHE-like source novel, "Queen Of Atlantis". The adult subject matter (filmed at least three times before) became kiddie matinée fodder with an extremely simplistic storyline: a couple of mining engineers get lost in a Saharan sandstorm and discover the lost city of Atlantis where they have to convince its queen that an A-bomb testing site is directly above and her underground empire will be vaporized in 24 hours. The queen falls in love with one of them and that's all she cares about. That's it.

Even though she isn't especially attractive, there's something about Israeli beauty queen Haya Harareet but I can't say the same for her Antinea who's neither immortal nor evil in this re-telling. Her only crime was falling in love in a NY minute and as if that wasn't silly enough, the yards and yards of chiffon she had on made her look like a burlesque queen. Jean-Louis Trintignant and Gian-Maria Volonte didn't have much to do in this Saturday morning time-waster.

ANTINEA, or JOURNEY BENEATH THE DESERT, is an odd little French/Italian adventure flick inspired by the Jules Verne movies that had been doing well at the cinema. The cast is undistinguished but the plot is similar to that of the novels by H. Rider Haggard, involving a mysterious lost underground civilisation ruled over by an exotic queen. It's rather plodding for the first hour, bogged down by romance, but picks up for an action climax.

This is eminently debatable! Pabst 's version was perhaps not his best or among his best but it retained a certain pristine charm,some magic,even an unexpected twist.Brigitte Helm, Fritz Lang's Maria in "Metropolis" only appeared about fifteen minutes but she had mystery and hieratic qualities going for her.Haya Harareet -who was a good Esther in "Ben Hur "- portrays a two-bit queen ,who seems to be in one of these cheap Peplums with muscle men whereas the Legionnaires from Pierre Benoit's novel have become civilians ,scientists to be precise .And -the writer would turn in his grave for when he wrote his book,this dreadful weapon (happy times ) did not exist -these men know that Atlantis is part of a no-go area cause an atomic bomb is going to explode any day now.

It was a good idea to "update" a rather old-fashioned book -few people still read Benoit now in France whereas he was a best seller half a century ago and before -Doing so by mixing Peplum with sci-fi does not do the writer any justice.The screenplay is silly,as an user wrote ,and Jean -Louis Trintignant looks stupefied ,as if the story did not concern him.Gian Maria Volonte has a small supporting part of a villain.There are so many plot holes the story is sometimes difficult to catch up with:for instance ,John (Georges Rivière) disappears very early ,probably because he was looking forward to collecting his fee and leaving this incredibly stupid tale .

The best version that I've seen of the story of a group of men who find Atlantis under the Sahara. Here the time is "now" and the men are flying in a helicopter across the desert when they are rerouted around an atomic test site. The copter is forced down by a terrible storm and they take refuge in the caves of some rocks. Eventually the end up in Atlantis where they get mixed up in court and romantic intrigue.

There are a bunch of versions of this story. I've seen a few of them and they are either hampered by bad dubbing into English or by really bad acting (the 1940's version has a Queen who just awful). Here the acting and the dubbing are fine. The story, which can be very soapy is handled nicely and you get a nice balance with the adventurous aspects of the tale. The look and the feel of the film is clearly similar to the sword and sandal films that were running rampant on the screens of the world at the time and it really works here, it gives Atlantis a nice feel.

Definitely worth a look see if you run across it, especially if you're a fan of the European adventure films of late 50's and early 60's.