La reine des barbares

Great peplum with lots of charm! It's kinda like the first 10 minutes of a sword and sorcery flick, where a bunch of barbarians dressed up as Manowar pillage some village, but for 90 minutes. It even features a man in a bear costume! The tartar queen is really a kick-ass girl, who takes no crap and is a better leader than the men (ps! she's really cute too). I wouldn't go an call it feminist masterpiece, but well... it's about as feminist as the peplum genre gets (remember this is the genre where women with black hair are automatically cunning and evil). If you're a peplum fan and get the chance to see this little film, by all means do - it's one of the best of its kind!

The chief of the Tartar Barla tribe adopts an orphan girl, Tania, whose parents were massacred by his warriors. When she grows up, and when the Tartar chief dies, she succeeds him as chief. Which doesn't go down well with several Tartar leaders. No surprise there as they think a woman shouldn't be in battle ...

To prove her mettle, she has to overcome the rivalry of the chief of the Black Tartars, the handsome Malok, and, of course, falls for him. Malok wants to take over her tribe, but she fights his tribe and wins, however Malok is stubborn and wants her for his bride and to rule her tribe, but refuses to let go of her leader role ...

Chelo Alonso is hot as ever as Tanya, the Queen of the Tartar Barla tribe, but she demonstrates some fine acting here, and though she doesn't swing a sword or is in the heat of the battle, she commands her horde quite successfully, proving that a woman has brains to think out a strategy and in the end she makes some changes to some barbaric customs -of course, Timor (the son of the late Igor) rejects her as a queen and leaves, and she has another problem. Malok- who she likes. Such a union could cause problems.

It's a good story, nicely told, and has some decent fight scenes and sufficient twists. Malok (Jacques Sernas) looks cool as the barbarian though his laughter can be annoying. Liked the battle scene at the end with the flaming chariots coming of the city that lets out a thunderous roar.

....but don't expect this film to put much of a fresh spin on the sword-and-sandal genre. Despite Alonso's top billing, the lion's share of the action is still done by the men. And speaking of the action, it is not particularly well staged. But the music score is appropriately epic, the landscapes are sweeping, and there are lots and lots of extras. The story has some interesting themes (the transition from barbarism and prejudice to civilization and wisdom), but for the most part it's too episodic - there is not even a clear goal until midway through the picture. The busty Alonso does look spectacular in her green peplum bikini, though! ** out of 4.

With her village utterly destroyed by rampaging Huns, a young girl named "Tanya" (Chelo Alonso) is taken by the leader of the tribe, "Igor" (Folco Lulli) and essentially raised as his daughter. But rather than being just any ordinary woman Tanya wants to be a warrior and because of this she is trained in archery and allowed to ride with the rest of the warriors. Unfortunately, not all of the men approve and her most vocal critics are Igor's son, "Timur" (Mario Petri) and the chief of a rival clan, "Malok" (Jacques Sernas). Ironically, when Igor is killed and Timur thought dead, it is Malok who helps Tanya become the chief of her tribe. But Malok has ulterior motives. Now rather than reveal any more of this film I will just say that it turned out to be an okay "Sword & Sandal" movie for the most part with Chelo Alonso certainly being the main attraction. Frankly, I thought some scenes could have used a bit more excitement and the ending was somewhat pretentious but that's just my opinion. In short, while it may not be a good movie I didn't think it was necessarily that bad either and I have rated it accordingly. Slightly below average.