Ursus dans la terre de feu

Actually they are five muscle men tossing make believe rocks but in a run of the mill film of good guy freeing oppressed people you take what you can get.The action is good but the story is average and the same one we've seen in just about every film like this. Worse its paced much too slowly. The dubbing is interesting as voices change depending on whats being said. Its a bland exercise that is best summed up by its semi volcanic eruption- its not quite the spectacle anyone hoped for.

The evil Hamilkar (Adriano Micantoni) wants to dethrone old king Lotar (Nando Tamberlani) and become king himself. But besides King Lotar, there are three other people blocking his way to the throne: the high priest who accuses him of sacrilege and murder, the popular hero Ursus (Ed Fury) and the king's daughter, princess Diana (Luciana Gilli). Hamilkar needs another mind's help (namely his wife's) to come up with a plan how to kill them all! Especially in the case of our hero Ursus, he'll find that very hard, though.

It's an OK genre movie, all the usual trademarks, but nothing outstanding. Good studio sets, but the outdoor scenes look cheap. The volcano is shoddy, and the lake is supposed to be the border between two countries, so they should not have picked such a small pond... The most memorable action scene is the tournament, when 5 opponents try and push Ursus into a spiked pit.

General Amilcare (Hamilon) kills King Lotar with the help of the king's niece Mila. Hamilon and Mila take the throne as the new dictator King and Queen. The King wages war on their peaceful neighboring country, killing the woman and kids, enslaving the men. The Queen is torturing her cousin Diana (King Lotar's daughter). Suddenly a hero appears, his name is Ursus. Ursus is captured and enslaved for only for awhile then sentenced to a slow and torturous death but Ursus breaks free. Now Ursus and Lotar will fight in the pits of a volcanic cavern! This is the 3rd film of the Ursus trilogy. It's your standard or typical B-Move Peplum of the time era. I found it a little entertaining at times. The arena scenes are the best, just mindless watching them in their costumes battle then Ursus challenged Hamilon. The ending was OK when the people battled the soldiers and the battles that took place underground in the cavern.

3/10

They really did a lot of those movie back in the day. So many it might be hard to distinguish some of them. I still would like to believe this is a better effort and stands out a bit. Low budget and over the top as it may be, this still can be a lot of fun to watch.

Don't mind the acting or the dubbing (depending on what version you do watch) ... and try to blend out the low budget of this. Just roll with it and the oil and muscles and women that need to be rescued theme ... I might not do a good job making this appealing I think ... ah well, it is what it is and there are worse movies than this. Dig it or not, you'll know early on

When the evil general "Amilcare" (Adriano Micantoni) kills king "Lothar" and seizes his throne, he promptly marries the dead king's niece "Mila" (Claudia Mori) to legitimise his rule and this narks his neighbours whom he invades, persecutes and enslaves. They find a champion in "Ursus" (Ed Fury) who challenges the new king, but that proves a daft plan as it just sees him arrested and chained to a grist-mill for his troubles. Meantime, the true heir to the kingdom, "Diana" (Luciana Gilli) is slowly being tortured to death by her queenly cousin so it's going to take all of the strength "Ursus" can manage if he is to galvanise his shepherding population and take on the king, his troops, the scheming "Mila" and save the Princess. Now of course there's no jeopardy at all here, it is all by the numbers stuff and Fury is all muscle from head to toe as he woodenly trots out the mundane dialogue, but there are a few memorable scenes to look out for. My favourite sees him trapped in a cage full of sharp spears whilst two sets of horses try to pull him apart, but there's also a volcano to contend with and there's lots and lots of sheep too - though they're not so menacing. Micantoni and Mori make for quite a decent baddies and were it not for the really poor standard of the production, especially the editing and the continuity, this would have made for quite a reasonable sword fighting adventure. Sadly, though, it's all just rather sloppily put together and misses more than it hits.