La Malédiction de la pyramide

In Egypt, Prof. Hayden Masterton (John Rhys-Davies) organizes an expedition to a pyramid to witness an event that takes place only once every 5000 years. But he needs to buy a key from a local dealer that will awaken aliens from outer space that are hidden inside the pyramid. However the treasure hunter Peter Levitz (Michael Higgs) kills the dealer with Masterton's walking stick and steals the key; then he blackmails Masterton to participate in the expedition. When the team breaks in the pyramid, they find deadly traps and only a few will survive and Masterton uses the blood of his own daughter to activate a system to awaken the aliens. Will Earth be doomed to an apocalypse?

"Prisoners of the Sun" is a movie of action, adventure and horror with a lame and messy unoriginal story. It is funny to see Prof. Hayden Masterton preparing an expedition where a key is necessary but he will only buy it in the last minute. The plot and unpleasant characters are near ridiculous but the acting is reasonable despite the histrionic John Rhys-Davies performing the lead role. The special effects are decent but the disappointing conclusion is awful and this film deserves the IMDb User Rating. My vote is three.

Title (Brazil): "O Despertar dos Deuses" ("The Awakening of the Gods")

Prisoners Of The Sun has Professor John Rhys-Davies astronomer organizing an expedition to Egypt to view from the pyramids or one specific pyramid a celestial event that only takes place every 5000 years or so. A perfect alignment of some stars. Since they're going in the tomb itself or will attempt same he's needing an archaeologist. The one he has in mind is Joss Ackland.

But Ackland suffers a heart attack and he sends his young assistant David Charvet in his place. Reluctantly the rest agree to have him along.

Others in this merry band are Gulshan Grower,, Michael Higgs, Nick Moran, and Mohamed Akszham and one of them killed for the privilege of going along.

Prisoners Of The Sun borrows from several other sources including Indiana Jones and all the mummy films you can name going back to Boris Karloff. Any cliche you can think of is there.

John Rhys-Davies must have been in competition for an award in overacting because he trundles and bellows his way through most of the scenes. He makes this whatever else it is, not dull.

Still it's one lame movie for Mummies.

I'm a fan of this genre; it's one of those "guilty pleasures" we all have. This one, however, was one I definitely should have skipped.

The movie drags up every possible trope and cliche of other similar films: sneaky bad guy, learned professor with his almost-as-learned assistant (sidekick), and a couple of others who were eminently forgettable. Then there are the ancient curses, resurrected mummies (or are they???), and a sandstorm. John Rhys-Davies is the only actor of note in it, as well as the only one who can act. I have no idea why an actor of his repute would do this film. Was he bored and had nothing else to do? Did he just want an easy paycheck? Even he had to resort to over-acting in some scenes just to give it some energy.

Short version? Don't bother. M.

Take a healthy dollop of Indiana Jones, a substantial amount of Aliens and Predators and some sprinkling of The Mummy - no, not any of the remakes! The original! I take it that John Rhys-Davies and Joss Ackland are short of cash in their dotage...

This pretends to be a mix of old time adventure and some meager sci-fi and it fails.

Acting is OK. There are no more damsels in distress than what is usual today - meaning none. Gender equality-wise, that's good! Women are quite capable by themselves and they really don't need men with hair on their chests to rescue them from anything.

There's no sex and no nudity - tends to get sort of awkward. Comforting! That means we're "down to some serious action". Ahem... Well...

The plot starts out OK, promising actually, but this production doesn't take off and doesn't deliver. It may be comforting to see old faces amongst all the new ones but wrinkles doesn't cut it.

There's neither hero nor heroine in this concoction.

The CGI is good, but with the software available today, who'd flunk it?

See it if you have to. But you don't, do you? No really!

I remember a time, when I used to love movies like this. Low budget, weird characters, easy to follow, clear cut characters, who'd be either good or bad. It does feel like a throwback, but not in a good sense. Of course there have been worse movies and considering the budget this movie (probably) used, this is pretty decent.

Still it would be too much to say, you have to watch this. Even as a party movie it doesn't really work. You have Mr. Davies in it though, who while still acts as if this is something important. Producers got their money worth there. Judging the other actors on this movie alone would be a bit unfair though. Sometimes you have to start small ...