408 - HERCULES UNCHAINED  

Genre:  Fantasy / Sword-and-Sandal (1959, Color)

Don’s Synopsis:  This movie starts off as Hercules travels with his new wife, Iole, and his young pal, Ulysses (yes, THAT Ulysses), around in a wagon for some reason.  They run into Antaeus, the son of the earth god, and also related (I think) to the comedy god because he never stops laughing.  Artaeus ends up fighting a sleepy Herc, who wins by throwing the laughing Artaeus into the water, where he loses his powers (although wouldn’t he get them back from the ground at the bottom of the water?).  To get out of the rain, Herc, Iole and Ulysses end up in a cave and run into the blind King Oedipus of Thebes, who has given his kingdom to his sons Eteocles and Polinices, but Eteocles is now in power and won’t rotate ruling annually with his brother. (Hey, is this King Oedipus the actual Oedipus Rex? And, if so, did he have these two sons with his own mother?  And, if so, then let me say EEEEWWWW!!!!)  So the Herc-meister and Ulysses leave to go try to fix things at Thebes… but first, Hercules drinks from the waters of forgetfulness and forgets everything.  Ulysses, playing deaf and dumb, and Herc, playing just dumb, are captured by the weirdly-hot looking Queen Eyebrows, who keeps Herc forgetful with a steady dose of the special water, as well as happy with heaping helpings of her harem of nymphs.  Eventually, Ulysses succeeds in knocking enough forgetful water out of Herc’s hands that he finally remembers who he is.  They escape with a group of Greek friends who happened to show up at just the right time, while Queen Eyebrows kills herself because she’s so in love with Hercules. (Uhmm, if she wanted to get over him, why didn’t she just drink the forgetfulness water and simply forget about him instead?)  Back at Thebes, Polinices is marching with his army on the city to take over from his brother, but instead of having a battle, Eteocles and Polinices fight a duel to the death to see who gets to rule, which they both lose.  So some other guy (Polinices’ 2nd in command, I think?) attacks the city now that he’s in charge.  Herc and everyone living in the city ride out and win the battle (I think).  The movie ends as Hercules is reunited with his wife (while I plan to drink the water of forgetfulness so I can forget ever seeing this movie).

Don’s Review:  This was the first of four Hercules movies to be seen on MST, three during Season 4 and one during Season 5, but it’s actually the second of the Hercules sword-and-sandal movie to be made during the Italian sword-and-sandal spectacle movie fad of the ’50s/’60s. And it’s the also one of the few to star Steve Reeves, the most famous Hercules, in the title role. The riffing on this by Joel and Bots is not the greatest seen on the show, but it’s still very funny and pretty strong throughout the movie. The host segments are not great either, but are a reasonable enjoyable lot, with the highlight being the invention exchange and Mike Nelson as Steve Reeves in Deep 13.  So a very good, though not great, episode.

Don’s Rating: 

Related Links: 
   (1) Mighty Jack’s MST3K Review (Episode Review)
   (2) B-Movie Central (Movie Review)