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There's more well-muscled beef on display here than at a cattle farm in Texas, but for fans of camp/cult titles or action with a mythological bent, this double bill of Italian-made sword-and-sandal adventure films will provide some old-school thrills. In the widescreen
Hercules Against the Moon Men, Alan Steel (ne Sergio Ciani) steps into the toga as the World's Mightiest Mortal (though in the original Italian version, he was called Maciste) to defeat a hot-blooded queen in cahoots with a race of evil invaders from the Moon. And in Riccardo Freda's
The Witch's Curse, Kirk Morris is Maciste, who must travel to Hell in order to save a woman possessed by the spirit of a dead witch. While the atrocious English dubbing renders these films into laugh fodder (
Moon Men made for one of the funnier "experiments" on
Mystery Science Theater 3000), their lush photography, frenetic pacing, and moments of pure budget surrealism (the ape creature in
Moon Men, the visit to Hell in
Curse) are solid reminders to both novice and veteran viewers of the Italian film industry's inventiveness and eye for spectacle, as well as the unadulterated fun these films provide.
--Paul Gaita
DVD features
As with all Image Entertainment/Something Weird DVDs,
Hercules Against the Moon Men/The Witch's Curse offers a wealth of rare supplemental material. In addition to the double bill, a pair of short subject features are included: "Mole Men Against the Son of Hercules" and "The Terror of Rome Against the Son of Hercules," both of which are feature-length sword-and-sandal pictures cut down to 30 minutes for the '60s-era American syndicated TV series
The Sons of Hercules. The disc is rounded out by a brace of English-language trailers (including one for
Moon Men) and a gallery of muscleman promotional posters. Easter egg hunters will find one near the bottom of the main menu; highlighting the baby icon will reveal a brief but alarming clip of a man balancing his "baby Hercules" in one hand while poised precariously on a rooftop.
--Paul Gaita
