Mole Men Against the Son of Hercules (1961)

One of my favorite low budget science fiction films is The Mole People with John Agar and Hugh Beaumont. This team of modern scientists discover an underground albino like people. That film must have inspired this uninspiring peplum epic, Mole Men Against The Son Of Hercules who in some countries is Maciste. Personally I think Hercules should have objected to the billing.One thing Mark Forest might have objected to, Hercules has a friend in Paul Wynter who's actually better built than him. I can't believe the producers let that one go.On his journeys Hercules comes upon a pretty barren countryside where a group of mysterious people make night raids, though mostly in the twilight of dawn, the better for cameras of surrounding villages, killing a few, but dragging the rest off as slaves. They can only operate above ground at night because they dry up and blow away just like The Mole People in the fire of Ishtar in that film.The albinos doing this are ruled by a Queen who doesn't quite have the pasty complexion they do. Of course there's an obvious reason for it, but no one in this film figures out until the very end.I will say this Paul Wynter is quite the total package, he's the best reason for watching Mole Men Against The Son Of Hercules.

"While traveling across the land, our hero Maciste finds the survivors of an attack by some strange warriors. The murderous attackers were all albinos that Maciste tracks to a hidden underground city. Looking to avenge the victims of the attacks, Maciste heads into the city under the surface to battle these strange underground dwellers," according to the DVD sleeve's synopsis. Dubbed "Mole Men against the Son of Hercules" for American consumption. Relatively speaking, this isn't too bad for a lower budgeted Italian "sword and sandal" epic. Bulging, muscular Mark Forest struts his Herculean form well. Queenly, voluptuous Moira Orfei will raise an eyebrow. Paul Wynter heralds some darker-skinned supporting players. And, Gianni Garko heads the clannish, white-cloaked "Mole Men", a vampire-like master race.**** Maciste, l'uomo piu forte del mondo (10/10/61) Antonio Leonviola ~ Mark Forest, Moira Orfei, Paul Wynter, Gianni Garko

The brave and mighty Maciste (brawny hunk Mark Forest) ventures underground into the kingdom of the Mole Men who capture humans and use them as slaves. The evil, yet beautiful Queen Alismoyab (gorgeously voluptuous brunette Moira Orfei) falls hard for Maciste. Naturally, Maciste rebuffs the Queen's advances and instead tries to free the slaves with the help of loyal companion Bangor (the equally muscular Paul Wynter). Boy, does this often uproariously terrible clunker possess all the right wrong stuff to rate highly as a real four-star stinkeroonie: we've got ham-fisted (mis)direction by Antonio Leonviola, erratic stop'n'go pacing, the mole men are played by a bunch of guys sporting pasty make-up and tacky white wigs, an utterly ridiculous Western-style theme song ballad, laughably cruddy dubbing, hopelessly stiff acting (special kudos here to Raffaella Carra as fair maiden Princess Saliura and Enrico Glori as wicked henchman Kahab), a bombastic score by Armando Trovajoli, clumsily staged action scenes, a cornball stentorian narrator, murky cinematography by Alvaro Mancori, and, of course, the inevitable last reel slave revolt. The picture earns bonus points for its inspired oddball touches: Maciste mixes it up with both a savage gorilla (some dude in an obvious ratty ape suit) and a bunch of ferocious lions, one unfortunate mole fellow disintegrates after being exposed to the sun's lethal rays, a godawful huge and deadly wheel contraption that the slaves are forced to push under threat of death, and Maciste being forced to hold up enormous slabs of stone that could crush his friends if he drops them. Moreover, Forest and Wynter make for a genuinely engaging beefcake duo. Entertainingly cheesy rubbish.

Once again our Italian friends come up with sheer nonsense!,people from underground who are obviously painted white with wigs that seem to have been rescued from a blaxploitation film, the usual bad photography is evident as in most sword and sandal epics, our hero the very handsome and athletic Mark Forest battles gamely against all the odds while no doubt having one eye on his bank account to provide him with an opera singing school, something he still does to this day,if anything he was one of the best muscle men but never really got any decent films to work on in the genre although most were made almost back to back in a production line way you would think at least one or two might have had attention holding qualities.