Jungla salvaje

I like this film, apart from being directed by the great Antonio Margheriti, it also features a great cast of B Movie stalwarts - Christopher Connelly, Lee Van Cleef, Luciano Pigozzi and Mike Monty - all with tongues firmly stuck in cheeks. The model effects may not be convincing, but I will take them over CGI any day. Margheriti directs with pure gutso and the cast look to be enjoying themselves. If I had to make a choice between Indiana Jones or Captain Yankee, Captain Yankee would win hands down.

Golan-Globus were shameless ripoff artists of the 80s who could take a formula from a successful film then turn it into atrocious cinema. How anyone outside of the third world could have been suckered into seeing Jungles Raiders, instead of Raiders of the Lost Atk, from which most the whole concept comes, is beyond me.

Bela Lugosi was to Ed Wood, what Lee Van Cleef is to this film – the only recognizable actor, past his prime but clearly content to collect a paycheck for the grandkids. For the most part the rest of the actors were Italian hacks whose dubbing is almost (but not quite) laughably bad. My favorite feature of the looping is what would appear to be a rule: all actors that are onscreen at any given moment must be talking or at least making utterances. Never mind that their mouths may now be closed, or that there is no reason for them to be talking – they are gonna make some noise and there's nothing you can do about it.

It's like bad porn, where the girl is moaning with her mouth shut (or occupied). Furthermore, these Italians must go to the School of Gusto Laughs where all male actors are taught to end all dialog lines with a hearty pirate's laugh. Just watch – it could make a good drinking game.

In a nutshell, however, this movie is bad – with a capital A. Not bad enough to be good, as I had hoped, but just plain bad. No story (and the story elements there are are taken directly from Raiders of the Lost Ark), no acting – lots of action with no motivation or reward in the last 20 minutes of the film.

Although some companies take great pains to maintain the quality of their film stock archives, noone should shed a tear if the entire Golan-Globus stock were to go up in flames tomorrow. The shelfspace is worth more.

I saw this years ago, and was astonished when I first saw it. It is a bad film, with a hunt for some gem called The Ruby of Gloom. Why anyone would look for something with a name that dubious escapes me, but okay.

The outstanding thing in this film, the thing that stayed with me, was the pet of a boy who was a member of Captain Yankee's party. It was a hooded cobra. This snake was very bright: he could put Lassie to shame, even conducting a scouting mission for the boy. He was so bright, he spotted a lady snake and slithered out of the film before the action concluded.

Not bad. Just silly.

What more could you want than a talking cobra, Lee Van Cleef, untold numbers of explosions, and a movie that makes no sense? Well how about an actress that can act? Obviously Marina Costa was not up to it. How about action scenes in a cavern that are not so dark and filmed in such close range, that they are actually nauseating? My favorite quote "Don't just sit there, blow something up." Lee Van Cleef is totally wasted, and only briefly appears in the beginning and end of the film. One positive note is the first 15 minutes, which are actually pretty enjoyable, with Captain Yankee bilking wealthy would be adventurers. The rest is bad, and not good bad either, just bad. - MERK

Antonio Margheriti will forever remain - at least as far as I am concerned - the undisputed king of Italian rip-off classics! During the late 70s and first half of the 80s, this wonderful man blatantly imitated the biggest contemporary blockbusters and made them crazier, sleazier, more violent, and more exploitative. His masterworks include "Killer Fish" (= "Piranha"), "The Last Hunter" (= The Deer Hunter), "Yor" (= "Conan the Barbarian"), "Tornado Joe" (= "Rambo"), "Hunters of the Golden Cobra", and "Ark of the Sun God" (= both "Raiders of the Lost Ark").

"Jungle Raiders" is also a knock-off of Spielberg's "Raiders of the Lost Ark", but by the time of its release, in 1985, Margheriti's energy and inspiration had clearly watered down a lot. This is undoubtedly Antonio's least entertaining rip-off effort, and a sorely disappointing jungle adventure/actioner altogether.

Still, Margheriti - or Anthony M. Dawson, like he always prefers to name himself internationally - effectively tricked me (and probably everyone) with the first 10 minutes of "Jungle Raiders". Three men are on a dangerous rainforest expedition to recover a tribal statue, but it surprisingly turns out to be a complete scam! Two of them, Duke "Captain Yankee" Howard and Gin Fizz, run a profitable business where they make rich wannabe-adventurers believe they are on actual jungle missions, but everything is fake; - including the primitive tribes' attacks and death traps! Well-played, Antonio!

Sadly, it's all downhill from here. Yankee and Gin Fizz are recruited for a real mission, and it rapidly becomes a familiar stew of cartoonish villains, erupting volcanos, exploding barrels, and jumping down waterfalls to escape. In fact, the only original gimmick is the local kid with his super-intelligent (and obedient) Cobra. Lee Van Cleef receives top billing, but he must have had a clause in his contract that stated he didn't want to get his clothes dirty, because he only appears in a few dull and talkative sequences.