Nothing Special   »   [go: up one dir, main page]

6/10
Enjoyable crossover with adventures , emotion , intrigue and spectacular fencing
9 November 2015
This average though acceptable Zorro realized in Spaghetti style is a tolerable adaptation inspired by Johnston McCulley character starred by Gordon Scott as role name in title , the dashing masked avenger along with three Musketeers , these characters taken from Alexandre Dumas novel . This is a passable , decent Swashbuckling outing in the "Zorro" series filled with sword duel . Set in seventeen century when Spain wages war France for the conquest a fortress , Vandrenant . Isabel (José Greci) , niece of King of Spain , Felipe (Gianni Rizzzo) , is kidnapped by the French army and housing in the castle Saint Denis . Then , the Count of Sevilla (Franco Fantasia) is decided to free her . Indeed , the count has agreed a covenant with the tyrant Cardinal Richelieu (Nerio Bernardi) to free Isabel for an essential military information . Later on , the son of Count of Teruel (Gordon Scott) posing as Count of Sevilla attempts to free Isabel and he joins forces with the four Musketeers : D'Artagnan (Nazzareno Zamperla) , Athos (Giacomo Rossi Stuart) , Porthos (Livio Lorenzon) and Aramis (Robert Risso).

This Spaghetti adventure with Zorro and four musketeers as likable protagonists is plenty of action , thrills , court intrigue , spectacular pursuits by Zorro and a lot of sword-play . This Zorro is decently starred by Gordon Scott , he took a chance and jumped from Tarzan movies and Sword and Sandals genre to costumed Italian adventure ; here he steals the show as foppish Zorro relishing his secret identity dressed in black ; executing bounds and leaps , twists and climbs and throughly enjoys himself . Gordon Scott made lots of roman-epic-Italian films also called ¨Musclemen movies¨ or ¨Sword and sandals¨ as well as costumer sword-fight and a few Spaghetti Western . Luck's Gordon Scott changed when Italian director Sergio Corbucci persuaded him to go overseas to star ¨Romulo and Remo¨ along with Steve Reeves and later on , he continued to play several others . Scott played the mythic Maciste in great number of movies was randomly assigned the identity of Hercules , Goliath , Samson or Aron for U.S. viewing . Gordon was an American bouncing who emigrated Europe where starred several Tarzan movies , subsequently was to Italy and created a true star-system based on pumped-up heroes . Scott and specially Steve Reeves paved the way for others actors to seek their fame and fortune in Italy playing stocky adventurers . Other stars by the time on this type of movies are Mark Forest , Gordon Mitchell , Dan Vadis , Kirk Morris , Brad Harris , Ken Wood ; furthermore 'Gordon Scott' made more important competence to Steve Reeves . Nobody , nevertheless, topped Steve Reeves and Gordon Scott in popularity . Gordon Scott played other epic characters : ¨Gladiator of Rome¨ , ¨Hero of Rome¨ , ¨Hercules and Princess of Troy¨ , ¨Conquest of Micene¨ , though also made some Spaghetti as ¨The tramplers¨ and ¨Buffalo Bill ¨, Spy-genre as ¨Secretissimo¨ , ¨Death ray¨ and , of course , his famous Tarzan movies as ¨Tarzan's greatest adventure¨, ¨Tarzan's Fight for Life¨ , ¨Tarzan and the hunters¨ and ¨Tarzan and the trappers ¨ , among others . In the movie appears usual support actors , all of them habitual in Horror/Peplum/Western genres , such as Giacomo Rossi Stuart , Nazzareno Zamperla , Livio Lorenzon , Maria Grazia Spina , Benito Stefanelli , Giuseppe Addobbati , and Franco Fantasia also master of arms , among others .

Regularly photographed by Carlo Bellero , an alright remastering being necessary . Evocative , jolly and lively musical score by Carlo Savina . The motion picture was professionally directed by Luigi Capuano . He was a good craftsman who made all kind of genres , and especially adventure movie . Capuano directed Spaghetti Western such as "Il Magnifico Texano" , Peplum as ¨Revenge of Ursus¨ ,"Revenge of the Gladiators" , "Hercules and the Black Pirates" and of course Adventures such as "Zorro in the Court of Spain" , "Zorro, Rider of Vengeance" , ¨Zorro and three musketeers¨ ,"Tiger of the Seven Seas" , ¨leopard of Sarawak¨ , ¨Vengeance of Sandokan¨ , "Terror of the Red Mask" starred by Lex Barker and "The Lion of St. Mark" set in Venice and also starred by Gordon Scott .

The first Spanish/Italian Zorros were ¨Vengeance of Zorro¨ and ¨L'Ombra di Zorro¨ (1962) by Joaquin Marchent with Frank Latimore , Paul Piaget and Robert Hundar . Other Zorro filmed by that time are ¨Zorro all Corte di Spaña¨ (1963) by Luigi Capuano , ¨Zorro versus Maciste¨ by Umberto Lenzi with Pierre Brice Alan Steel , Moira Orfei ; ¨El Jiuramento Di Zorro¨ by Ricardo Blasco with Guy Stockwell and Mikaela ; ¨Zorro Il Ribelle¨ by Piero Pirotti with Howard Ross ; ¨Il Figlio Di Zorro¨ (1973) by Gianfranco Baldanello and two directed by Jose Luis Merino with Charles Quiney and Maria Pia Conte as ¨Zorro the rider of vendetta¨ and ¨Zorro of Monterrey¨. This was one of the many European action flicks to flood theatres and TV in the early 60's, this one pales in comparison to more the more mainstream Zorro outings produced before and after. As the best Zorro are the followings : The mute classic adaptation ¨Mark of Zorro¨ 1920, Fred Niblo , with Douglas Fairbanks, the classic ¨Mark of Zorro¨, 1940, Robert Mamoulian with Tyrone Power , Basil Rathbone and Linda Darnell , and followed by ¨The legend of Zorro¨ 2005, Martin Campbell again with Banderas and Catherine Zeta Jones , Tony Amendola , Pedro Armendariz and Rufus Sewell . Tyrone and Banderas fared much better than Gordon Scott in establishing the legendary status of this famed fictional hero . In addition , European version in similar style as ¨Le Tulipe Noie¨ (1964) with Alain Delon and Virna Lisi and ¨Zorro¨(1975) by Duccio Tessari with Alain Delon , Octavia Piccolo and Stanley Baker .
8 out of 9 found this helpful. Was this review helpful? Sign in to vote.
Permalink

Recently Viewed