Sandals action with a mix of Wagner's "Ring" and the Nibelungenlied
This film, directed by Emimmo Salvi in 1965, is also known under the German title "The petrified / stone forest". In the original Italian it is called "Il tesoro della foresta pietrificata". And the conflict between the Nibelung prince Sigmund (played by the Croatian actor Ivo Payer, also known as Ivica Pajer) and the dark Viking leader Hunding (with impressive physique: Gordon Mitchell, who plays "Maciste, the son.) is also about a treasure / tesoro of Hercules" from 1961 was discovered as the main protagonist). With the Sword of Valhalla and the Nibelung Treasure the peoples of the North could be dominated, something Hunding naturally doesn't need to be told twice. Elaborate fights in which Hunding can flex his huge muscles, and various intrigues in which the two dissimilar sisters Siglinde and Gertrud (played by the enchanting Eleonora Bianchi and the fantastic Luisa Rivelli in a very ambivalent role) are involved, hardly leave you bored come up. In interesting supporting roles are Pamela Tudor as Valkyrie Brunhild, who is of course always announced with Richard Wagner's famous "Ride of the Valkyries", and the short actor Franco Doria as the fool Knut, who always causes laughter, but also exciting rescue operations with complicated rope winches.
The problem with the film is that it was all too obviously shot on cheap studio sets. The fight scenes are also not always convincing, although the two main actors are expressly excluded. Overall, the story is a bit half-baked because with the Nibelungenlied and Wagner's "Ring of the Nibelung" two very different stories are mixed together, which simply cannot succeed.
Worth seeing for fans of Gordon Mitchell, but probably not for others!
