Bad Movie Logo
"A website to the detriment of good film"
Custom Search
HOMEB-MOVIE REVIEWSREADER REVIEWSFORUMINTERVIEWSUPDATESABOUT
Welcome, Guest. Please login or register.
Did you miss your activation email?
March 29, 2024, 02:19:35 AM
713385 Posts in 53058 Topics by 7725 Members
Latest Member: wibwao
Badmovies.org Forum  |  Movies  |  Good Movies  |  Hercules in the Haunted World (1961) « previous next »
Pages: [1]
Author Topic: Hercules in the Haunted World (1961)  (Read 1654 times)
Mofo Rising
Global Moderator
Frightening Fanatic of Horrible Cinema
****

Karma: 460
Posts: 3222


My cat can eat a whole watermelon!


WWW
« on: May 26, 2011, 05:35:11 PM »

This was a pretty entertaining bit of inconsequential fantasy from the '60s. Basically, super-strong Hercules must travel to Hades to rescue a princess. This leads to unfortunate consequences when his pal Theseus falls in love with Persephone and steals her from the shadowy depths.

A low-budget effort from director Mario Bava, who nonetheless creates a quite visually inventive and entertaining "epic." It stars Reg Park as Hercules and Christopher Lee as his nemesis, Nico.

I'd really like to talk more about it, but I watched it "instantly" on Netflix and, well...

Here, watch this preview:

Small | Large


Looks terrible, doesn't it? The digital copy Netflix offers is about that bad, with a few added detriments. The copy Netflix uses is clearly a dub from a VHS tape, which is already taken from an inferior print. So along with the film scratches, every once in a while some magnetic distortion shows up, at times obscuring the entire image. (Haven't seen that since the '90s.) There's a 20-minute patch where roughly a quarter of the screen is obscured by horizontal white visual noise. Also, as you can imagine, the sound is terrible.

This sums up how awful it is. The movie is offered in 16:9, but it's clear that they just chopped the bottom and top off of a 4:3 version, itself already cut down from the original. You only get about 56% of the original picture!

I would love to see a high-quality version of this film. Apparently there's a DVD released by Fantoma which is pretty good. The Netflix "Watch Instantly" version is one of the worst ports I've ever seen.
Logged

Every dead body that is not exterminated becomes one of them. It gets up and kills. The people it kills, get up and kill.
RCMerchant
Bela
B-Movie Kraken
*****

Karma: 0
Posts: 30435


"Charlie,we're in HELL!"-"yeah,ain't it groovy?!"


WWW
« Reply #1 on: May 27, 2011, 04:38:30 AM »

Wow-that IS awful! Not the movie itself-which is pretty good as far as sword and sandle stuff goes (plus Christopher Lee!)-the picture quality.
I bought a vhs copy of METROPOLIS some time back. The transfer looked like it came from a print as old as the film itself. It was totaly unwatchable. It was so murky-the whole thing looked like it was in a thick fog. I actually threw it in the garbage.
Logged

"Supernatural?...perhaps. Baloney?...Perhaps not!" Bela Lugosi-the BLACK CAT (1934)
Interviewer-"Does Dracula ever end for you?
Lugosi-"No. Dracula-never ends."

Slobber, Drool, Drip!
https://www.tumblr.com/ronmerchant
JaseSF
Super Space Age Freaky Geek
B-Movie Kraken
*****

Karma: 719
Posts: 13871


Soon, your brain will turn to jelly.


« Reply #2 on: May 28, 2011, 10:36:12 PM »

There's actually a nice DVD of this movie out there from Fantoma..
Logged

"This above all: To thine own self be true!"
Mike From BBandBCs
Dedicated Viewer
**

Karma: 5
Posts: 68



WWW
« Reply #3 on: May 30, 2011, 01:08:59 PM »

This looks simply awesome though I've never heard of it. I just added it to my netflix, thanks!
Logged

http://badassesboobsandbodycounts.com/ - Badasses, Boobs and Body Counts
Hammock Rider
Frightening Fanatic of Horrible Cinema
****

Karma: 255
Posts: 1916



« Reply #4 on: May 31, 2011, 08:09:24 AM »

I'm a sucker for peplums. This is one of my favorites. It's head and shoulders above most of them. Mario Bava and Christopher Lee in a Hercules movie? What's not to like?
Logged

Jumping Kings and Making Haste Ain't my Cup of Meat
Pages: [1]
Badmovies.org Forum  |  Movies  |  Good Movies  |  Hercules in the Haunted World (1961) « previous next »
    Jump to:  


    RSS Feed Subscribe Subscribe by RSS
    Email Subscribe Subscribe by Email


    Popular Articles
    How To Find A Bad Movie

    The Champions of Justice

    Plan 9 from Outer Space

    Manos, The Hands of Fate

    Podcast: Todd the Convenience Store Clerk

    Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill!

    Dragonball: The Magic Begins

    Cool As Ice

    The Educational Archives: Driver's Ed

    Godzilla vs. Monster Zero

    Do you have a zombie plan?

    FROM THE BADMOVIES.ORG ARCHIVES
    ImageThe Giant Claw - Slime drop

    Earth is visited by a GIANT ANTIMATTER SPACE BUZZARD! Gawk at the amazingly bad bird puppet, or chuckle over the silly dialog. This is one of the greatest b-movies ever made.

    Lesson Learned:
    • Osmosis: os·mo·sis (oz-mo'sis, os-) n., 1. When a bird eats something.

    Subscribe to Badmovies.org and get updates by email:

    HOME B-Movie Reviews Reader Reviews Forum Interviews TV Shows Advertising Information Sideshows Links Contact

    Badmovies.org is owned and operated by Andrew Borntreger. All original content is © 1998 - 2014 by its respective author(s). Image, video, and audio files are used in accordance with the Fair Use Law, and are property of the film copyright holders. You may freely link to any page (.html or .php) on this website, but reproduction in any other form must be authorized by the copyright holder.