HERCULES IN THE HAUNTED WORLD (Italy - 1961; US release 1964) Directed by Mario Bava. Written by Alessandro Continenza, Mario Bava, Duccio Tessari and Franco Prosperi. Cast: Reg Park, Christopher Lee, Leonora Ruffo, Giorgio Ardisson, Marisa Belli, Ida Galli, Franco Giacobini, Mino Doro, Ely Drago, Gaia Germani, Raf Baldassarre, Elisabetta Pavan, Aldo Pedinotti, Claudio Marzulli. (Unrated, 84 mins) The global success of 1958's HERCULES, an Italian production starring American bodybuilder and former Mr. Universe Steve Reeves, led to countless peplum films coming out of Italy over the next several years. Stanley Kubrick's epic 1960 blockbuster SPARTACUS also had a hand in this exploding subgenre's immense popularity, and before long, muscle-bound guys like Reeves, former Tarzan Gordon Scott, Mark Forest, Brad Harris, Gordon Mitchell, Mickey Hargitay, "Alan Steel" (Sergio Ciani), "Kirk Morris" (Adriano Bellini), Dan Vadis, Ed Fury, and "Rock Stevens" (American actor Peter Lupus, who would later act under his real name when he was on MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE) were headlining dozens upon dozens of these things, playing heroes like Hercules, Samson, Ursus, Goliath, and Maciste (Reeves even played the son of Spartacus in 1962's THE SLAVE), though by the time many of these ended up dubbed in English and headed straight to syndicated TV, the hero could be a completely different character. British bodybuilder and three-time Mr. Universe Reg Park (1928-2007) had a very short-lived movie career courtesy of the post-HERCULES muscleman craze, starring in five films over a four-year period, starting with 1961's HERCULES CONQUERS ATLANTIS, aka HERCULES AND THE CAPTIVE WOMEN.
Park made enough of an impression that he was immediately cast in another Hercules outing with the same year's HERCULES IN THE HAUNTED WORLD, directed by trailblazing Italian horror auteur Mario Bava, who served as the cinematographer on the initial HERCULES and was coming off his highly influential official directing debut with 1960's BLACK SUNDAY (Bava's mentor Riccardo Freda let him direct large chunks of 1957's I VAMPIRI and 1959's CALTIKI, THE IMMORTAL MONSTER, though only Freda was credited). One of the most innovative stylists and special effects craftsman of his day and a guy who could work phantasmagorical wonders on tight budgets using matte paintings and colorgasmically garish lighting techniques, Bava would seem to be the only choice for a horror peplum that sends Hercules into the bowels of Hell, and the end result is one of the subgenre's strongest entries. As explained in verbosely muddled detail by Medea (Gaia Germani), oracle, sorceress, and mythical Basil Exposition, Hercules, son of Zeus, must venture into the depths of Hades on a quest to recover the Stone of Forgetfulness in order to break a spell cast upon his true love Princess Dianara (Leonora Ruffo) by her uncle, the diabolical King Lico (Christopher Lee!), who is conspiring with the forces of darkness to rule Italia for all eternity and have Dianara for himself. Hercules is joined by his friend Theseus (Giorgio Ardisson) and a bumbling comic relief sidekick in Telemachus (Franco Giacobini) as the trio embark on a journey to retrieve the Stone, save Dianara's soul, and defeat the treacherous Lico.
Just out on Blu-ray from Kino Lorber in a stunning restoration with three different versions (distinctly unique US, UK, and Italian releases) because physical media is dead, HERCULES IN THE HAUNTED WORLD is as hokey as any other peplum of this sort (it's no surprise that some of them became prime MST3K fodder). But Bava's visual flair and the effectively-executed horror elements make memorable impressions, whether it's Theseus being tortured on a stretching rack by a stone creature lumbering around like an ancient Frankenstein monster, Hercules and Theseus encountering obstructive vines that "imprison the souls of the damned" and bleed and emit cacophonous shrieks of agony as the two heroes hack their way through them, or an enraged Lico resurrecting the dead and forcing Hercules to battle on onslaught of zombies. Lico is also described as a "vampire," an obvious nod to Lee's notoriety from 1958's HORROR OF DRACULA and undoubtedly just another brick in the wall in his decades-long resentment of being typecast in horror roles. This was one of several films Lee made in Italy during this period, most of them taking advantage of his Dracula connection, including the 1959 spoof UNCLE WAS A VAMPIRE and the 1963 Karnstein riff TERROR IN THE CRYPT. Lee's best film in his Italian sojourn was a reteaming with Bava on 1963's THE WHIP AND THE BODY, released in the US in 1965 as WHAT! The unfortunate downside of both of Lee's Bava films is that he didn't dub himself, and there's unquestionably something missing when an actor has a voice as distinctive as his. Nevertheless, Lee's presence--even though he's absent for a long stretch in the middle--is as vital a component in establishing HERCULES IN THE HAUNTED WORLD's horror bona fides as Bava's innovative directorial touches.
Reg Park and Christopher Lee
goofing off on the set
with Leonora Ruffo
The horror/peplum crossover worked, and inspired a few similar mash-ups, like Gordon Scott in 1961's GOLIATH AND THE VAMPIRES (Scott played Maciste, but became Goliath via dubbing), and Park battling werewolves in 1963's HERCULES, PRISONER OF EVIL (filmed as URSUS: IL TERRORE DEL KIRGHISI, but again, magically transformed into a Hercules movie through its English dub). The Italian peplum fad died down by 1965, when everyone moved on to spaghetti westerns and 007-inspired Eurospy knockoffs, and while some--Mitchell, Hargitay, Vadis, Lupus--shifted into journeyman actor mode, others called it a day and moved on. Reeves took a few years off and attempted a one-off non-peplum comeback with the 1968 spaghetti western A LONG RIDE FROM HELL before retiring from acting, while Park left the movie business altogether after starring in HERCULES THE AVENGER in 1965, the same year that he won his third and final Mr. Universe. He continued to be a staple in bodybuilding events well into his 40s, and at 42 and nearly two decades after winning his first Mr. Universe, he was the runner-up in the 1970 competition, with that year's title being the third straight for 23-year-old Austrian phenom Arnold Schwarzenegger, who has long cited Park as one of his heroes and inspirations. Park retired from bodybuilding by the mid-1970s, having already relocated with his South African-born wife to Johannesburg, where he opened a chain of successful gyms. He died in 2007 at 79 after a battle with metastatic melanoma.
A PISTOL FOR RINGO (Italy/Spain - 1965; US release 1966) Written and directed by Duccio Tessari. Cast: Montgomery Wood (Giuliano Gemma), Fernando Sancho, George Martin, Hally Hammond (Lorella De Luca), Nieves Navarro, Antonio Casas, Jose Manuel Martin, "Pajarito," Juan Casalilla, Pablito Alonso, Nazzareno Zamperla, Paco Sanz, Jose Halufi. (Unrated, 99 mins) Following the blockbuster success of Sergio Leone's A FISTFUL OF DOLLARS in Italy in 1964, countless spaghetti westerns followed at a relentless pace for the next decade. An early hit in the spaghetti cycle, 1965's A PISTOL FOR RINGO made it to American theaters courtesy of Embassy Pictures in 1966, a full year ahead of FISTFUL's belated US release. However, its influences lie more with the '50s style Hollywood B oater rather than the trailblazing work of Leone or Sergio Corbucci's DJANGO, right down to Ennio Morricone's uncharacteristically Dimitri Tiomkin/Elmer Bernstein-like score. Written and directed by Italian genre journeyman Duccio Tessari (who had already scripted several post-HERCULES peplum and would latter dabble in everything from 007 ripoffs to gialli to crime thrillers), A PISTOL FOR RINGO is part of that first wave of spaghetti westerns--along with Ferdinando Baldi's TEXAS, ADIOS and Sergio Corbucci two-fer of MINNESOTA CLAY and THE HELLBENDERS to name just three--that were still emulating the Hollywood style before Leone's more influential FOR A FEW DOLLARS MORE and THE GOOD, THE BAD AND THE UGLY set the genre template, along with the more politically-charged Zapata spaghettis like Corbucci's THE MERCENARY and COMPANEROS, and Damiano Damiani's A BULLET FOR THE GENERAL. Corbucci would soon shift gears--the same year he made THE HELLBENDERS, he also cranked out the classic DJANGO--and it wouldn't take long for Tessari to make the change with PISTOL's much different sequel THE RETURN OF RINGO later in 1965.
A PISTOL FOR RINGO is an entertaining time-killer at best, the kind of Saturday matinee-type western with a wisecracking hero in Ringo, aka "Angel Face," played by Giuliano Gemma under the pseudonym "Montgomery Wood." He's an outlaw with a heart of gold who guns down four men in self-defense and is promptly thrown in jail by the sheriff (George Martin). At the same time, a band of outlaws led by Sancho (Fernando Sancho in his usual "Frito Bandito" persona that he embodied in seemingly dozens of these things) have robbed a bank and commandeered the outskirts-of-town home of wealthy landowner Major Clyde (Antonio Casas). They're holding his family hostage in exchange for the sheriff--who's engaged to Clyde's daughter Miss Ruby (Lorella De Luca, who would marry Tessari a few years later)--backing off and letting them go. Instead, the sheriff offers Ringo a get out of jail free card: pretend to be an outlaw just passing through and seeking refuge, and ingratiate himself into Sancho's gang, eliminate them all, save Miss Ruby and the hostages, and collect the reward money. Despite its vaguely DESPERATE HOURS scenario, A PISTOL FOR RINGO never takes itself too seriously. Gemma (dubbed by Marc Smith, who would later infamously revoice Franco Nero in ENTER THE NINJA) is loose and likable, but compared to where the genre would go under the leadership of Leone and Corbucci, Tessari displays all the technique, style, and pizazz of a random episode of GUNSMOKE or RAWHIDE. There is one underexplored subplot with Clyde almost being Stockholm Syndrome'd by falling for Sancho's woman (Nieves Navarro, the wife or producer Luciano Ercoli and frequently credited later as "Susan Scott"), and it's got a great theme song performed by Maurizio Graf, but it's so beholden to Hollywood westerns that it even borrows SHANE's ending with Ringo riding off alone. A PISTOL FOR RINGO was a huge hit in Italy in the summer of 1965, and by the end of the year, Tessari and most of the main cast would be back for THE RETURN OF RINGO.
Fernando Sancho as--wait for it---Sancho in A PISTOL FOR RINGO.
THE RETURN OF RINGO (Italy/Spain - 1965; US release 1966)
Directed by Duccio Tessari. Written by Duccio Tessari and Fernando Di Leo. Cast: Giuliano Gemma, Fernando Sancho, George Martin, Hally Hammond (Lorella De Luca), Nieves Navarro, Antonio Casas, "Pajarito," Monica Sugranes, Victor Bayo, Tunet Vila, Juan Torres, Jose Halufi. (Unrated, 97 mins) It's obvious that at some point between finishing A PISTOL FOR RINGO and starting the sequel THE RETURN OF RINGO, director/co-writer Duccio Tessari and writer Fernando Di Leo (an uncredited script contributor on PISTOL) saw A FISTFUL OF DOLLARS. RETURN is an in-name-only sequel, bringing back much of the same cast (producer Luciano Ercoli even makes sure his wife Nieves Navarro gets a musical number) in different roles with Giuliano Gemma playing a character named Ringo, but clearly not the same Ringo from the previous film, much like Clint Eastwood's archetypal "Man with No Name" is similar in each installment of the Leone trilogy, but they aren't the same character. Here, Gemma's Ringo is a Union soldier returning to his home near the Mexican border two months after the end of the Civil War. He's devastated to find his entire family buried in the local cemetery after the town was taken over by a group of Mexican outlaws led by the evil Fuentes brothers, Esteban (Fernando Sancho, cast radically against type as "Fernando Sancho") and Paco (George Martin, who was the good-guy sheriff in the previous film). When Ringo learns that his wife Hally (Lorella De Luca) has been abducted, informed she's a widow, and is being forced into an arranged marriage with Paco and the useless sheriff (Antonio Casas) has no plans to do anything about it, he goes undercover as a Mexican peasant to wipe out the Fuentes gang and rescue his wife and the young daughter he never knew he had.
A loose spaghetti western reworking of The Odyssey, THE RETURN OF RINGO is a huge improvement over the OK but unremarkable A PISTOL FOR RINGO. It's significantly more atmospheric with its bleak, dusty Almeria desert landscapes, and this incarnation of Ringo is much more serious and driven, with a wife and daughter to save and vengeance to exact as opposed to the blithe and carefree Ringo from the first time around, whose only concern was reward money. It's a grimmer, darker, and more violent film, with Ringo introduced blowing a guy away in a saloon and blood splattering against the wall behind him. Tessari directs RETURN in a more Leone-like fashion, with some tense action sequences, one incredible shot of a silhouetted Ringo (in a great resurrection motif) revealing his true self to the Fuentes gang just before ruthlessly massacring the lot of them, and with music by Ennio Morricone that's still a bit Hollywood (again with a bombastically overemphatic Maurizio Graf theme song) but leaning more toward the distinctive sounds of a spaghetti score. Despite the American success of A PISTOL FOR RINGO, THE RETURN OF RINGO only received a spotty release later in 1966, though the first film was popular enough in the States for MGM to rechristen Sergio Corbucci's 1966 western JOHNNY ORO (starring Mark Damon) as the unofficial sequel RINGO AND HIS GOLDEN PISTOL for its 1967 US release. A PISTOL FOR RINGO and THE RETURN OF RINGO have just been released in a double feature set from Arrow, with numerous extras, including archival interviews with Gemma (who died in 2013) and De Luca (who passed in 2014), who talks at length about the career of her late husband Tessari (1926-1994), and commentary tracks with spaghetti scholar Henry C. Parke and fan/cult screenwriter C. Courtney Joyner (CLASS OF 1999, DOCTOR MORDRID). When viewed in succession, both films serve to show the transition taking place in the spaghetti western genre in its infancy, from the mimicking of old-school Hollywood to the new standards being set by the Italians in the formation of their uniquely original style that would soon be influencing American westerns in just a few short years.
