Hot Picks

- Ready for My Close Up 2019

- Talk of the Dead 2016

- Script of the Dead 2024

- The Bell Affair 2023

- Easter Bloody Easter 2024

- Velma 2022

- Everwinter Night 2023

- Main Character Energy 2023

- Stupid Games 2024

- Bittertooth 2023

- 4 Minutes of Terror: Night Slasher 2024

- Apart 2024

- The Abandoned 2006

- Becky 2024

- The Evil Fairy Queen 2024

- The Black Guelph 2022

- Followers 2024

- Silence of the Prey 2024

- Battle for the Western Front 2024

- Beware the Boogeyman 2024

- Subject 101 2022

- Driftwood 2023

- The Legend of Lake Hollow 2024

- Black Mass 2023

- Skinwalkers: American Werewolves 2 2023

- The Manifestation 2024

- Spirit Riser 2024

- Garden of Souls 2019

- It's a Wonderful Slice 2024

- Caleb & Sarah 2024

- The Thousand Steps 2020

- The Desiring 2021

- When a Stranger Knocks 2024

- Quint-essentially Irish 2024

- Son of Gacy 2024

- Saltville 2024

- The True Story of the Christ's Return 2024

- Whenever I'm Alone with You 2023

- Jurassic Triangle 2024

- Midnight Peepshow 2022

- Offworld: Alien Planet 2024

- The Swiss Conspiracy 1976

- Sex-Positive 2024

- Here for Blood 2022

- All Over Again 2024

- The Color Yellow 2023

- Des Töchterleins Leid 2024

- I Am a Channel 2024

- The Hermits 2023

- Murdaritaville 2024

- Inheritance 2024

- The Devil's Partner 1960

- Pareidolia 2023

- First Impressions Can Kill 2017

- A Killer Conversation 2014

- Star Crash 1979

- Strangler of the Swamp 1946

Ercole al Centro della Terra

Hercules in the Haunted World
Hercules in the Center of the Earth / Vampire gegen Herakles

Italy 1961
produced by
Achille Piazzi for SPA Cinematografica
directed by Mario Bava
starring Reg Park, Christopher Lee, Leonora Ruffo, George Ardisson, Marisa Belli, Ida Galli, Franco Giacobini, Mino Doro, Rosalba Neri, Ely Drago, Gaia Germani, Raf Baldassarre, Elisabetta Pavan, Aldo Podinotti, Claudio Marzulli, Monica Neri, Grazia Collodi
written by Mario Bava, Sandro Continenza, Franco Prosperi, Duccio Tessari, music by Armando Trovajoli, cinematography by Mario Bava

Hercules, Theseus, Hercules (Reg Park), Hercules in Italy, Hercules in the 1950's/60's

review by
Mike Haberfelner

Quick Links

Abbott & Costello

The Addams Family

Alice in Wonderland

Arsène Lupin

Batman

Bigfoot

Black Emanuelle

Bomba the Jungle Boy

Bowery Boys

Bulldog Drummond

Captain America

Charlie Chan

Cinderella

Deerslayer

Dick Tracy

Dr. Mabuse

Dr. Orloff

Doctor Who

Dracula

Edgar Wallace made in Germany

Elizabeth Bathory

Emmanuelle

Fantomas

Flash Gordon

Frankenstein

Frankie & Annette Beach Party movies

Freddy Krueger

Fu Manchu

Fuzzy

Gamera

Godzilla

Hercules

El Hombre Lobo

Incredible Hulk

Jack the Ripper

James Bond

Jekyll and Hyde

Jerry Cotton

Jungle Jim

Justine

Kekko Kamen

King Kong

Laurel and Hardy

Lemmy Caution

Lobo

Lone Wolf and Cub

Lupin III

Maciste

Marx Brothers

Miss Marple

Mr. Moto

Mister Wong

Mothra

The Munsters

Nick Carter

OSS 117

Phantom of the Opera

Philip Marlowe

Philo Vance

Quatermass

Robin Hood

The Saint

Santa Claus

El Santo

Schoolgirl Report

The Shadow

Sherlock Holmes

Spider-Man

Star Trek

Sukeban Deka

Superman

Tarzan

Three Mesquiteers

Three Musketeers

Three Stooges

Three Supermen

Winnetou

Wizard of Oz

Wolf Man

Wonder Woman

Yojimbo

Zatoichi

Zorro

Available on DVD!

To buy, click on link(s) below and help keep this site afloat (commissions earned)

Always make sure of DVD-compatibility!!!


After years of absence, Hercules (Reg Park) returns to his fiancée Deianira (Leonora Ruffo), to find her in a state of trance he is unable to wake her from, while her benign uncle Lycos (Christopher Lee) has taken over the affairs of state she was invested with - thing is, uncle Lycos is not quite as benign as he seems to be (after all he's played by Christopher Lee - dead giveaway), and it was actually him who put her in her trance in the first place. Be that as it may, Hercules learns that to cure Ceianira's condition he has to travel to Hades, the underworld, the land of the dead, to retrieve a certain stone, and in order to leave Hades again, he has to first fetch the apple of the Hesperides ...

So before long, Hercules, his loyal sidekick Theseus (George Ardisson) and comic relief Telemachus (Franco Giacobini) travel to the land of the Hesperides, a land covered in permanent darkness terrorized by a stone monster and populated by a tribe of women, where Hercules tries his best to climb the local apple tree - but to no avail. Only eventually does Hercules come up with the idea to build a swing out of a stone and a rope and shoot down the apple from below - immediately the darkness leaves the land of the Hesperides and the female populace jumps with joy ... but by now, Hercules' friends are attacked by a stone monster, and Hercules can only just save them when he throwsthe monster against some rocks and shatters it.

Then its off to Hades for Hercules and Theseus, and while Hercules fights off all kinds of threats and retrieves the stone, Theseus ultimately loses his life falling into a pool of hot molten lava ... but does he really die ?

Nope, Persephone (Ida Galli), daughter of Pluto, saves him, nurses him back to health ... and falls in love with him. And ultimately, Theseus can persuade Persephone to follow him to the upper world - as a stowaway in Hercules' ship.

On their way back home, Hercules' ship has to face a storm, and it looks as if our heroes are done for - when Persephone tells Theseus to throw the apple of the Hesperides overboard ... and wouldn't you know it, the storm seizes and our heroes arrive home safely.

Soon enough, Hercules has healed Deianira from her condition, but by now Lycos has joined up with Pluto, who is furious because Hercules has taken away his daughter - even though Hercules was totally oblivious to that fact - and abducts Deianira to sacrifice her to Pluto in a Stonehenge-like stone circle that is guarded by the living dead, courtesy of Pluto.

Of course, Hercules soon takes up fighting the living dead and crushing them with the stones of the circle, he even defeats and kills Lycos, but to ultimately save the country, Persephone realizes she has to leave Theseus for good and return to her father, even if that breaks her and Theseus' heart ...

 

Director Mario Bava was without a doubt one of the most important and influential horror directors of his time, having created such classics as Black Sabbath, Black Sunday and Planet of the Vampires, to name but a few. Hercules in the Haunted World, a borderline horror film at best, however is not among Bava's best films, nor is it a classic of either the horror or the sword-and-sandal-genre (or peplum, if you may). Much rather, the film is a typical trashy entry into the Hercules-series of films that was immensely popular in the early 1960's that had little to do with the actual mythological Hercules (as you might have realized reading the film's synopsis).

That all said though, Hercules in the Haunted World is quite simply a wonderful film: the sets are a cheap but enjoyable mixture of ancient Greece and pop art, the colourful lighting effects are quite unique and inventive, and direction and camerawork give the film an unusual dark atmosphere - which all works surprisingly well together with the film's rather silly plot.

The result is a quite enjoyable film, but one you mustn't take seriously.

 

 

review © by Mike Haberfelner

 

Feeling lucky?
Want to
search
any of my partnershops yourself
for more, better results?
(commissions earned)

The links below
will take you
just there!!!

Find Hercules in the Haunted World
at the amazons ...

USA  amazon.com

Great Britain (a.k.a. the United Kingdom)  amazon.co.uk

Germany (East AND West)  amazon.de

Looking for imports?
Find Hercules in the Haunted World here ...

Thailand  eThaiCD.com
Your shop for all things Thai

Something naughty?
(Must be over 18 to go there!)

x-rated  find Hercules in the Haunted World at adultvideouniverse.com


Thanks for watching !!!

 

 

In times of uncertainty of a possible zombie outbreak, a woman has to decide between two men - only one of them's one of the undead.

 

There's No Such Thing as Zombies
starring
Luana Ribeira, Rudy Barrow and Rami Hilmi
special appearances by
Debra Lamb and Lynn Lowry

 

directed by
Eddie Bammeke

written by
Michael Haberfelner

produced by
Michael Haberfelner, Luana Ribeira and Eddie Bammeke

 

now streaming at

Amazon

Amazon UK

Vimeo

 

 

 

Robots and rats,
demons and potholes,
cuddly toys and
shopping mall Santas,
love and death and everything in between,
Tales to Chill
Your Bones to

is all of that.

 

Tales to Chill
Your Bones to
-
a collection of short stories and mini-plays
ranging from the horrific to the darkly humourous,
from the post-apocalyptic
to the weirdly romantic,
tales that will give you a chill and maybe a chuckle, all thought up by
the twisted mind of
screenwriter and film reviewer
Michael Haberfelner.

 

Tales to Chill
Your Bones to

the new anthology by
Michael Haberfelner

 

Out now from
Amazon!!!