Mole Men Against the Son of Hercules (1961)

Mole Men vs. the Son of Hercules

Cast:

Mark Forest is Hercules
Moira Orfei is Queen Halis Mosab
Paul Wynter is Bangor
Raffaella Carrą is Princess Saliurą
Enrico Glori is Kahab

What the box says:

While travelling across the land, our hero Maciste finds the survivors of an attack by some strange warriors. The murderous attackers were all albinos that Macists tracks to a hidden underground city. Looking to avenge the victims of the attacks, Maciste heads into the city under the surface to battle these strange underground dwellers.

Plot:

On a beach, Macistse pulls in whale when a guy runs to the beach.

The Mythbusters were right, I can't pull 2 interleaved phonebooks apart without a tank...
He's attacked by Mole Men. Maciste rushes them with his harpoon. The sun rises and paralyzes the Mole Men. The dying man pleads for Maciste to save his village and his captured son, Lof. Maciste heads to the village and finds the hidden princess Salur. She tells how the Mole Men attacked and captured the villagers.

Maciste heads off to trail the Mole Men and find them trying to sacrifce Bangor, a foreigner. Afterwards, Bangor swears his sacred life oath to obey Maciste.

I bring you oatmeal from Wilford Brimley.
The two head to find the Mole Men and discover a Mole Men listening post. That night, the Mole Men trap Maciste and Bangor and take them underground to the captured villagers.

Hei Lei Mo Yob, the Mole Men's Queen wants to sacrifice Salur. The Mole Men use the villagers for the grinding wheel to mine gold and jewels for the Queen. The good Queen has decided it is time for a contest.

She's decided that Maciste may be good enough to rule with her if he can defeat Bangor. The winner gets to defend Salur from some kind of beast man. Let the competitions begin. The first guy is quickly killed by the beast man. Now it's time for the big contest. Maciste versus Bangor who gets knocked out. While Maciste is defending Salur from the beast man.

Say 'Uncle', come on say 'Uncle'..."
Tulac, one of the queens chabermaids, frees the princess. Maciste grabs Salur and rides off when he hears the Queen demand that he sacrifice Salur himself. Riding away as the son rises drives the Mole Men from chasing them.

Maciste hides Salur at a sacred waterfall temple.

The Mole Man high priest is scheming to get his son, Katan, married to the Queen. He reveals that the Queen was actually a surface-dweller who was raised to think that she a Mole woman. However, the good son was injured by Maciste earlier and talked out of fighting the beast man but chased after the escaping Maciste and manages to capture him.

The Queen wants to see how strong Maciste is. She has him lift stones over Bangor and Lof. Eventually, she decides to call the strength test off before the men are crushed to death.

Later, the Queen tries to talk Maciste into marrying her again.

I'm sorry but have to card all wearing loinclothes.
He refuses. The Queen admits how she hates the darkness and wants to see the sun. Can anyone say foreshadowing? The high priest overhears the Queen and plots to eliminate her. The sacred lions rush at the Queen and Maciste who is able to save them. This impresses the Queen to where she frees Maciste and allows him into the royal aprtments.

The high priest and Katan plan to eliminate Maciste now. They're able to knock him out and hide him. Later, they tell the queen instead that Maciste ran off to be with Salur.

What a wild Frat party wth any guy wearing buffalo horns.
She decides to torture Bangor to force him to reveal where Salur is. He does, and the Queen rides off to get the woman that done her wrong.

Maciste tries to wreck the grinding wheel. The enslaved villagers start rebelling. Viva La Revolucion...

The Mole Men try to trap the slaves from escaping while Maciste gets a plan.

The Queen is searching for Salur. Katan reveals that he was ordered to but can't kill her. He does reveal that she is a surface dweller.

Maciste and the rest start tochain a pillar to the grinding wheel to pull the pillar apart. Deus Ex Machina... The peolpe escape.

The Queen watches the waterfall and a rainbow, she falls off the side of the cliff to her death. Salur and Lof, Bangor and Tulac thank Maciste as he rides off.

What I say:

A number of movie genres have appeared out of nowhere which lead to a number movies in that genre. In the late 1970s, George Romero's movie Dawn of the Dead inspired the Italian zombie movies. The early 1970s saw the rise ofthe gritty tough cop movies. However, those weren't the first genres like that. How does this have to do with Greek mythology? The late 1950s saw Hercules become a surprise hit. It started the Italian sword and sandal movie craze for the early 1960s. Yes, this was what created the peplum (a version of the Greek word for "tunic") movie craze.

The several I've seen all have named the protagonist as Hercules or a relative of Hercules be it son, nephew, 3rd cousin twice removed... With Greek mythology, one can pretty much use any character however they want wih them being in public domain and no copyright to endure. Hercules and the Masked Rider, Hercules and the Tyrants of Babylon, Jason and the Argonauts, Clash of the Titans.

With the second worst dubbing to Japanese monster movie, the Italian peplum has to be in good running. It's possible that the original dub may not quite have sounded as bad. Almost every character mentions Maciste as son of Hercules. or has his son when dubbed in English when released over to the US..

The grinding wheel does seem to have inspired the wheel in Conan the Barbarian. This may be one of the times that something from an Italian peplum movie was used in a bigger budget movie that in turn inspired the 1980s Italian barbarian and sword sub-genre.

In fact, Maciste was a strong guy going around having adventures think of him sort of like how an Old West gunfighter is made of into a Western. Maciste isn't exactly a brilliant tactician or strategist. Finding the Mole Men listening post, he lets himself get captured so he can be taken to the enslaved villagers because he wouldn't be able to find them any other way.

Thankfully, Mole Men Against the Son of Hercules has plenty of action rather than the typical low-budget "in-action" vibe. Get a beast monster along with plenty of disposable Mole Men goons. For the Mole Men apparently being fatal to sunlight, the nights seem awfully bright. Can't think of any movie where nights were so bright. I've ran across plenty where the days were absolutely pitch black.

Quotable Dialogue
"Such a man can never be killed."
"I beg you not the sunlight!"
"Did you really think that I would sit beside you on a blood-drenched throne?"
"Don't forget that Hei-Lei MoYob."
Morals of the Story
Beaching a whale is heroic if you pull the whale ashore by yourself.
Throwing mutliple spears will hit multiple targets.
Horses are easy to trip.
Moles are tasty.