Atlas (1961)

One of my all time favorites.

As somebody who had not heard any of this before, it became a curious phenomenon to sit and watch a film and slowly have the realities begin to click into place.

It’s sentimental, ridiculously long and only occasionally funny

A clunky actioner with a handful of cool moments.

As much as I am a fan of Michael Forest from Star Trek, The Outer Limits,to name a few - this movie is an absolute farce. Frank Wolf who up to this point is really a 3rd rate actor, is the lead bad guy in this movie that plays out like a high school play with just a handful of extras. 1st blunder is when they announce that the wrestling match will begin when the trumpets blow. The trouble is that the horns are never heard. The Wardrobe Designer must have been on break with Barbara Morris wearing shorts that look like she should be on the set of Beach Blanket Bingo and not a Greek sword and sandal movie. The story line is very poor and really makes no sense. Soupy Sales could have played the lead baddie with the same results.

Sometimes you see a movie and wonder if it was made just so the crew could enjoy a six-week vacation in a nice place. Unspoiled Greece in 1961 was probably a very pleasant locale indeed for Roger Corman and friends to take such a vacation.The story is a familiar one: Buff, good-hearted but naive hero is tricked by a more worldly man into using his great strength for his benefit until the hero wises up. This is a plot used in the great sagas of Hercules, Sigfred, and Tom Cruise. Here the trusting hero, Atlas, is invited by a city-state tyrant, Praximedes, to be his champion in a fight to the death so that Praximedes can annex some defiant holdout city.The problem with all of this is: the movie is boring. Very boring. The fight scenes lack drama; the battle scenes look like extras throwing sticks that are supposed to be spears at each other. Michael Forest as Atlas can't act - period. Barboura Morris is the sex interest of changeable loyalties; she isn't bad looking, but she doesn't take off near enough clothes. --Oh, don't tell me it was 1961. "Spartacus" was made a year before, and that had a bathing scene. Plus a reference to homosexuality. "Atlas" was never meant to be a big-budget epic. So no excuses, Roger. This kind of movie, you have to sex up if you don't do anything else.Frank Wolff's Praximedes seems to be having a good time; but rather than coming across as a figurative tyrant (he makes no secret that he is a -literal- tyrant), he seems more like a glad-handing jerk, and a distinctly American one at that.I hope the crew enjoyed their vacation. The rest of us, if we want a Greek vacation, should catch "Summer Lovers" or "Venus on Fire".

... that is, if you dig flicks that involve men wearing really high cut "togas" that look more like skirts. The battle scenes are absolutely laughable, with lots of shots of shields being hit by things (occasionally the wooden swords), and lots of guys who throw spears really poorly at their crew-cut Greek rivals. The charges just sort of slow in front of enemy lines, once even to turn around and change a formation four feet from the "battle line." Some of the editing looks like it may have been done by a deranged chimp, and that's just for the important dialogue scenes. There are a few shots where the camera literally gets knocked out of place. A final word of warning: the director took full advantage of shot width, so if you are unfortunate enough to watch this on tv, several scenes will have half of the speakers cut off at the edge of the screen. If you need something to MST3K, come and get it!

Trust Roger Corman to go all the way to Greece, shoot in widescreen against a backdrop of real ancient monuments, and STILL end up producing the cheapest looking sword and sandal 'epic' of them all. If you squint hard enough the battle scenes might start to look vaguely impressive. Only Frank Wolff's ripe performance as the evil Praximedes provides much entertainment.