Siren of Atlantis (1949)

Beautiful, moving film.

It is not deep, but it is fun to watch. It does have a bit more of an edge to it than other similar films.

Although I seem to have had higher expectations than I thought, the movie is super entertaining.

By the time the dramatic fireworks start popping off, each one feels earned.

It's a shame that Universal never used Maria Montez as a female monster, a la a new Dracula's Daughter, or an ancient Egyptian princess made the walking dead in one of their later "Mummy" movies. She could be so deliciously evil when called to do so, and horror movie women were scream queens rather than the perpetrators of fear. But she did spread her share of fear, whether it was the mysterious Marie Roget or the jewel hunting cobra woman. In this action/adventure, made after her Universal days had come to an end, she's both conniving and sultry, playing another queen of questionable personality.This is late 40's escapism at its strangest, a hidden oasis in the middle of the desert, melodramatic and silly, but not without mystery to make it intriguing. Jean Pierre Aumont is the handsome victim of her latest games, pairing him as a rival to Dennis O'Keefe whom he gets into a supposed fight to the death with for her favors. Henry Danielle is over the top as one of Montez's old conquests, giving a sense of "She" into the plot. A scene with a doomed slave girl is haunting at one second then shocking, then laughable with the way that plot development is tied up. It's obvious that Montez had a career simply because of her exotic looks. She's certainly not a great actress by any means, bellowing many of her lines and coming off as rather cold in spite of her attempts to seem alluring. In fact, everybody seems to be overacting here, and as handsome as it looks, it sort of feels like a serial that might come to a cliffhanger at any moment. But there are some truly eye rolling moments, a few unintentional laughs, and the feeling that the writers secretly had their tongue in their cheek when they handed it over to the director to begin shooting.

Its a somewhat interesting curiosity, strictly for fans of the actors. I assume that 90% of people these days will watch it because of Montez, and they will probably be a bit confused and disappointed; "Cobra Woman" this is not! Its very much kind of a version of "She" in the Sahara, with the odd low-budget feel of an old B&W Saturday Matinée serial; but this is very adult and not for the kiddies! Its intellectual and philosophical in some ways, and the Queen plays games of chess with her victims. Unfortunately for all sorts of reasons it ends up being a disjointed mess. My feeling was that its most fatal flaw among many is that it has several excellent actors struggling to give serious performances against the odds, and needs Montez to come up to their level; unfortunately she was absolutely not up to this task.

The setting of this film suggests that it will be similar to the escapist fare which Montez starred in at Universal. She plays the man-hungry Queen Antinea of Atlantis, which is located inside a mountain in the Sahara Desert, into which two officers of the French Foreign Legion stumble. Within this setting, however, the story played out is not an action adventure, but psychological melodrama, involving a femme fatale, obsession, deception, jealousy, murder, guilt, repentance, and fatalism.There are many noirish resonances: the monochrome photography of the claustrophobic torchlit chambers of the underground kingdom, the obsession of St. Avit (Jean-Pierre Aumont, Montez' real life husband) for the queen, the amoral cynicism of the court librarian Blades (Henry Daniell), and the alienation of all the characters. The nearest thing to normality is the Legion outpost. The film ends with a strong suggestion that nothing has been resolved and that the same sequence of events is about to be replayed.This was Tallas' first film as director. He had previously been an editor, and indeed edited this film as well as directing, but the film's producer, Seymour Nebenzal, probably had more influence over the mood of the piece. Two years earlier he had produced "The Chase" (which also ended with the suggestion that it was all about to start again), and three years later produced "M" - clearly a man with a taste for the noir. The two uncredited directors also have noir credentials. Arthur Ripley had directed "The Chase" for Nebenzal, and John Brahm had directed "The Locket."The film suffers from somewhat disjointed narrative flow in parts, although this may be due to damage to the surviving copies. Whatever its faults, it is better than many reviews suggest, and is surely the weirdest amalgam of exotic "eastern" and film noir that you will ever meet.

This film is a combination of a subtle adventure and love, mystery and revenge and abandonment in the unforgiving Sahara desert.The mystery queen Antinea, of the lost Atlantis, has a penchant for embalming her lovers and using them as ornamental statues in her gallery, until finally, she met a lover who could resist her charms. It is a real pity that this movie is not available on VHS or DVD.