Mole Men Vs. The Son of Hercules - 1961

Gotta hit up this genre for mindless entertainment sometimes, don't I?  This one has the English title above, but is also known as Maciste The Strongest Man in the World.  Maciste is not known in the US so they re-titled it as Son of Hercules.  Although in the movie he's called Maciste - although pronunciation sounds like "Majestus".  Who cares about all this shit?  Well, I gotta put some info into this thing, or it's pointless.

This Maciste entry pits him against the Mole Men and their evil queen:

There's also a character named Katan or something, and I just thinking of Chris Kattan.  There is a lot of bad pronunciation in this, let's just say that right off.  What else does this movie offer?  A horrid looking hairy ape thing that gets in a fight....  Another evil queen, another black sidekick to Maciste, just like in Thor and the Amazon Women....  In fact, it is the same writer director as Thor, Antonio Leonviola (gee, what a surprise).  I have to say that I do appreciate seeing a beefy and strong black guy as opposed to a wimpy sidekick black guy this time, a whole lot more equal feeling in this flick. Also, physically the black sidekick (Banjo, pronounced Banger) is bigger looking than Maciste.

Plot wise, Maciste's friends are held by the evil queen and she agrees to spare their lives if he passes some endurance test.  So, another series of big build-ups to some tests of strength.Where would we be without these movie standby's?  In test number one, Maciste has to hold a bunch of big iron bars.  No problem for ol' Mac, though he grunts and sweats a lot.  Finally winning that, things ponder on until the end of the film wherein Mac must turn a giant wheel (with Banjo nonetheless!) to put an end to a prison that is underground, in the home of the mole men.

Everything in this one was pretty good, I guess.  Decent sets, average pacing, and it didn't suck.  Better than Thor and the Amazon's in other words.  It's not my genre, but it is the definition of mindless fluff/fun, and if you're down, it's worthy.  2.5 middle of the road type deal.