Evento

THE AMAZONS

(Le guerriere dal seno nudo)
Dir. Terrence Young, 1973
Italy, 102 min.
In (dubbed) English

"All men are repulsive in mind and body! Their hands are coarse and rapacious!"

It's hardly a shock to discover the seventies awash in films ostensibly about Amazon tribes as pretext for contemporary thoughts on the battle of the sexes. In that not-always-proud tradition director Terrence Young (WAIT UNTIL DARK, DR. NO, THUNDERBALL) and writer Robert Graves (most relevantly I CLAUDIUS, also the amazing THE SHOUT) walk the fine line between bold peplum extravagance and winking smirks with THE AMAZONS, a film known in Italy as Le guerriere dal seno nudo, or The Warriors With The Naked Breasts.

We begin with the tribe performing feats of strength to decide who will be the next Queen (the price of admission? A man's head!) .The challenge is decided when Antiope (Alena Johnston in one of her few roles) defeats rival Oreitheia (Sabine Sun of WHAT'S NEW PUSSYCAT, MR. FREEDOM and THE BITCH WANTS BLOOD) and becomes queen, capped with a speech about the absolute inferiority of the failed male race that'd make a great trailer all by itself. Unfortunately for the new queen, the yearly Procreation Celebration (which is to say the only time the women come into contact with men that doesn't lead to a pile of headless bodies) is coming up, and between discovering that even a Queen can have strange unseemly desires and Oreitheia's plans for a coup things get complicated in a hurry.

Midnighters will take special note of two names: the astonishing Helga Line (from Spec faves CHINA 9 LIBERTY 37, HORROR EXPRESS and HORROR RISES FROM THE TOMB) and Eurohorror royalty Rita Calderoni among the Amazons. There's a Riz Ortolani score, which is almost always a thing to celebrate, but to be honest there's a constant level of goofery that feels more like incidental music from Green Acres than anything approaching the dramatic. That said, with an obviously lavish budget, some fantastic stunt/fight scenes, multiple nude fights to the death and whiplash changes in tone, it's a film that shows a whole different side to the sword and sandal school. ARE YOU NOT ENTERTAINED?