Clash Of The Titans (2010)

The 1980's original of Clash Of The Titans may not have been one of the strongest of Ray Harryhausen's stop-motion sword-and-sandal epics, but at least it had charm and excitement going for it.

And the definitive depiction of Medusa!

The 2010 remake is sadly lacking in all of those areas, with the reworked storyline transforming a classic hero's journey into a collection of random happenstance with no overriding logic.

Sticking to the same basic plot - Perseus has to kill the Medusa and use her head to petrify the unstoppable kraken before it eats the princess and trashes the city - this version manages to hit a few key beats (e.g. the Pegasus, the Stygian witches and Medusa), but then throws out so much from the original that worked well (Calibos, for instance, is reduced to just another monster to be slain).

Even ignoring the blatant jibe at the original - when Perseus is told to discard Bubo the clockwork owl - Clash Of The Titans tries too hard to "be different" and ends up being drab and unengaging.

As Perseus, Sam Worthington again demonstrates the total lack of charisma he showed in Avatar and while much of the CGI is quite impressive for its time, there seems little attempt at maintaining an Ancient Greek verisimilitude (who, for instance, were the strange rock creatures riding the giant scorpions and why did one join Perseus' group for no apparent reason?).

With the filmmakers almost total disregard - bordering on contempt - for the source material, it would have only taken a bit of a nudge further and this could easily have become just another Lord Of The Rings-aping fantasy film, devoid of any Ancient Grecian trappings.

Azumi 2 - Death Or Love (2005)

Picking up from where the original left off, Azumi 2: Death Or Love sees the cute, young assassin and her one surviving colleague, Nagara (Yuma Ishigaki), heading off to slay the final warlord, the last of the troublesome triumvirate, whose death they believe will bring peace to Japan.

Soon, Azumi (Aya Ueto) and Nagara fall in with a Robin Hood-style bandit, Ginkaku (Shun Oguri), who happens to be the spitting image of Nachi, the beloved friend that Azumi was ordered to kill as the final part of her training (this is because Nachi and Ginkaku are played by the same actor).

Also joining their little gang is a zealous neophyte ninja, Kozue, played by the instantly recognisable Chiaki Kuriyama (from the awesome double bill of Kill Bill Volume 1 and Battle Royale).

Azumi's final mission proves to be her toughest as the last warlord, Masayuki Sanada (Toshiya Nagasawa) has gotten into bed - literally - with the head of a ruthless, and warmongering, ninja clan, a superhumanly fast harridan called Kunyo (Reiko Takahashi).

On one level Azumi 2 is more of the same as Azumi, although the blood-letting is considerably more restrained in this second film, but it still delivers a smart plot looking at honour, friendship, blind obedience, betrayal and the lengths some people will go to to see their mission fulfilled.

As before there are numerous glorious set-pieces, beautifully choreographed and shot, with the "poison spider web" in the bamboo forest being the most inventive.

While Chiaki's performance is, as usual, both memorable and menacing, the film - as with the first one - belongs to Aya Ueto, whose Azumi is one tough cookie who could give Buffy a run for her money any day. 

However, the two volumes of Azumi films share certain characteristics with the structure of Quentin Tarantino's two Kill Bill films; both have their largest and most gruesome fights at the climax of the first volume and their heroines have to carve their way through a number of sub-bosses before facing off against the final Big Bad at the end of volume two.

This final confrontation stands out not so much for the actual conflict but for the position Azumi is put in by her own side, when Sanada suggests he would be willing to withdraw his troops from the impending war if Azumi is left to face him in single combat.

Azumi 2: Death Or Love doesn't quite touch the giddy heights of the first movie, but is still a more satisfying conclusion to the tale than Kill Bill Volume 2 was to Kill Bill Volume 1.

Azumi (2003)

While I enjoy anime as much as the next geek, nothing can beat the sheer visceral thrill of live-action comic book adaptations.

Serialised in comic form since 1994, Azumi is the ultra-violent tale of a teenage girl raised, with nine young boys, in a hidden mountain retreat to form an elite cadre of assassins to restore peace to Japan by killing off warlords who make trouble.

The two-hour movie starts slowly, and at first I wasn't sure where it was going. Then once the 10 assassins were exposed to their "final test" before heading into the outside world to complete their mission, I began to appreciate what a brutally clever film this was going to be.

Obviously it helps that Azumi herself (Aya Ueto) is very easy on the eye and let's be honest to most geeks there are few things hotter - besides our significant others - than an Asian lady with a katana!

And, yes, there is a lot of blood - more than a Victorian slaughterhouse - although few actual graphic wounds (one severed arm and a couple of decapitations that I can recall) but the swordplay and creativity of the stunts distracts from the red stuff anyway.

Azumi and her cohorts are tasked with killing three particular warlords, but to get to their targets they have to carve their way through hordes of samurai, ninjas and bandits in a variety of inventive settings and, often, massively outnumbered.

Mix this in with some incredible characters - the stand-out being the effeminate psychopath Bijomaru Mogami (Jô Odagiri) - and a thought-provoking plot and Azumi surprised me by quickly rising to classic status.

Tackling honour, friendship and the cycle of violence, the film certainly doesn't preach, instead choosing to serve up its lessons with a heavy dose of tomato ketchup through its morally ambiguous protagonist constantly questioning the veracity of her mission, but finding her heritage impossible to ignore.

For those who love their chanbara, I cannot recommend Azumi highly enough.

Ape vs Mecha Ape (2023)

After the surprisingly enjoyable nonsense of Ape vs Monster, I'm delighted that The Asylum decided to return to that particular well with an even wilder sequel, Ape vs Mecha Ape.

Nearly two years after the events of the original movie, the American government has been working on a Mecha Ape program (for reasons).

The film opens with the Pentagon taking its giant robot for a test drive in the Eastern European country of Vololodrezjk (aka The Great Sovereignty), where it flattened an illicit chemical weapons factory (along with all the troops guarding it).

Understandably miffed by this, a rogue cadre of elite Vololodrezjkan Foreign Intelligence Division operatives - husband and wife Arnott (Xander Bailey) and Pavla Oalk (Iris Svis), along with hacker Blanka (Lindsey Marie Wilson), Florien (Sady Diallo), and Zara (Eugenia Kuzmina) - head to the States, with the aim of hijacking the Mecha Ape so it will steal a nuclear warhead and detonate it in Chicago.

Meanwhile, our old friend Abraham, the 45-foot tall giant ape with alien DNA in his blood, is about to be moved from his secure location, much to the concern of his main handler, Sloane (Asylum regular Anna Telfer), who has developed a canny method for communicating with the oversized primate using different coloured lights.

However, once Mecha Ape starts his out-of-control rampage (and Sloane ends up trapped inside him!), the American government decides the only course of action is to release Abraham... so he can destroy the Mecha Ape before it has a chance to set off the 1.2 megaton nuclear bomb.

Even though none of the human stars of the original movie return for this sequel, Ape vs Mecha Ape crashes ahead with such gusto that you soon forget about that and are drawn into the unfolding chaos.

The script from writer/director Marc Gottlieb (another familiar name from Asylum credits) does a great job of foreshadowing useful plot twists and - as with the original - distracting from the fact that the two giant creatures don't actually appear onscreen as much as perhaps we would have hoped (although there are plenty of shots of people looking up or reacting to sounds from off-screen).

Obfuscation of plot holes and budgetary deficiencies is handled with deft dollops of technobabble again and extended scenes of people doing anything but interacting directly with the giant ape or towering robot.

However, it's the climactic fight in the streets of Chicago between Abraham and Mecha Ape that we paid the £7 cost of the DVD for and that delivers, once it arrives. Sure, it doesn't last long but the kaiju-scale property damage is still impressive.

I realise the financial limits of an Asylum budget mean the CGI content has to be carefully shepherded but why don't they take a leaf out of the classic Toho playbook and put some stunt people in rubber suits and have them crash around on a model city?

While I don't think Abraham has quite the cachet of a Sharknado just yet, I really hope The Asylum continues this entertainingly silly franchise (although some returning human characters would be a nice, and useful, touch for continuity).

And I want to know more about the Vololodrezjkans! From just the titbits we heard about it here, I reckon that fictional country is prime real estate for a whole cavalcade of Asylum movies.

Ape vs. Monster (2021)

A long-thought lost joint Russian and American space probe crashes back to Earth after 30 years, releasing its simian test pilot, Abraham, into the New Mexico desert.

The chimpanzee, and his craft, are coated with a green, alien goo that causes him to grow at an incredible rate... and unfortunately a passing gila monster lizard sups from the liquid and transforms into a kaiju beast of its own.

Abraham is captured by the American authorities, led by Dr Linda Murphy (Arianna Scott), who has a childhood connection with the ape through the controversial work of her scientist father, Noah Murphy (Rudy Bentz).

Assisted by an old Russian friend, Eva Kuleshov (Katie Sereika), with whom there is obvious sexual tension and an unspoken past, Linda tries to study Abraham while tracking the escaped gila monster, which is tunnelling underground and has some kind of power-dampening field.

Abraham escapes while Linda is away, and it becomes a race against time as both giant creatures appear to be converging on Washington D.C. 

The military, under the gung-ho and patronising General Delaney (R.J. Wagner) wants to blast both creatures off the face of the planet, but Linda believes that Abraham is still the ape she knew as a child and is really on the side of humanity.

Oh, and there's an alien ship coming round the dark side of the Moon that seems to be beaming some kind of mind control ray at the giant monsters.

Just another day at the office.

Originally crafted by the crew at The Asylum as a Godzilla vs Kong mockbuster, Ape vs Monster is an unsurprisingly awful - yet hilarious - flick that just manages to scrape into the "so bad it's good" category, as long as you're willing to cut it a lot of slack.

If you watch the film closely enough, you realise how little the two giant CGI beasties actually appear on screen, but also you gain an appreciation of The Asylum's masterful melding of stock footage with their own material to fill out the 88-minute flick.

It should also be noted that while the giant ape certainly resembles an oversized chimpanzee more than a direct rip-off of King Kong, the mutated gila monster bears more than a passing resemblance to Godzilla.

Dramatic action scenes are broken up by protracted, earnest, exchanges of waffle and technobabble in an attempt to stitch together a nonsensical story into something an easy-going (possibly drunk) audience might be willing to swallow.

And while it starts off far-fetched, the plot of Ape vs Monster rapidly goes so far off the rails that credibility is stretched beyond breaking point and the moment they start talking about "aliens" you can't help but wonder if you're somehow watching an entirely different movie.

However, I certainly don't regret the £2.35 I spent on Amazon to buy the DVD of this movie, and I can't wait to see what Abraham gets up to next.

Thor - God of Thunder (2022)

Over here in the UK, the rebranded SyFy Channel - now the much more palatable Sky Sci-Fi - christened its late night Asylum Movie Slot in 2022 with the latest from the mockbuster factory: Thor - God of Thunder.

Like the majority of The Asylum's output it's not great, but I've seen far worse and, as I've come to expect with this particular genre of film, it has some interesting Asylum-style twists on established mythology and fables.

Thor: God of Thunder opens with some deceptively decent CGI of an aerial Asgard, clearly "inspired" by the version we know from the Marvel movies, but as soon as it cuts to inside we're back on more familiar Asylum turf, resplendent as it is with amdram levels of set decoration and acting.

Loki (Daniel O'Reilly) escapes imprisonment, stabs Odin (Vernon G. Wells), steals some trinkets and flees to Earth, with the aim of freeing the giant wolf-god Fenrir.

Sadly, in hi-def, Loki's staff - clearly made of cardboard and gold-painted gaffer tape - looks rather cheap and nasty.

The god, who may be Thor's brother or uncle, wants Fenrir to destroy Yggdrasil - The Tree of the Nine Realms - so he can plant a new one and shape the universe to his own designs.

Summoned by his dying father, the titular god of thunder, Thor (Myrom Kingery), follows Loki to Earth and arrives at an archaeological excavation in California.

Grace Choi (Vaune Suitt), the site manager, had believed they were excavating an Indigenous Native American grave, but - just moments before the pair of Norse gods show up - she begins to suspect that the cave system is something more, possibly a prison for Fenrir.

The wolf-god is freed and it's now up to Thor and a handful of humans to stop Loki's schemes before the Earth shakes itself to pieces and a new world is born in the image of the trickster god.

On one - very large - hand, Steve Doucette's script, under Noah Luke's direction, is riddled with weak dialogue and plot holes, but on the other the impressive thing about Asylum films is there is usually no unnecessary padding and they don’t tend to hang around.

Thor: God of Thunder makes great use of its 87-minute run time, with enough momentum and action that - unless you're deliberately hate-watching this - will buoy you along with a wry smile on your face.

Sure, some of the CGI is naff and a lot of the acting is overacting; for instance, Vernon G. Wells (possibly best known as Wez from 1981's Mad Max II: The Road Warrior) has clearly been taking lessons from the William Shatner School of Acting, cranking up the mid-sentence dramatic pause to 11.

And while initially I was disappointed that Myrom Kingery's Thor lacked the golden locks we're accustomed to from the old Norse myths and Marvel Universe, he had the physicality of a Viking and his portrayal grew on me through the movie.

Even if every time he cried out for Odin all I could picture was this scene of the brilliant Matt Berry from The IT Crowd :

But for all the slack I'm cutting Thor: God Of Thunder, there was one scene that was simultaneously pure Asylum and possibly a new low.

At one point, towards the climax of the film, Thor is "rowing" a Viking ship across the sea and absolutely no effort is made to suggest that he is actually anywhere near water, it's almost as if Myrom Kingery is simply waving a paddle around in the air.

Honestly, the film is almost worth watching for that scene alone, even if you're not traditionally a fan of The Asylum's unique oeuvre.

I'm also surprised - and I suspect it's due to the lack of budget, which probably also explains the absence of decent wig work - that The Asylum, when mockbusting a Marvel movie (this one's clearly targeted at the Thor: Love and Thunder audience),  don't employ the classic mid- or post-credit scene, potentially setting up a sequel.

Grace even asks Thor: "Will we see you again?"

And I half-expected him to look to camera and say: "That depends on how well this film does!"

However, no matter how much Myrom Kingery's Thor grew on me, I also think it's a shame that The Asylum didn't get back Cody Deal - who played the character for them in 2011's Almighty Thor - as, at the time, he'd said he was up for a sequel.

If they'd also brought back Loki from that flick, Richard Grieco, and Kevin Nash as Odin, it would have gone a long way towards establishing some degree of continuity for their own "Asylum'Verse".

Lord of The Elves aka Age of The Hobbits aka Clash of Empires (2012)

Okay, confession time. I have a bit of a weakness for Bai Ling. I know she's not the world's greatest actress, but I find her alluringly watchable in whatever awful B-movie she turns up in.

And Lord of The Elves is a classic of that genre. Crafted by the masterminds at The Asylum as a mockbuster of Peter Jackon's first Hobbit movie, this was originally called Age of The Hobbits until the lawyers stepped in and its name changed to Lord of The Elves.

Then, without any warning or explanation, it suddenly underwent a bland renaming to Clash of Empires.

The Blu-Ray I have of this is entitled Lord Of The Elves, but for the sake of clarity I should point out at this stage that not only is the word "lord" never used in this 82-minute flick, but there are also no "elves" in it, nor is that word mentioned either.

Of course, both of these words do have connections with the rather popular Lord of The Rings movies, but that's surely a coincidence, right?

Inspired by real-world archaeology, the action of Lord of The Elves takes place 12,000 years ago on Flores Island, Indonesia (where examples of an early hominid, Homo floresiensis, were found in 2003).

But this is an Asylum movie, not a National Geographic documentary. As well as being populated with giant lizards, some of which can fly (like dragons), and giant spiders, the island is home to three types of human: the diminutive vegetarian Tree People, cannibalistic cavemen called the Rock Men (who ride the flying lizards on occasion), and a tribe of hunters that the Tree People refer to as "giants" but are simply humans.

When the Rock Men raid the Tree People village - to stock up on snacks for their cooking pot - one family escapes, fleeing to the land of the "giants", where they gain assistance from Amthar (Stargate SG-1's Christopher Judge), Laylan (Bai Ling), and a couple of disposable prehistoric red shirts.

Together, despite being severely outnumbered, they stage a rescue mission on the Rock Men's encampment in the hope of saving the captive Tree People.

Shot on location in the jungles and mountains of Cambodia, Lord of The Elves certainly looks mythic.

It just kind of falls apart when people get involved.

Eric Forsberg's script is simplistic, to say the least, and much of the acting is am dram level. While some bad dubbing contributes to this, I have a suspicion that Christopher Judge was the only true actor on set, and most of the rest were Cambodian locals randomly roped in because they 'looked the part'.

I'm sorry, I can't help myself...

Except for eye candy, I'm not exactly sure what Bai Ling or her character really contributed to the movie. Being generous, you could say that Laylan has a basic revenge arc, but she could easily have been excised from the movie and nothing would have changed.

Of course, I might not have been so keen to watch it. But that's a different story entirely.

The giant creatures, and the faux-dragons, are delivered as mediocre CG monsters, but actually they're not so poor that they take the audience out of the moment (come on, you're watching an Asylum joint, what were you expecting? Marvel Studios level CGI?).

The monsters help add some colour to the otherwise human-centric "fantasy" tale , which, barring its prehistoric setting, has an element of Willow about it as well.

Let's be honest, Lord of The Elves (or whatever you want to call it) is not a great movie, and bears absolutely no resemblance to any of the big budget Hobbit movies.

However, if you're a fan of classic cavemen movies, such as One Million Years B.C., Clan of The Cave Bear, Quest for Fire, When Dinosaurs Ruled The Earth etc then you might be able to eke out some silly fun from this nonsense.

Dragon Crusaders (2011)

You have to admire the unrepentant chutzpah of The Asylum for its continued use of unattributed quotes making grandiose claims on their DVD boxes.

For Dragon Crusaders, an "anonymous critic" has declared it: "an epic action adventure in the tradition of Clash Of The Titans and Reign Of Fire!"

The Reign Of Fire angle being that it features dragons and the only Clash Of The Titans (presumably the remake) connection is the use of dodgy CGI - and, to be honest, it's actually a bit better here.

Dragon Crusaders is typical, low-budget Asylum mockbuster fare, but I've always contended that their fantasy, sword-and-sorcery titles are among their best - 2006's Dragon was the first Asylum flick I saw and remains my favourite.

A group of outlawed Knights Templar are fleeing across faux-Medieval England to find a sanctuary from the pursuing soldiers of the king (who we never see and are quickly forgotten about) when they are distracted by sounds of battle in a nearby town, which is being raided by pirates.

The Templars - of course - ride in and save the day, slaying the pirates, and then heading out to the pirate ship (which looks oddly anachronistic) to finish the job.

Unfortunately, as they arrive, a captive witch - Neem (Shinead Byrne) - on the ship has just finished invoking a curse that any who set foot on the boat and have shed blood will be transformed into demonic gargoyles.

The curse has a couple of twists - first anyone affected by it, but slain before the transformation takes place, will rise as a revenant and secondly the purer the soul of the cursed the longer the transformation will take.

Dispatching the pirate-revenants with the aid of wandering warrior woman Aerona (Cecily Fay), Neem reveals that she found the curse in a grimoire she stole from the "Black Dragon" sorcerer who has her people in thrall.

And the only way to break the curse is to travel to the Black Dragon's fortress and slay him. Oh, and Faolon (Steve McTigue) is called the Black Dragon because he can transform into one and has another seven, smaller dragons under his control.

There's witchcraft, bickering, internal disputes, chaste romance and some pretty decent fight scenes (even if one of the largest, against an entire 'village' of the sorcerer's slaves, just seems to suddenly stop without any resolution) along the way and if you can ignore the plot holes, dreadful acting, cheesy dialogue and laughable attempts at banter, Dragon Crusaders is an okay film.

Welsh-location filming certainly adds to the verisimilitude, and the woodlands and sweeping, rolling landscape makes for a dramatic backdrop to the action.

A 'silent' knight turns up at one point, peppering our heroes with arrows, seemingly commanding Faolon's dragons and then challenging the lead Templar, John (Dylan Jones), to single combat... but then disappears from the story as suddenly as he appeared.

Throw in some exploding salt peter for good measure, some slick fight moves from Aerona and the Templar's resident archer (Feth Greenwood) and there's quite a bit to keep you entertained for an hour-and-a-half as long as you aren't expecting a replay of Peter Jackson's Lord Of The Rings or either iteration of Conan The Barbarian.

Grimm's Snow White (2012)

Remember the other week when I was reviewing fairy tale films? Well, I thought I'd kick off this week of Asylum movies with one of their "fairy tale"-inspired offerings: Grimm's Snow White.

Once again The Asylum proves that their strength lies in fantasy stories with this joyously gonzo, kitchen-sink spin on the story of Snow White that throws elves, dragons and magical falling stars into the traditional mix.

On the other hand there are no dwarves (that's where the elves come in - it being easier to stick pointed ears on an extra than turn them into little people) or poisoned apples (there's a poisoned ring instead) in this tale.

A long time ago a star fell from the skies and where it fell a magical flame sprung up that created the dragons and the elves.

Queen Gwendolyn (Jane March) of Whitevale wants to get her hands on the magical flame - the source of the elves' magic - but it is in the neighbouring land of North Phalia.

So she engineers the death of her husband and then sets about winning the heart of the North Phalian prince, Alexander (Jamie Thomas King).

Unfortunately for the queen, Alexander has fallen for her drippy step-daughter Snow White (Eliza Bennett).

Therefore, the queen arranges for Snow to meet with an unfortunate accident in the woods at the hands of her huntsman... only she is rescued by the elves.

Initially the elves, especially the outspoken Orlando (see what they did there?), played by Alan Burgon, don't want to get involved in the affairs of humans for fear it will bring further oppression down on them.

Eventually, of course, Snow wins them round and everything culminates in a deliriously lacklustre woodland battle between about a dozen elves and a similar number of the queen's troops (this is supposed to be a major battle, by the way).

Some of the acting, especially from the heavily-accented extras, is a bit stilted, the CGI dragons are pretty poor and the queen's CGI hunting dogs have clearly been based on the Garmr from its 2011 Thor-mockbuster Almighty Thor.

Yet there are elements (albeit minuscule) of an inventive story here - even if, ultimately, it comes to nothing.

There are hints of an interesting take on elves and the whole deal with the Veridian Flame is a really nice touch which, hopefully, the Asylum might pick up and run with in another of their fantasy flicks. It seems too good a concept to dismiss as simply a MacGuffin in Grimm's Snow White.

I'm not sure what went wrong with the non-fire-breathing dragon though as I've seen better in Asylum flicks - perhaps they blew the budget on rubber elf ears and costuming, as there's a distinctly well-tailored Georgian feel to many of the outfits worn by the human characters.

Eliza Bennett is rather unimpressive as Snow White and totally overshadowed by Jane March's evil step-mother, clearly loving the chance to devour some scenery in her wonderfully melodramatic role.

Journey To The West - Conquering The Demons (2013)

How many movies can you think of that climax with a fight between King Kong and God*? I can name one: Journey To The West - Conquering The Demons.

With Conquering The Demons writer/director Stephen Chow gives us a prequel to the well-known tale of The Monkey King as portrayed in various media, including the '70s TV show Monkey!

Conquering The Demons is the origin story of the famous quartet at the heart of the latter tale - Monkey, Pigsy, Sandy and Tripitaka - although this isn't entirely obvious until the final moments of the movie, as the film stands well enough on its own without any prior knowledge.

The story grows gradually out of a number of vignettes with characters that seem rather familiar from other iterations of Journey To The West (one of the  Four Great Classical Novels of Chinese literature) but cast as villains where we have only really known them as reluctant heroes before. You'll also spot items that eventually become iconic artefacts in the story of Monkey and Tripitaka's travels.

Zhang Wen plays scruffy demon-hunter Xuan Zang who doesn't want to slay demons but simply remind them they were once innocent children, though the songs in his book of 300 Nursery Rhymes.

While battling a giant fish-shaped water demon, Xuan crosses paths with the pretty and resourceful Miss Duan (Qi Shu), who is attracted to Xuan's innocence - despite his outward expressions of chaste disinterest.

After a run-in with an unstoppable pig demon, Xuan's master sends him on a quest to seek help from The Monkey King, imprisoned under Five Finger Mountain.

Luckily, he is not alone when he comes up against the ultimate trickster - he has fellow demon-hunters, Miss Duan, Prince Important (Show Luo), Almighty Foot (Chaoli Zhang) and Fist of the North Star (Xing Yu) to watch his back.

Blending comedy (both physical and verbal), with horror, martial arts, wire-work, magic, romance, song, tragedy and pathos in a cocktail rarely seen in Western cinema, Conquering The Demons is a genuinely captivating action movie.

Chow's take on The Monkey King is a lot darker than any I've been used to before. He's still playful, selfish, manipulative and arrogant, but he's also really very evil here - having clearly not learned his lesson from when Buddha trapped him under the mountain 500 years earlier.

The humour subsides in the totally gonzo climax as The Monkey King demonstrates his true nature, making short work of the demon-hunters before Xuan calls on Buddha to intercede and matters come to a head on a cosmic scale.

It's no surprise this film raked in the yuan in China, Journey To The West - Conquering The Demons is not only magnificent storytelling but a visual feast as well, packed as it is with magical martial artists and monsters.

* Technically it's The Monkey King and Buddha... and it's not really even a fight... ignore me, you just have to watch it... seriously... watch this film!

The Lady Assassin (2013)

A bevy of gorgeous women run an isolated coastal tavern/brothel with the sole purpose of killing and robbing corrupt officials in the top-notch, Vietnamese period martial arts flick, The Lady Assassin.

When they free a hostage from a funeral caravan, the leader of the group, Kieu Thi (Thanh Hang) decides to take this new woman, Linh (Tang Thanh Ha), under her wing and train her to become an assassin, like them, so she can seek revenge on the local warlord Quan Do (Le Thai Hoa) who killed her family.

Yes, it's a classic martial arts revenge story that harkens back to the golden age of kung fu movies - but it plays out magnificently, against a background spectacular landscapes and certainly helped by the universal good looks of the central female cast.

Despite some fleeting dodgy CGI, the stunts and wire-fu action is fantastic and the relentless story escalates to a protracted fight around the tavern that takes the entire third act of the movie as Quan Do and his never-ending legions of black-clad, ninja-like soldiers assault the women's base of operations.

Along the way there, we are treated to some great plot twists and character development, a fair degree of family-friendly titillation, a musical number, and a chaste sapphic sub-plot as Linh becomes part of the female family of assassins.

My main gripe about the movie is that although it was Vietnam's first 3D movie and the country's biggest box office hit to date, when I first saw this in 2014, Terracotta Distribution had only released a standard DVD of this movie - despite some very obvious "3D" moments.

The Monkey King (2014)

For those up on their Chinese mythology (or fans of the old Japanese TV show, Monkey!), the basic story of The Monkey King is a familiar one, although this latest big screen adaptation adds a few flourishes and twists to the traditional tale.

At its heart though, it's a straight-forward morality play about a naive and egotistical animal spirit, Sun Wukong aka Monkey King (Donnie Yen), being tricked into helping the evil forces of the Bull Demon King (Aaron Kwok) get through the Gates Of Heaven and attempt a coup against the Jade Emperor (Chow Yun-Fat).

Kam-Yuen Szeto and Edmond Wong's script is very clever, giving the well-known tale a fresh coat of paint rather than a total overhaul.

For instance, I liked the introduction of the low-key romance between the Monkey King and Silver Fox (Xia Zi Tong), that added an extra layer to explaining his willingness to go along with the Bull Demon King, and unlike many Western films this sub-plot doesn't slow the phenomenal pacing of the main story.

Although The Monkey King is two hours long, it moves along like a bullet train, but where it falls down is the rather inconsistent quality of its special effects.

While the blend of "people-in-costumes" creatures and CGI gives the movie a certain charm - the 'costume creatures', for instance, evoke memories of the old Monkey! TV show... and Power Rangers - the computer graphics lurch from breath-taking to appalling.

Rather oddly, for me, the equally unpredictable subtitles on my Thai-import DVD didn't hamper my enjoyment of the movie.

Some lengthy dialogue scenes merited no sub-titles (particularly, for some reason, when Sun Wukong was speaking) and at other times screeds of text would race across the screen at migraine-inducing speed.

And yet, the plot was still easy to follow. Yes, I might have missed some moments of witty (or profound) dialogue, but the visual storytelling was so spot on that I still felt as though I had my finger on the film's pulse.

That's not to say it's simplistic. This is an Asian fantasy after all, so there are some insane segues and moments of mind-baffling surreality that trigger 2001: A Space Odyssey flashbacks, but you watch enough of these movies and you learn to just go with it.

Interestingly, The Monkey King serves as a prequel to the better known story of Monkey and Tripitaka's 'Journey To The West'; we just get a teasing glimpse of young Tripitaka in the closing moments.

Flying Guillotine Part II (1978)

The cunning but cruel Qing emperor Yung Cheng (Feng Ku) has a hatred of the conquered Han and a penchant for having people's heads cut off, as exemplified by his revolutionary "flying guillotine" weapon.

The flying guillotine is an almost certainly fictitious weapon said to have been thrown over an opponent's head and causing instant decapitation.

However, heroic rebel Ma Teng (Lung Ti) has invented the "iron umbrella", a device to counter the flying guillotines, and even turn them back on their users.

So the emperor calls on the guillotine's inventor, a high lama, to design an even better flying guillotine.

Meanwhile, the Han rebels, including Na Lan (Szu Shih), daughter of a palace official, keep trying to assassinate the emperor.

Their plans - especially one involving poisoned daggers firing out of a scroll case - are inspired, but the crafty emperor is always one step ahead.

Ultimately, this leads to a monumental, large-scale, showdown in the emperor's palace between his forces and those of the rebels.

The denouement is not exactly what I was expecting, but I appreciated its honesty.

Set in Ancient (17th Century?) China, Flying Guillotine II aka Palace Carnage is an incredibly pacey and chaotic Shaw Brothers martial arts masterpiece, full of incredible fight sequences, superheroic wire-fu, and bonkers, physics-defying, exotic weaponry.

Throw in a couple of unexpected moments of brief female nudity, frequent splashes of bright red blood, and some half-decent dubbing and Palace Carnage is an impressive, if occasionally hard to follow, frenetic slice of 1970's Hong Kong martial arts. 

There's an avalanche of palace intrigue, spying and counter-spying, as Na Lan wins the emperor's favour - much to the disgust of his senior aides - and gets to form her own all-female cadre of palace guards.

While all the main rebels are superb fighters, major kudos to the ultimate badass villain, Yung Cheng, who holds his own against at least half-a-dozen rebel mooks and ultimately faces off against the three main heroes and gives no quarter.

This final showdown is as glorious a spectacle of bloody martial arts as you could hope for from a Shaw Brothers flick.

Everything Everywhere All at Once (2022)

Honestly, it's next to impossible to summarise what's going on in the mind-bending Everything Everywhere All At Once without attempting to spell out every single moment of this gorgeously crafted movie.

Michelle Yeoh is Evelyn Wang, a middle-aged Chinese immigrant buckling under the pressure of running a launderette, filing her taxes, and coping with family drama.

Unbeknownst to her, her gentle husband Waymond Wang (Ke Huy Quan) wants to divorce her, but first they must report to the Internal Revenue Service for an audit by the officious Deirdre Beaubeirdre (Jamie Lee Curtis).

However, that's also when Evelyn unexpectedly learns of the existence of the multiverse and the fact that she's the only hope for saving all of reality from erasure... by drawing upon the unique skills of other versions of herself from across the infinite planes of existence.

Written and directed by Daniel Kwan and Daniel Scheinert (as Daniels), Everything Everywhere All At Once is simultaneously unlike anything you've seen before and yet comfortably familiar to genre fans.

Superficially it is The Matrix meets Doctor Strange In The Multiverse of Madness with a shot of Rick and Morty thrown in for good measure.

But mix in talking rocks and apocalyptic bagels amidst the frenetic wuxia martial arts and reality-bending and suddenly Everything Everywhere All At Once is also a cerebral art house flick as well.

Once the action begins, it's pretty much non-stop (I couldn't help but be reminded of Mad Max: Fury Road in that respect) with a visual assault of chaotic images that often comes at you faster than your brain can process, almost certainly necessitating a repeat viewing.

Yet, for all the cosmic, existential, threats, at its heart this is a film about family, handled in a way that rings true without getting overly mushy.

Ultimately, though, no mere words can do it justice. Everything Everywhere All At Once is a film that has been to seen - experienced - rather than read about.

Snow White - Fairest Of Them All (2001)

Snow White - Fairest Of Them All is a ropey, old TV movie that was dusted down and given a new name so it could be rereleased on DVD to co-incide with the cinematic début of Snow White And The Huntsman in 2012.

Using extreme magical logic, it begins with the birth of Snow White and the death of her mother Josephine (Vera Farmiga).

Her father John (Tom Irwin) wanders off into the snow to find milk for the infant, but instead frees a trapped troll (Clancy Brown).

The wish-granting monster not only provides milk for baby Snow White, but makes John a king of his own kingdom.

The troll then transforms his own sister, Elspeth (Miranda Richardson), into a queen for John (as he cannot bring the dead Josephine back to life).

Years pass and Snow White (Smallville's Kristen Kreuk) turns 16, but ageless Elspeth is bored of her enchanted husband and step-child, so seeks fresh meat when young prince Alfred (Tyron Leitso) arrives to woo the princess.

When he spurns the wicked queen, Elspeth turns him into a bear, then charges smitten courtier Hector (Jose Zuniga) with leading Snow into the woods and cutting out her heart.

Snow flees and ends up in the company of the seven colour-coded dwarves (think Teletubbies, but dressed in charity shop cast-offs), who are actually elemental representations of the days of the week as well as weather-sprites.

Miranda Richardson's Elspeth is a delightfully loopy, fairy tale cougar (you can't help but smile when she makes her pass at the young prince and he runs a mile) and definitely comes off best when compared to Kristin Kreuk's hippy, whiny little Snow White.

This story is full of bright colours and wild magic - especially where the Queen's mirror is concerned (it flies, it spies, it transforms people, it shrinks things, it turns them to stone etc etc) - but while clearly aimed at a very young audience, the surprisingly subtle moral of the piece might go over their heads.

Elspeth is given everything by her brother, has access to powerful magics, but is never satisfied and is ultimately brought down by her own hubris. In a sense the traditional story of Snow White is simply a test of character by Clancy Brown's character of his sister.

Snow White And The Huntsman (2012)

Snow White And The Huntsman is the classic tale of Snow White given the full-on Lord Of The Rings treatment.

Director Rupert Sanders was clearly taking lessons from Peter Jackson with his presentation of a fully-developed fantasy world.

Unfortunately, for all its sumptuous production values, the script by Evan Daugherty, John Lee Hancock and Hossein Amini is quite flawed - the pacing is rather measured, to put it politely (most would call it slow), the magic mirror (a key element of the story and a great special effect) is forgotten about a third of the way into the story, and the central characters of the Huntsman (Chris Hemsworth) and Snow's childhood sweetheart, William (Sam Claflin) both serve the same role in the movie. This duplication of roles is further highlighted by the script's failure to resolve either character's personal journey.

And all that brings us to Snow White herself. Kristen Stewart may have the whole Twilight thing under her belt and is reasonably easy on the eye, but she is totally devoid of charisma in this movie - this is never more evident than in her "rousing speech" to her father's subjects hiding out in the castle of Duke Hammond (Vincent Regan).

She is supposedly whipping them up into a frenzy of rebellion against the evil queen Ravenna (Charlize Theron), but totally fails to sell it. I couldn't imagine an army following her to the supermarket let alone into battle against a powerful, magical foe.

That said, the film gave us a well thought-out back story of how the witch Ravenna usurped Snow White's father and took over the kingdom - even if we are supposed to believe that for the decade (or longer) that Snow was kept imprisoned, the lone rebel Duke Hammond - father of William - was able to hold out against the queen and her mastery of the dark arts.

When Snow comes of age (and thus the queen is no longer "the fairest in the land"), she escapes captivity and flees into the well-realised Dark Forest.

Ravenna summons The Huntsman to track Snow down, on the promise that she will bring his dead wife back to life if he delivers. Realising that the queen's offer is an empty one, the Huntsman instead helps Snow to escape the forest and head towards Duke Hammond's castle.

On the way they are captured by the seven dwarf bandits - who count a number of famous faces amongst them: such as Ian McShane, Bob Hoskins, Ray Winstone, Nick Frost and Toby Jones.

And the dwarves are another strength of the film. Once you get over the initial shock of seeing such well-known faces on the bodies of little people, they are wholly convincing and wouldn't look out of place around the table at Bag End when Thorin and co pay a visit to Bilbo Baggins.

The dwarves then escort Snow and the Huntsman to their final destination, and play an integral part in the princess's scheme to get her kingdom back and avenge her father's death.

But of course the stand-out performance of the piece is Charlize Theron as the evil queen, who not only acts Kristen Stewart out of the picture but looks every inch the majestic evil sovereign, whatever make-up effects are piled on her to show the ageing cost of her magic.

There are even, early on, strong suggestions of an incestuous, Game Of Thrones-style relationship between Ravenna and her (twin?) brother Finn (Sam Spruell), but this, ultimately, being a children's movie that particular sub-plot also goes nowhere - although there is definitely a link of some kind between them as demonstrated when the Huntsman slays Finn.

Stylistically Snow White And The Huntsman is a visually impressive retelling of Snow White story, but the script has serious, basic issues that really should have been picked up during the film's development.

Maleficent (2014)

I can't honestly think of anything good to say about this major disappointment.

For some reason, a suit at Disney decided that their finest "evil for the sake of evil" villainess - Maleficent (Angelina Jolie) from Sleeping Beauty - needed a ridiculous backstory.

It turns out that she's actually just misunderstood, a victim of male oppression striking back for the sake of equality, and is really a decent fairy who ultimately decides that Sleeping Beauty is a good egg and shouldn't be cursed... but then finds out it's too late to lift the curse!

There are just so many missteps in this film I'm amazed it could find its way to the cinema: for instance, Aurora aka Sleeping Beauty (Elle Fanning) is only asleep for about five minutes and the cartoon's spectacular climax of the witch transforming into a dragon is undercut by Maleficent, instead, transforming her henchman, Diaval (Sam Riley), into the dragon.

Such a pity. I had high hopes for this fantasy, but Disney managed to strip everything so iconic about the original Sleeping Beauty villainess and reduce her to a bland, cookie cutter "anti-hero".

I'd put this on a par with the pointless reinvention of The Wicked Witch of The West in Wicked. These are fairy tales, the bad guys are just bad because they enjoy being bad (and probably have a #bad4life tattoo). They don't need to be "understood". They need to be overcome. 

Sleeping Beauty (2014)

Years before they became a byword for cheap, blockbuster cash-ins (i.e. mockbusters), the first movie I discovered by The Asylum was a fantasy film (simply called Dragon, I believe) in the discount aisle of Woolworths in Tonbridge (which shows just how long ago it was).

Since then I have remained firm in my belief that although they're not exactly known for quality productions, The Asylum is at its best when working in the fantasy genre.

That said, Sleeping Beauty isn't up to the pulpy, B-movie calibre of, say, an Arrowstorm film, but it still has its moments.

Directed by Casper Van Dien, who also appears as King David alongside his wife, Catherine Oxenberg as Queen Violet and his daughter Grace Van Dien as Princess Dawn aka Sleeping Beauty, the film is a liberal reworking of the fairy tale that starts in Disney territory then caroms off into its own little world.

To complete the family atmosphere on set, Maya Van Dien (daughter of both Casper Van Dien and Catherine Oxenberg) appears as a totally random addition to the story - a young girl called Newt (Aliens, much?) who has survived inside the enchanted castle and gives aid to Princess Dawn's rescuers.

Events initially unfold as they do in Disney's Sleeping Beauty cartoon, with the Three Good Fairies bestowing gifts upon the newborn Princess Dawn (although the guards' ill-fitting helmets and the treasure chests that look like cardboard boxes give away that this isn't the Disney version).

But then busty, yummy-mummy, evil witch queen Tambria (Olivia d'Abo) - whose invite got lost in the post - turns up and zaps Dawn with the familiar curse, then proceeds to blow up the good fairies.

In The Asylum's version, Dawn is raised alone in a castle tower, educated by her parents, and kept away from spinning wheel needles (several on-the-nose double entendres involving the word 'prick' got my hopes up this was going to be a wittily-scripted comedy; it's not), until just before her 16th birthday. And what do you know? She only gets tricked by Tambria into pricking her finger and falling asleep (taking the whole kingdom down with her).

A century passes and in a neighbouring kingdom, a servant called Barrow (Game Of Thrones' Finn Jones) discovers fragments of a map and a message leading to the cursed castle. Now, I'm not sure exactly who wrote this as Princess Dawn (as is suggested) is, of course, in a magical sleep.

I presumed it was actually an elaborate trap set out by Tambria - who has also been trapped inside the castle and unable to harm her slumbering nemesis - but this is never made clear.

Barrow's master is the obnoxious, privileged, bullying Tory-boy Prince Jayson (Edward Lewis French), who, learning of Barrow's discovery, decides to lead his coterie of yobbish mates on a jolly wheeze to rescue the treasure in Sleeping Beauty's castle and claim that kingdom for his own.

Again, it's never exactly clear how much this neighbouring territory knows about the curse on King David's land or the power of the wicked sorceress Tambria who now rules (kind of) there.

Given that it's just "over the mountain" from Jayson's realm, the general knowledge of the whole "asleep for a century" scenario seems rather vague.

Of course, Tambria isn't going to make things easy and throws a scaly pliosaur, a giant lizardman, a legion of shadowy wraiths and a never-ending army of zombies at the adventuring party that's coming for the treasure (and maybe the chance to snog a sleeping 115-year-old princess).

A particularly wonderful aspect about Jayson's loathsome cronies is, given that they are supposed to be trained fighters, just how cowardly they are. Their go-to tactic when confronted by any monster is "run away, run away".

The only one who shows the slightest bit of decency towards Barrow, and some backbone, is Gruner (Gil Kolirin) - who may be a commander or captain or something in Jayson's army, again it's not very clear.

The adventuring party gradually gets whittled down as they wander, seemingly aimlessly, around the same sections of castle and overgrown garden, until the final confrontation with Tambria.

By this time, Jayson has switched sides (or is he bluffing?), Newt has popped up and disappeared in a cloud of cryptic warnings several times, and Gruner and Barrow have bonded.

I'm not entirely sure who Sleeping Beauty is aimed at as there's some gore (Tambria pulling the head off of someone and dragging out their spine comes to mind) and an uncomfortable, rape-threat moment where a couple of brothers in Jayson's gang discover a magically sleeping servant woman in the castle kitchens. Thankfully Barrow steps in before that goes too far.

There's certainly an attempt at a Dungeons & Dragons vibe in the latter stages of this movie (torch-lit exploration, traps etc), but despite constant references to Barrow's map, there's never any real feeling that the adventurers are navigating a convincing, contiguous environment.

One minute they are stuck on one side of a lake, the next there's a bridge; they talk about going to certain places, but are next seen elsewhere.

This also isn't some hallucinogenic, dreamscape either, but simply a combination of poor directing, editing and scriptwriting.

The low-budget monsters aren't too bad though; the giant lizardman (despite being a cheap CGI creation) is quite interesting and the various undead have the added bonus that Tambria keeps resurrecting them every time they get nobbled.

As well as the many, many plot holes in the story (some of which I've alluded to above), more often than not the dialogue is delivered in quite mannered ways; now I'm not sure if this is director Van Dien trying to create a "fantasy Medieval" ambience but it doesn't really work.

Budgetary limitations abound in this version of Sleeping Beauty (there's no big dragon showdown at the end, for instance) - both in the effects and script - but it's an okay way to pass 90 minutes, if there isn't anything better on TV.

Sleeping Beauty (1959)

Set in a nameless kingdom in 14th Century Europe, the action in Disney's iconic Sleeping Beauty kicks off at the celebrations for the birth of King Stefan's daughter, Aurora (voiced by Mary Costa).

In the middle of the baby being granted magical gifts by the three Good Fairies - Flora, Fauna and Merryweather - the proceedings are interrupted by the arrival of an uninvited gatecrasher, the powerful evil witch, Maleficent (voiced deliciously by Eleanor Audley).

Maleficent has her own gift for the young child - a curse that before sunset on her 16th birthday, she will prick her finger on a spinning wheel spindle and die.

The Good Fairies manage to mitigate this slightly by changing the curse to one of "sleep until kissed by her true love" and then spirit young Aurora away, to raise her - without magic - in secret in the woods, to hide her from Maleficent's schemes until her 16th birthday.

Years pass and it's now the morning of Aurora's 16th birthday - and judging by the evidence of the Good Fairies' attempts to organise a birthday surprise for their guest it's a miracle she's made it this far!

Sent out while her "aunts" prepare the surprise for her, Aurora bumps into Prince Philip (voiced by Bill Shirley) and immediately falls in love with him (being the first man she's ever seen!) - little realising she has actually been betrothed to him since birth anyway, as part of an alliance between her father and a neighbouring kingdom.

Naturally they fail to exchange names, so when the Fairies explain to Aurora that she's  already promised to another, she's rather heartbroken.

Nevertheless, Aurora is returned to her father's castle in secret, unaware that Maleficent has finally tracked her down.

The evil witch lures the princess out of her bedroom to a tall tower where she spies a magical spinning wheel, pricks her finger and falls asleep.

Having never really considered the structure of the plot before I was rather surprised that Princess Aurora doesn't fall into her magical slumber until 50 minutes into the hour-and-a-quarter movie.

Then the Good Fairies decide to put all the inhabitants of the castle (there for Aurora's 16th birthday celebrations) into a similar slumber until the princess is awoken. I'm not entirely sure that that really qualifies as "only using their powers for good"!

Just to prove how evil she is, Maleficent kidnaps Prince Philip as well, to hold him hostage in her dungeons so he can't awaken Aurora with a kiss.

Luckily the Good Fairies bust him out of gaol, equip him with a magical sword and shield and send him off to lift the curse and slay Maleficent.

It's easy to see why Disney decided to make a live-action movie focussing on the character of Maleficent as the scenes in Sleeping Beauty with her are certainly the strongest and most entertaining.

She is a wonderfully evil character - presumably driven by jealousy, although this is never really explained - and, despite the Good Fairies saying "there must be some good in her", she isn't seeking redemption, she simply revels in being a Mistress Of Evil.

The highlight of the film is, of course, the well-known final sequence when Prince Philip rides from Maleficent's lair in the Forbidden Mountains to King Stefan's castle, only to find it surrounded by magical thorn bushes, and then once through those he confronts Maleficent herself, who has transformed into a mighty dragon.

The pacing does drag occasionally, for instance there's a scene with King Stefan (voiced by Taylor Holmes) and Prince Philip's father, King Hubert (voiced by Bill Thompson) discussing the impending return of Aurora that goes on just a tad too long.

Yet, without a doubt, Sleeping Beauty is the definitive fairy story - it has it all: a headstrong princess, a noble prince, an evil witch, romance and magic.

Aguirre, The Wrath Of God (1972)

Set deep in the Amazonian rainforests of South America in the mid-16th Century, Werner Herzog's Aguirre, The Wrath Of God is a mesmerizing tale of an adventurer's descent into his own "heart of darkness" and the fate of those he pulls along with him.

Fresh from his conquest of the Incas, Gonzalo Pizarro (Allejandro Repulles) leads his army down the Andes and into the jungle, searching for the legendary city of gold, El Dorado.

The film opens with a languid scene of Pizarro's forces, with their cannons, Indian slaves and supplies, snaking down the mountain side and this quickly establishes the pace that Herzog adopts for this movie.

After a while hacking through the jungle, Pizzaro calls a halt to his expedition and decides to send off a small unit to scout ahead and hopefully learn the location of El Dorado and the disposition of hostile natives in the area.

Leading the group are Don Pedro de Ursúa (Ruy Guerra) - who has brought his mistress along with him, Inez de Atienza (Helena Rojo) - Lope de Aguirre (Klaus Kinsi) - who is accompanied by his 15-year-old daughter, Florés (Cecilia Rivera - and, representing Spanish royalty, nobleman Don Fernando de Guzmán (Peter Berling).

The group heads off on rafts down the river and it's not long before it becomes clear that the already slightly unbalanced Aguirre is determined to undermine his commander, Don Pedro, and take control of the group.

However, he's a canny old sod and orchestrates events so that although Don Pedro is usurped, Don Fernando is put in charge and the group declares itself independent of Spain with Don Fernando as the first emperor of El Dorado.

From there, the film is a series of random encounters as the group drifts down river, plagued by diminishing supplies and harassed by (mostly) unseen natives who pepper them with darts, arrows and spears.

For a film about conquistadors there is little to no actual fighting, although a lot of guns and cannons are fired, because Aguirre's party seldom meets face-to-face any of the people they are trying to conquer and convert to Christianity.

As their adventure continues and the group gets whittled down, so Aguirre's insanity increases and he starts making increasingly bizarre proclamations, as their progress becomes more and more dream-like.

Many, many scenes go on for just a bit too long, just enough time for the audience's mind to start questioning 'what's going on? why am I watching this?'

And the reason you stay watching Aguirre, The Wrath Of God is that it is incredibly compelling.

Filmed entirely on location in the Peruvian rainforest, on tributaries of the Amazon River, there is an almost documentary-like quality to the film's reality.

This is further heightened by Kinski's understated portrayal of Aguirre, a man of incredible charisma and intelligence who is also clearly several cards short of a full deck.

Although far from a silent movie, much emphasis is placed upon silence and the measured dialogue manages to embrace such topics as power, religion, corruption, megalomania and hallucination.

There are obvious comparisons to Apocalypse Now (which was based, in part, on this movie, as well as Joseph Conrad's Heart Of Darkness), both on screen and in the tales of behind-the-scenes antics getting the movie made, although Aguirre relies more on atmosphere and less on an enigmatic protagonist - in a sense Kinski is both Martin Sheen's and Marlon Brando's characters, as both the explorer and the person driven insane by what he finds.

This certainly isn't a film for a casual viewer or those who need "all-action, all-the-time", but as a fictionalised account of how such an expedition, led by a powerful figure such as Aguirre, could go so inevitably wrong, then this is interesting viewing.