SINBAD WEEK: Sinbad The Sailor (1947)

As well as being the first, live-action cinematic outing for Sinbad (after a couple of animations), Sinbad The Sailor is particularly notable as one of the rare stories in the "franchise" that doesn't actually feature monsters or magic.

Sinbad, as portrayed by the dashing Douglas Fairbanks Jnr, has never swashed as many buckles or been more charming and romantic. He is a master raconteur, thief, philosopher and trickster; his enemies call him a "magician" because of the tricks he uses to escape their grasp.

He is also the narrator of this tale, in the sense that the main story is bookended with scenes of Sinbad regaling a gathering of jaded sea-dogs with the tale of his "eighth voyage" - they are all bored of hearing, repeatedly, about his first seven.

While there is talk of djinn, rocs and cyclops, this is the story of Sinbad's discovery that he is actually - maybe - the long-lost son of the ruler of a lost treasure island, Deryabar, where Alexandar The Great is thought to have hidden  all his gold and jewels.

However, his plan to return there is thwarted constantly by the Emir of Daibul (Anthony Quinn), who enlists flame-haired beauty Shireen (Maureen O'Hara) to seduce Sinbad into revealing the location of this fabled isle. Sinbad, of course, doesn't know where it is and, in turn, hopes that the Emir knows!

There's also a third party after the treasure, a mysterious and elusive assassin called Jamel (who has his name engraved on all his swords - and presumably written inside his underpants as well!).

Aiding Sinbad is his trusty, comedy sidekick Abbu (George Tobias) - who doesn't turn out to be anywhere near as irritating as the phrase "comedy sidekick" suggests - and the ship's barber and resident sage Milek (Walter Slezak).

To a cynic such as I, watching this through modern eyes, the secret identity of Jamel isn't particularly hard to guess, and there's a bizarre moment when he (or she) reveals himself (or herself) to Sinbad and the Emir and his (or her) face is suddenly lit from below with a green light - for no other reason than to really hammer home the point that Jamel is not a nice person.

John Twist's screenplay is wordy but as smooth as silk, the Technicolour is glorious and Douglas Fairbanks Jnr makes Sinbad a very physical character, constantly gesturing with his arms, moving his body and throwing himself around acrobatically and with the grace of a trained dancer.

At almost two-hours duration, Sinbad The Sailor could seem a bit slow to some contemporary tastes, but the poetic script and outstanding performances - along with the requisite amount of stunt-filled fight scenes, chases, sea battles and even some mushy romance for the ladies - makes this such an engrossing adventure movie that you quickly forget that you're more used to seeing Sinbad fighting off Dynamation monsters!

The film's final act is a great meditation on the nature of real treasure, and although Sinbad does eventually claim his birth right he uses it to drive home the message of the story he has been telling his rapt audience... and obviously the post-war audiences in America and Europe.

Although the trope of the unreliable narrator isn't really played on, the movie does open with text posing the question of who made Sinbad the legend he was, how did he gain this level of immortality?

And the answer is very quickly given: "Who else, O Brother, but - Sinbad the Sailor!"

Thus leaving the audience also with the question that, given he is his own greatest publicist and how fanciful his previous adventures were, how much of what he said this time round was actually true?

Barbarian Queen (1985)

Both IMDB and the blurb on the DVD box erroneously claim that Barbarian Queen is set during the "days of the Roman Empire", but there is no evidence whatsoever in the body of the film that this is anything more than a generic barbarian fantasy flick.

On the day of Amethea's (Deathstalker's Lana Clarkson) wedding, her village is raided by the troops of  Lord Arrakur (Armando Capo) looking for slaves.

All are taken except for Amethea and a few other hotties, who manage to avoid capture, and then pledge to pursue the raiders to their kingdom and liberate their friends.

Arriving at the generic city, the maidens fall in with local rebels and, discovering that their menfolk are being groomed as gladiators, plot to stage a coup.

Outside of the requisite harem and orgy scenes that were de rigeur in these low quality sword and sandal movies, there's a fair amount of female nudity - but always combined with misogynistic sexual violence, which makes much of this otherwise forgettable film quite unsavoury.

Not that there's much to enjoy about Barbarian Queen anyway, as the acting is generally poor, the dialogue atrocious, the direction chaotic and the props resemble LARP rejects.

Another trait it shares with others of its low-budget ilk is that the film doesn't so much reach an ending as just suddenly stop - possibly when everyone concerned ran out of money or enthusiasm.

No one truly emerges from this mess with any dignity and Armando Capo caps the lunacy in the climatic brawl by doing a passable impression of the late Colonel Gaddafi.

Saddled with a mundane plot, Barbarian Queen is really one for Lana Clarkson fans only. 

Samson (2018)

With its Dungeons & Dragons-level of swords-and-sandal violence and comic book superheroic protagonist, the story of Samson was one of the few Bible fables that ever held my interest for long.

Samson is the latest live-action realisation of the tale, featuring a good few recognisable names in supporting roles - from Billy Zane as Philistine King Balek to Rutger Hauer and Lindsay Wagner as Samson's parents.

Set around three thousand years ago, the 105-minute movie sees Dagon-worshipping Philistine Prince Rallah (Jackson Rathbone) charged by his father, Balek, with keeping the troublesome Hebrews in check, even though he'd rather his time was spent on more exciting projects elsewhere.

With the aid of his duplicitous consort Delilah (Caitlin Leahy), Rallah aims to manipulate the Hebrew's chosen champion Samson (Taylor James) - through his love for Rallah's handmaiden Taren (Frances Sholto-Douglas) - to curb any rumblings of rebellion.

But things go wrong and Rallah ends up making a worse enemy of Samson, driving the superstrong Hebrew to slaughter the entire Philistine army with just the jawbone of an ass.

Years later, Samson returns to the court of King Balek to try and negotiate a better deal for his still-oppressed people, but the residents of the city haven't forgiven him for the deaths of the soldiers and drive him out...

And into the arms of Delilah, who now claims to turned her back on Rallah since realising how wicked he was.

Samson is a high quality production. The locations (it was shot in South Africa), sets and costumes are incredible, giving the story a definite sense of verisimilitude, even if the acting is occasionally a bit wobbly and the script seems rather forgettable about such key elements as the passage of time.

Taylor James is charismatic enough as the lead, but there's an inescapable feeling that had this been filmed a decade or so earlier the chances are Duane 'The Rock' Johnson would have been in the titular role of Samson.

The film has gotten a lot of stick from reviewers for its quite earnest and pedestrian take on the story, but given that it was made by Christian film company Pure Flix, they weren't going to suddenly start injecting complex sub-plots or musical numbers into the story..

And, of course, it's earnest, it's a Bible story. They're all rather earnest... by definition.

But that doesn't stop co-directors Bruce Macdonald and Gabriel Sabloff from putting some thought into how they would realise Samson's superstrength and giving us standout action scenes along the way (the whole 'jawbone of an ass' sequence and its aftermath are truly cinematic).

Because, like, say, Titanic, we all know where the story is going, Samson's strength is in the telling and - while there are moments it veers towards Monty Python and others when it lurches towards The Scorpion King - it's well-paced and never dull.

It's not perfect, and there are missed opportunities, but I suspect Samson is exactly the film Macdonald and Sabloff set out to make for Pure Flix.