Of
Antonio Margheriti's three early-80's Raiders of the Lost Ark ripoffs, Hunters
of the Golden Cobra, Ark
of the Sun God (both of which starred the late
David Warbeck), and Jungle Raiders, this is probably the best.
Christopher Connelly (Manhattan
Baby, The Atlantis
Interceptors, Night
of the Sharks) stars as a red-white-and-blue clad Captain Yankee, an
all-American hero hanging out in 1930's Southeast Asia swindling aspiring
trekkers out of their money. He does this by setting up sort of staged
adventures, paying the local natives to act as headhunters and acting as a
"guide". Connelly thus accumulates his share of enemies in the
region and the attention of washed-up Western legend Lee Van Cleef (Escape
from New York, Code Name
Wildgeese), who blackmails Connelly into searching for a lost artifact
called The Ruby of Gloom. During a lengthy car chase sequence through the
streets of Singapore, Connelly crosses paths with archaeologist Marina
Costa (The Final
Executioner), who just happens to be in search of the same item. With
the aid of an old drunken Scotsman Luciano Pigozzi (Yor
- The Hunter From the Future), Rene Abadeza (Indio,
Tiger Joe), and
shifty-eyed Mike Monty (Strike
Commando, Zombi 3),
the two head off to the deep jungles of Malaysia to find the ruby. Of
course, along the way they stumble across jungle traps, wild animals,
ancient curses, backstabbing guides, and eventually end up battling with a
bumbling paramilitary organization with oddly terrible luck.
Chock full of explosions, shootouts, car chases, and silly dialog, Jungle
Raiders rarely fails to entertain. Although it does get slow at times,
Jungle Raiders is kept fun and enjoyable through Margheriti's light-weight
direction and eye for interesting cinematography. Of course the film has a
slew of quirks often seen in Italian cinema, such as unfunny, out-of-place
one-liners, bad guys idiotically jumping to conclusions, silly fight
scenes, and goofiest of all; a Malay kid (horribly dubbed by what sounds
like an old woman) with a curious kinship with a cobra. Andrea Ridolfi
provides the goofy, yet likable music, although his scoring doesn't seem
to fit in with the subject matter quite as well as it did later in Alien
From the Deep. Margheriti's miniatures (particularly in the toy car
chase scenes) look unusually tiny and fake, but the high degree of almost
non-stop action helps to overlook such flaws. A low budget, but inspired
and fun film, especially for fans of Italian action films.
Although the film somehow achieved a PG rating in the United States, it
features slashed jugulars, beheadings, impalings, and a gory shootings, so
it is definitely not much of a children's movie.
Reviews by: Mike
Martinez (courtesy
of his website www.insane.nu)
