Samson and the 7 Miracles of the World (1961)

It’s Gordon Scott who dons the loin cloth here as he tries to save the young Chinese Princess (Yôko Tani) from a fate worse than death. She is the daughter of the murdered Emperor and a much prized asset for the leader of the Mongols (Leonardo Severini) to consolidate his power. Luckily for her, our intrepid hero arrives just in time to save her brother “Tai Sing” (Chu Lai Chit) from a tiger and together with her imperial feistiness they unite with her late father’s allies and set off to regain a throne that was brutally usurped. Naturally, “Garak” isn’t best pleased that these flies are in his ointment, and with his own scheming “Liu Tai” (Hélène Chanel) and the burly guards captain (Franco Ressel) on his team it’s not going to be a cakewalk for our muscle-bound “Maciste”. It’s all a bit procedural, certainly, but this has had some thought put into the production and the whole thing is stitched together in a way more technically professional fashion than so many other films from this genre. The story allows for a little more depth from the characters and there’s plenty of action and plotting to complement the oriental mythology and the horseplay that this provides. Scott is also not a bad actor. No, he will never win a BAFTA, but he knew what was required of him here and his own limitations - especially when it came to his seriously concrete style of dialogue delivery. He realised that he wasn’t employed for his voice but because he could start an earthquake just by thumping the ground! (OK, so some of this is also a bit far-fetched, too). If you like your peplum lively and with some attention payed to the edits and the continuity, and don’t mind the odd shot that has crept in from other films, then you ought to quite enjoy this