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Rating:  - A largely forgetable film with a few minutes of greatness at the end
This lesser known John Wayne film is the poster child for what happens when a film is miscast. There are many reasons why this film is largely invisible among many better Wayne films, but the primary reason in my view is that there is absolutely no connection between the the three main characters. The actors couldn't relate to each other, and the result is a dry, stilted performance by all. John Wayne is horribly miscast in this role, he is too `American' and too closely identified with the American Western. He is not at all convincing as the `African adventurer'. The biggest problem with this film is Rossano Brazzi, though. He makes absolutely no connection with either Loren or Wayne. Other problems with this film include poor dialogue and a lack of clarity as to where this film was going (is it an adventure film? a character study of two men in a love triangle? a Christian-themed film?).
The basic premise of this film is a search in the desert for lost treasure in the Sahara. John Wayne's character leads Brazzi out into the desert in search of a lost city and lost treasure supposedly discovered by Brazzi's father several years earlier. Loren plays a prostitute in Timbuctu who joins the pair. Coming several years after the vastly better `King Solomon's Mines', this film shares several similar plot threads. In spite of the hyperbole, this really isn't much of an adventure film. It is more of a vehicle to get the Italian hottie out in the desert alone with two very different men and explore their reactions and underlying motivations.
The first 3/4 of this film are largely forgettable, but I've rated it at 3 stars because the film makes a dramatic recovery in the last 20 minutes. Brazzi is mostly gone, and it is in the last few sequences when we see some real connection between Wayne and Loren. Brazzi treated Loren like a prostitute, and Wayne treats her like a woman who deserves respect, no matter what she has done. Both Loren and Wayne discover themselves and each other in the final few sequences. Wayne has a great line about faith in God and faith in men. The bottom line is that this is a seriously flawed film on several levels, although the final twenty minutes make it worth the price of admission.
Rating:  - Legend of the Lost
Although I am a dedicated fan of John Wayne and dearly love his movies, I found this movie, which I have never seen before, to be slow and for lack of a better word boring. I will view it again and add it to my collection because John Wayne is in it.
Rating:  - Great classic flick!
This film is very much in the genre of Strange Cargo, which I hope will be released on DVD as well. Both movies involve the self discovery of the main characters and the titanic struggle of good and evil.
Rating:  - A Pretty Good Flic
I first saw this movie when I was 10 and was completely captivated. Of course, I've seen this movie on tv multiple times over the years and I never fail to fall under the movie's spell.
John Wayne as Joe January, drunken guide. Sophia Loren as Dita, a prostitute...do they ever look this good? Brazzi as a starry eyed treasure hunter and do-gooder. What a package. Henry Hathaway did a terrific job directing and Jack Cardiff does a terrific job with the photography.
Unlike other reviewers I think the soundtrack is perfectly aligned with the movie. The movie uses the desert as a fourth character. In the movie the desert is set up to be a strange and eerie place, especially the lost city they eventually end up in. Lost city, lost treasure, and finally a betrayl. The music supports this very well.
I give this movie pretty high marks. The story line is very credible. Brazzi's character shows up wanting to go into the desert to search for his father. Waynes character is hired. Before they can leave, Brazzi charms Sohia Loren's character and she manages to show up in the desert at Wayne's and Brazzi's first camp, escorted by desert nomads. Together the three travel the desert. They eventually end up out of water and stumble into a lost city, the real goal of Brazzi. Given some of the trite and predictable movies touted as good cinema today, even this movie makes them look pale.
Watch the movie for yourself. Unless you're one of those people that has to have a movie loaded with special effects, you should enjoy the experience.
Rating: - Strange movie invites unfairly harsh criticism
I had just seen Houseboat and really wanted to catch another Sophia flick. There is a criminal lack of her movies on DVD. With all the harsh criticisms of this movie, I bought it hesitantly only because I couldn't find many Sophia movies. There's a strange flavor to this movie, almost as if something about it was experimental. And the score is just plain weird. The story doesn't have a strong punch line by the end, but it does come to a logical conclusion that some may not find satisfying, but I did.
The best part of the movie were the good lines they gave John Wayne and the great comic timing with which he delivered them. In this movie he seems to have perfected the kind of character Harrison Ford played in the Star Wars and Indiana Jones series. While Sophia Loren is breathtakingly beautiful, with her talent and ability to project personality, she would still be fun to watch even if she was as plain as a blank sheet of paper. (Thank goodness she is gorgeous, though.)
Maybe what disappoints some people is that this movie appears to set itself up to be a wild action adventure, but instead this is more of a character development story before the time this kind of thing was popular in the late 1960's and early 1970's. It's a good movie to display some of the Duke's abilities to display the kind of character he often plays from a different perspective. And of course, Sophia is Sophia, bless her heart, and the packaging it comes in.
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