La leggenda di Enea (1962)

Director:

Giorgio Venturini

Writers:

Albert Band (adaptation)
Ugo Liberatore (writer)

Release Date:

1963 (USA)

Genre:

Fantasy | Adventure

Tagline:

His mighty sword avenged a nation!

Plot:

Etruscan slavers opress the Trojans, leading to a revolt, started by Aeneas and his fellow gladiators. |

Plot Keywords:

Trojan | Gladiator | Settlement | Flashback | Troy

Cast

  (Cast overview, first billed only)

Steve Reeves	...	Enea (Aeneas)
Carla Marlier	...	Lavinia, Latino's Daughter
Liana Orfei	...	Camilla, Queen of the Vulga
Giacomo Rossi-Stuart	...	Eurialo
Gianni Garko	...	Turno, King of the Rusalie
Mario Ferrari	...	King Latino
Lulla Selli	...	Queen Amata, Latino's Wife
Maurice Poli	...	Mezensio, Turno's Henchman
Luciano Benetti	...	Phalandre
Pietro Capanna	...	Bisia
Enzo Fiermonte	...	Acate
Charles Band	...	Ascanio
Benito Stefanelli	...	Niso
Nerio Bernardi	...	Drance
Adriano Vitale	...	Dancer

Also Known As:

Conquérants héroiques (France)
The Avenger (USA)
The Last Glory of Troy (USA) (TV title)
War of the Trojans (UK)

Runtime:

USA:95 min | Italy:105 min

Country:

Italy | France | Yugoslavia

Language:

Italian

Color:

Color (Eastmancolor)

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono

Certification:

Portugal:M/12

Company:

Mercury Films

Trivia:

The actor playing Niso, Benito Stefanelli, also did some of the stunts, trained the other actors in fencing and choreographed the sword-fights.

Goofs:

Anachronisms: Early in the movie, an army is seen passing by a maize field; this plant, however, was cultivated in Europe only since 1525, having been brought to the continent by Christopher Columbus.

Movie Connections:

Featured in Dusk to Dawn Drive-In Trash-o-Rama Show Vol. 7 (2002) (V)

THE AVENGER (Giorgio Rivalta and Albert Band, 1962) **

This is an unnecessary and very much inferior sequel to THE Trojan HORSE (1961), evidently made on a reduced budget (though the murky, pan-and-scan print I watched certainly did no favors to it or the scenes from the original which were interspersed into the narrative as flashbacks!); Steve Reeves reprises his role of Enea - whose lineage, we are told, eventually led to Romulus and Remus and the founding of Rome (incidentally, the actor appeared in a peplum about that very event called DUEL OF THE TITANS [1961]!) - but his performance here is somewhat mechanical and less convincing...though that may be due to the English dubbing, whereas I had watched the earlier film in Italian!!

As a whole, THE AVENGER (the print I watched bore the title THE LAST GLORY OF TROY, given to it when sold to TV) is only marginally better than the ordinary peplum: the plot is rather dreary this time around, in comparison to the fascinating events depicted in the original; the cast - despite the presence of Euro-Cult regulars like Gianni Garko (essaying the role of the villain) and Giacomo Rossi-Stuart (effectively dispatched by a hail of arrows in the style of Akira Kurosawa's THRONE OF BLOOD [1957]!) - is less interesting; and the battle sequences are only memorable for the ridiculously-shaped helmets with which the warriors on both fronts are saddled!!