URSUS IN THE LAND OF FIRE (1963)

 

PHENOMENALITY: *uncanny*
MYTHICITY: *poor*
FRYEAN MYTHOS: *adventure*
CAMPBELLIAN FUNCTION: *sociological*

LAND OF FIRE was the sixth Ursus film but the third and last to star Ed Fury, who originated the role in the initial 1961 movie, easily the best of the nine. FIRE, though, proves nearly forgettable.

One big problem with the script is that the title seems to promise some big conflict stemming from the hero's encounter with some entities in the "Land of Fire." Maybe there are some nuances left out of the English translation, but I doubt it, because the Land of Fire is just this volcano region neighboring an unnamed kingdom. For some reason the inhabitants consider the volcano-area taboo, but they don't seem to worship the volcano or anything. The taboo territory barely even affects the plot, which, as you might guess, is once more about who controls the kingdom.

Ursus belongs to some tribe of shepherds living nearby the Big Kingdom. He has a meet-cute with Princess Diana (Lucianna Gilli) when she falls from her horse into a lake. Not far away, Diana's cousin Mila (Claudia Mori) and the king's general Hamilcar (Adriano Micantoni) watch but make no attempt to succor Diana. They take custody of Diana after Ursus rescues her, but later Hamilcar misrepresents Ursus' actions as an attempt to kidnap the princess. The king sends soldiers with Hamilcar to apprehend Ursus, but he takes refuge in the taboo Land of Fire. However, this has a down side in that he gets buried in a landslide.

Hamilcar then gets condemned by the local priest for having let his men transgress on the taboo terrain, and the king seems okay with letting his general get executed. Hamilcar then kills the king and enacts a coup with his soldiers. In an attempt to legitimize his sudden ascendance to the throne, he marries Mila for her connection to the royal bloodline.

However, Ursus survives the landslide and makes common cause with Diana to usurp the man who killed her father. Though Hamilcar is unpopular with his people, Ursus has no army to call upon. Then Hamilcar and Mila put on a tournament to distract the populace with bread and circuses. Ursus disguises himself and contends with other gladiators at the tournament, hoping to undermine the new king by exposing his crimes to the people. But Mila spots Diana in the crowd and smells a rat. Hamilcar forces Ursus to try a game of tug-of-war with chariots pulling him in opposite directions. Being the hero, Ursus wins and challenges Hamilcar to combat. The ex-general simply forces Ursus to fight five warriors, but he wins this game too. However, Hamilcar simply imprisons Ursus (in a cell with a huge stone block pressing down on him) and Diana. 

During this section of the film Mila gets her big scene, relating to Diana a deep envy of her cousin's royal prerogative, and then she punctuates her enmity by whipping Diana. But Hamilcar decides he can placate the people by marrying the legitimate princess, and that's it for poor Mila. Diana's only hope is for Ursus to break free and destroy the usurper.

Fury doesn't get any outstanding fight-scenes, and both he and Gilli come off like stock characters. Mori and Micantoni aren't really any better drawn, but perhaps because they're the villains, they show a little more verve in their performances. FIRE was director Giorgio Simonelli's only peplum (though he may have done one or two period-historicals outside the strongman-genre), and I get the impression he rushed through the assignment as quickly as possible, just as the script cobbles together all the expected cliches. Simonelli probably found his true metier directing farces for the Italian comedy team of Franco and Ciccio, including the effort best known in English-language circles, THE TWO CRAZY SECRET AGENTS.