cinema history class: the lion man

Session: Wild, Wild Films From a Wild, Wild World, Week 3
Movie: Lion Man* (1975)
Directed by Natuch Baitan

As always, there may be spoilers here. And the trailer may be NSFW and/or NSFL

Plot:
A prince, born after the his father is murdered, is abandoned and raised by Lions. As an adult, he returns for revenge. Hilarity ensues.

Reaction:

This was disconcerting from the start -- we're thrown into the middle of a battle scene with no preamble or exposition. It felt like I was watching a trailer, and I was expecting a narrator's voice to say something like "brave warriors battled over..." But the narration never came and I finally realized that we were watching the actual movie.

The producers kind of threw everything into this story. Tarzan and Robin Hood are obvious influences, and some scenes reminded me of the biblical book of Exodus. And there's thewhole trope of brothers finding themselves on opposite sides of a war.. But with all of those elements, this was largely a garbled mess that was hard to follow.

Even so, there were parts that I found quite enjoyable in a sort of "WTF did I just see?" kind of way. When the king dies early on, it's quite a sight to behold.

The fight scenes were oddly choreographed to feel like ballet. And that feeling was strengthened by the endlessly repeating fight music. I don't know the name of the piece but it was reminiscent of Khachaturian's "Sabre Dance." There was an odd theatrical beauty to a lot of these sequences.

Is this what Turkish movies are like?

Ratings:

Me: 6
Christina: 9.2
Ethan: 4
Sean: 2 out of 4

*AKA The Sword and the Claw