This thrilling picture deals with an adventurer named Hamilton (Michael Dudikiff) who decides to go in search of the lost city in the Amazon jungle , entering the dangerous world of a forgotten tribe . A motley crew of other people (Donald Pleasence , Herbert Lom , L.Q. Jones) in search of wealth , tripping over Neo-Nazi scientific and war criminals . But to their terror they find out that they have bit off more than they can think . As a Nazi doctor (Rovert Vaughn) , Joseph Mengele-alike , still doing his experiments on people in the same place and endeavouring to reconstitute the Nazi movement from his Amazonian sanctuary by creating an army and a deadly weapon .
This absurd and mindless adventure/thriller deals with a misfit crew who travels Amazons , being led by star Michael Dudikoff along with other people with reasons of their own decide to join him for the wealth of the lost city . The picture contains frenetic action , thrills , intrigue , shootouts with no much sense and a silly finale . The story is a crossover between Indiana Jones adventures , ¨Boys from Brazil¨ and films about tribes of Amazons . But it results to be too complex to be harmlessly agreeable . The acting of the little interesting characters is unbelievable and unconvincing . Good support cast , though widely wasted , including notorious secondaries such as Robert Vaughn as Wolfgang Manteuffel , Donald Pleasence as Heinrich Spaatz ,Herbert Lom as Colonel Ricardo Diaz and special mention to L.Q. Jones or Justus McQueen who still today playing . Based on an Alistair MacLean's novel , a best-selling author , whose stories have been much better rendered in other occasions . Alistair employed the pseudonym Ian Stuart several times in order to prove that his books were best-sellers due to their content and not solely because his name appeared on the cover. This is one of the several adaptations based on his novels and most of them set in WW2 , such as the successful ¨Where the eagles dare¨ and ¨Guns of Navarone¨ . Furthermore, ¨Ice Station Cebra¨ that is the first of two movies based on an Alistair MacLean novel set in rugged icy and snowy terrain , the second would be ¨Bear Island¨ . ¨Ice Station Zebra¨ is one of two filmed Alistair MacLean adaptations directed by John Sturges , the other was ¨The Satan Bug¨ made and released about three years earlier . ¨River of Death¨ produced in low budget by Avi Lerner and British Harry Alan Towers was middlingly directed by Steve Carver . He's an expert on action/thriller genre such as ¨Capone¨, ¨Big Bad Mama¨, ¨Steel¨, Drum¨ and directed two successful hits for Chuck Norris as ¨Lone McQuade¨ and ¨An eye for eye¨. His last films have been failed as ¨The wolves¨, ¨Dead center¨ and this ¨River of death¨ . Rating : below average . Too ridiculous for the complexity to be worth watching .
