Medusa

George Hamilton shows why he became more popular for his tan than acting ability with "Medusa," a terribly insipid attempt at a crime thriller with would-be supernatural undertones. The plot...ummmmm...doesn't really make any sense (and not in the good David Lynch way). Okay, imagine Andrezej Zulawski's "Possession," with made-for-TV production values, none of the surreal sh1t, and a bunch of cop-thriller baloney. Set against a Greek backdrop, George (our hero?) plays a character more obnoxious and muggy than what you'd find in a typical "Saturday Night Live" sketch; anyway, he runs afoul of scenery-chewing gangster Cameron Mitchell (whose presence in any movie is like the official stamp of bad taste) who is whacking a bunch of guys(?); George spends the rest of the film running around Greece, wooing (and killing) random females, and finally fleeing to 'Atlantis' on a boat with his unusually devoted sister. Some existential hokum about the body dying, but the soul living forever is tossed in like an afterthought. Blandly directed by Gordon Hessler, "Medusa" is a slow-moving bore, its only amusing moments belonging to Mitchell ("The Toolbox Murders"), who gives an epic bath-house speech that is brilliant in its own head-scratching incoherence.

George Hamilton. What an argument for birth control. I have never seen this guy in anything worthwhile, yet he still seems to hang around. This terrible film involves his being tiresome and obnoxious. He goes from place to place, acting like an idiot, drunk, living a life he wants to continue. If this is why he needs the money, don't give him any. He serves no purpose at all. The title of the movie is misleading. If someone can explain it to me. I found it in a horror collection. I thought it was about Greek mythology. There is no Medusa. That's the thing that when looked at would turn a person to stone. Just about the same thing happened to me. Only I was snoring the whole time. There is nothing campy or bad movieish about this. It is an hour and half of dreadful dullness. Oh yes, George is known for his tan.

That's one of the biggest problems i have with this movie. i have NO idea why it's called Medusa. She doesn't appear in the movie, there's no mention of her, and it's not even one of those cheesy things like "cat on a hot tin roof" where they use her name in a metaphor one time. they NEVER mention her or allude to her. EVER. if you name a movie "Medusa", then it better FRIGGIN HAVE MEDUSA IN IT! but enough of that, how's the actual movie? well it comes in the chilling movie 50 pack, and that's probably the only reason anybody would see this stinker. and it has a problem a lot of the other movies do. number 1. it's not a horror movie and therefore does not belong in a horror set. number 2. it's boring. BORING BORING BORING. God how do all these 70's movies keep getting more and more boring? but OK. lets discuss plot. Guy (Hamilton) needs to find the new will to destroy it so he and his sis can get all the inheritance money so he can pay off the mob. along the way people die. why? i'm not sure. there's really no justification of WHY these people are dying, they just kind of are. This movie was actually incredibly hard to follow. There were several characters doing things that i didn't know what they were doing and i didn't really care.

this movie made me stop several times to take breaks. and as a film lover. i hate doing that. i despise stopping movies and taking breaks. i saw epic movie in one sitting. i should be able to sit through anything. But not Medusa, oh no. you have to break this crap up.

Even the kills are dull as dirt in this movie. there's a lot of strangulations and offscreen deaths with no tension because i couldn't tell who was dying half the time because of oh yeah. the lighting! This movie must have a hard on for night shots because over half of this movie is filmed like someone forgot to bring a flashlight on their camping trip. The picture gets so dark you can't see who's doing what or what's going on. it's confusing and stupid.

The payoff (if you can call it that) isn't really a payoff because the beginning of the movie shows you what happens at the end. so it's not really a payoff.

Unless you want to see all 50 movies in your box set, (in which case know you're in for a boring one here) for the love of GOD do not search for this movie by itself, but if you HAVE to sit through it, just know you're in for a snoozer.

Medusa gets 2 scenes in pitch black dark, out of 10.

With a bow to Sunset Boulevard with the late George Hamilton narrating as William Holden did in that Billy Wilder classic just how it came that he got himself dead, Medusa did an impossible thing. It has the beautiful scenery of the Grecian Isles, photographed in color and it's in one dull and confusing picture.

When Hamilton and his sister Luciana Paluzzi are not living totally useless lives as international playboy and playgirl, he's got a very interesting sideline killing people just for the thrill of it and he's got Luciana cleaning up after him.

One of the folks he kills is a guy who does a little of it himself in his line of work, gangster Cameron Mitchell. That one might have had some rational basis because Hamilton's in deep and he's been cut out of his late father's will so no payback money from that source. Truth be told Mitchell's on the hook for that particular bad investment with his bosses.

In the end one really doesn't care one way or the other how Geroge got dead.

Confusing tale of hell-raising playboy (Hamilton), a rogue mercenary thief based in Greece and living a bizarre double life as a cold blooded murderer. Enchanting though she may be, Paluzzi's Medusa connection is tenuous, instead the film focuses on Hamilton's bloody conquests with a succession of exotic imports, among them, Alana Stewart and the beautiful (and unknown) Nora Valsami. The rub of course is that Hamilton never actually recalls doing the deeds, while the manipulative Paluzzi disposes of the evidence (complete with mop and bucket) before suspicion is aroused.

Takis Kavouras is effective as the no-nonsense, yet ineffectual police inspector, while Cameron Mitchell is wasted as a local mobster who ends up, literally, swimming with the fishes in a sadistic demise. Hamilton is suitably hammy as he feigns drunken stupor one moment, fractured lunatic on the edge the next. The relationship between Paluzzi and his character is complex and, to my mind, never properly revealed (there's an implied incestuousness never realised). Paluzzi, for her part is assured and suitably sinister as the title character, with just a hint of the mythology to make the title linkage (revealed in the film's final act).

Authentic and attractive location work, combined with some effective chills and suspense are hampered by the convoluted storyline, making for a very uneven thriller. "Medusa" seems to dramatically change track at intermission, switching from a routine crime drama to a twisted "Bonnie & Clyde". Director Hessler's plot is full of sadism, lust and jealousy - just the ingredients necessary for a Greek tragedy of this ilk, but it ultimately lacks cohesion and sense.