Treasure of the Four Crowns

I remember seeing this movie when I was 11 with my brother, 14. That was in 1982 and we still make fun of it and use it to make jokes. I remember only two crowns and no real purpose to the

3-D. This was just a bad movie. Not even good for a " bad movie night." Just stay away from it. Save that time in your life for something important, like cleaning lint form your bellybutton.

Ok this movie is a ripoff of Raiders of the Lost Ark, and yes it's a very cheap movie, filmed with the worst lens, and film stock they could find, and yes you can see the strings, and yes lots of things don't make sense, but if you just watch it and try not to take it seriously it's actually pretty good.

The first 22 minutes of the movie is a bizarre take on the opening scene of Raiders of the Lost Ark, filled with traps, birds, dogs, ghosts, and lots and lots of fire. Yes none of it makes sense, but it's also kinda awesome, and there isn't a single line of dialogue the whole time which makes it even better.

After that people do start talking and we are given the basics of the plot, where are protagonist, whose name is JT Striker, is tasked with retrieving two of these four crowns from an evil cult leader who plans on using them four evil. Then along with four other accomplices Striker infiltrates the cults castle compound.

Now the movie is actually acted fairly well, and as a heist movie it's pretty good, it's only with the supernatural stuff does the movie go really off the rails. But even where it gets weird and crazy it's enjoyable for the simple WTF factor. Things are flying at the screen, there's fire everywhere, and yes you can see all the strings but it's still awesome.

The movie is fun if you just let it be fun and not expect much out of an Italian knockoff of Raiders of the Lost Ark.

I could see the producers showing this to investors and saying "this is the future of movies". It's kind of overdone, like showing the most extreme examples of the 3D effect really getting in people's faces. That, seemingly, is the only reason for it's existence. It was part of a short revival of the 3D process, and i remember seeing it in a theater and thinking at the time how cool it was.

What's the plot? Well, a guy in a red windbreaker walks around and does some "treasure hnting" stuff, while things pop up at him (and us) in a vaguely surprising way. There really isn't any other plot than that. It could be argued that it was based on the popularity of "raiders of the lost ark", but you could actually argue just as convincingly that it's based on "the ghost and mr. Chicken". Recommended just for the flat out gimmicky-ness of it.

Treasure of the Four Crown in 3-D is the heartwarming story of a man suffering from impotency (Tony Anthony) who races through Southern California with the government closing in. A hypnotist (Ana Obregon) reluctantly helps in the daring plot. Gene Quintano disturbs in the role of fetishist "Edmond". While the performances are rather uneven overall, you won't forget Kate Levan in her breakout role as "Possessed Woman".

The film though cannot be fully appreciated unless viewed in 3-D. Only then do the strings attached to the "floating key" and the fact that there's only two crowns shown in the movie (though a third is briefly mentioned) truly jump out a come alive for the viewer.

J.T. Striker (Tony Anthony) is an adventurer / fortune hunter hired by his associates Edmond (Gene Quintano) and Professor Montgomery (Francisco Villena) to get his hands on the legendary Four Crowns, which when obtained can make a person all powerful. This he has to do because diabolical religious cult leader Brother Jonas (Emiliano Redondo) is using them to control his mindless flock. To accomplish his task, J.T. gathers together a bunch of his old friends: the weary old Socrates (Francisco Rabal), the drunken Rick (Jerry Lazarus), and the super sexy Liz (Ana Obregon).

You know you're in trouble when the opening "Star Wars" style crawl is sorely lacking in any sort of punctuation. This basically amiable movie, rushed into production in order to cash in on the success of the previous Cannon Group 3-D feature, "Comin' at Ya!", is entertaining in spurts. Its extreme crudeness and cheesiness (one can clearly see the strings that are manipulating objects) could have been forgiven if only the movie had more energy. It moves along much too slowly, and there's overkill in terms of exposition. The acting from most of the cast is pretty bland. The filmmakers thrust as many objects into the camera as they can.

Helping to uplift "Treasure of the Four Crowns" (starting with that title, it's all too obvious which hit movie was a big influence on this one) to a degree are its WTF moments, its admittedly amusing opening set piece that goes on for over 20 minutes without dialogue, its absolutely priceless climax, and a wonderful, stirring Ennio Morricone music score that truly deserved a better movie.

This just isn't as much fun as this viewer would have liked.

Five out of 10.