Treasure of the Amazon

Disjointed jungle adventure follows three disparate groups of characters as they search for diamonds in the Amazon and encounter savage natives. Generally boring, but briefly enlivened by some awesomely gory scenes (crabs!), and a half-nude amazon fleshed-out (no pun intended) by Sonia Infante. Location shooting also helps, although some of the cast members look like they would be more comfortable in a nursing home. ** out of 4.

This Mexican adventure is a real treat for fans of cult movies.It has plenty of gore and violence including decapitations,throat cuttings etc.The scene where one guy has his eyes gouged out by some bloodthirsty crabs is the goriest bit and it reminds me the spiders sequence from Lucio Fulci's masterful "The Beyond"(1981).The cast is decent-a horror veteran Donald Pleasance("Halloween","Paganini Horror")shines as a Nazi adventurer.So if you are a fan of gory adventure movies like "Mountain of the Cannibal God" or "Cut and Run" give this one a look."The Treasure of the Amazon" is not easy to find though!

This is the best Indiana Jones knockoff I have ever seen. What it lacks in originality it makes up for in stupidity. Catchy and original names for characters like Gringo and Paco. Cheesy and lame effects make for fun. The props are about as pathetic as you can get. It stars a real hard ass (Gringo) who doesn't take crap from anyone or anything. I was also pleased by the work of Donald Pleasance. Donald plays really crappy villains well, if you can check him out in the movie Puma Man, he plays the ultimate in villainy, Kobras. Anyway, some of my favorite scenes are the ones with graphic violence that is so cheesy, Kraft invested in its use on Macaroni. For example, when Gringo cuts off an indian's finger, the severed finger looks like a carrot with ketchup on it. Good laughs if you watch while drinking lots of beer.

Gratuitous nudity, violence, gore, "action," over the hill stars looking of a payday and unintentional comedy. With that said it's at least 20 minutes longer than it needed to be which will test your feelings of it's so good it's bad to just bad. Luckily it saves the best for last with a third act filled with crosses and double crosses.

A pretty decent adventure film from 1985 offers us several small groups of characters, each going into the wilds of the Amazon seeking different kinds of treasure. The movie is downright imaginative in the unpredictable kinds of trouble they encounter seeking out gold, diamonds or oil.

The good thing about the movie is how it depends on characterization although the visuals are great too. It's much better than most of the clueless action movies of 2007. For one thing the camera holds steady instead of shaking all over creation trying to fake suspense. Most of the 2007 era cheap tricks --- such as the vim vim vim vim sound tracks weren't invented yet.

Expect a disparate bunch of characters, mostly bad, a couple of girls with legs, and more fearful jungle creatures than you ever guessed existed.

After the movie, buzz down to Manaus, Brazil and spend a few days seeing things first hand.