
            This desert epic about a Libyan hero who helped his nation fend off an
Italian invasion in 1929. Anthony Quinn stars as Omar Mukhtar, who
organizes Libyan forces to hold off the encroaching Italian troops
under General Rodolfo Graziana (Oliver Reed), who are trying to gain
a foothold on Libyan soil under direct orders from the Italian dictator
Mussolini (Rod Steiger). With the persistence of Mukhtar, the Libyans,
battling the tanks and guns of the Italian army with their Bedouin
troops on horseback, managed to hold off y the Italians for twenty
years, until Mukhtar was finally captured and executed.
    

The Lion of the Desert


            Handsomely-mounted historical epic concerns the birth of the
Islamic faith and the story of the prophet Mohammed -- who, in
accordance with the tenants of Islam, is never to be depicted (as this is against certain Islamic schools of thought). In Mecca in the 7th century, Mohammed is visited by a
vision of the Angel Gabriel, who urges him to lead the people of
Mecca to cast aside the 300 idols of Kaaba and instead worship the
one true God, speaking out against the corrupt political and military
leaders who rule Mecca. With the help of his uncle, a brave warrior
named Hamza (Anthony Quinn), Mohammed and his followers return
to Mecca to liberate the city in the name of God. The Message
(originally screened in the U.S. as Mohammed, Messenger of God)
proved to be highly controversial during its production and initial
release. Unfounded rumors had it that Mohammed would not only be
depicted in the film, but that he was to be played by Charlton Heston
or Peter O'Toole. This resulted in protests by some Muslim, until director Moustapha Akkad hired a staff of respected Islamic clerics as technical advisors. The Message was shot in two
versions, one in English and one in Arabic (entitled Al-Ris-Alah), with
different actors taking over some of the roles due to language
requirements.
    

The Message


            Approximately 2,500 years ago, the Athenian tragedians -- Sophocles, Aeschylus, Euripides -- said it all in the most eloquent and poetic terms. Everyone else has followed in their footsteps, from Goethe and Shakespeare to Mann and Beckett. More than ever, the ancient tragedies are relevant today, for their subject matter is the universal nature of man: his hunger for power, his greed, and his lust. The plays are the confirmation of the human tragedy for all times, and all places. The Greek myths upon which these tragedies are based combine marvelous storytelling with symbolic associations that are the foundations of the collective unconscious of our modern world.Euripides left behind some of the most astonishing expressions of human passion and compassion ever set into dramatic form. His plays express a range of delight, hope, and terror unmatched in classical drama. Of these, certainly none display more range than the inexorable bloodletting of the stories of the House of Atreus and the Trojan War, which Euripides treats with characteristic balance in several of his tragedies.For the cinema, Greek myths and ancient tragedies are made-to-order screenplays. Many film directors have tried to take advantage of this gold mine, with varying degrees of success. For some, they have proven to be very expensive failures, as exemplified recently by a prominent Hollywood director, Wolfgang Petersen. Other directors, reworking particular tragedies, have produced freshly reincarnated masterpieces. Such is "Iphigenia" (1977), by Greek director Mikhali (Michael) Cacoyannis, based on Euripedes' tragedy, "Iphigenia in Aulis.""Iphigenia" relates the story of an incident that took place just prior to the Trojan War. Helen, wife of Menelaus, king of Sparta, had eloped to Troy with Paris, son of King Priam. Menelaus' brother, Agamemnon, King of Argos, had assembled a huge Greek expeditionary force on the shores of Aulis that he planned to lead to Troy in order to reclaim his brother's wife. The Goddess Artemis, taking revenge for an insult done to her by Agamemnon's father, King Atreus, created a meteorological problem by sending storms, or calms, to prevent the Greek fleet from sailing to Troy. This is where the film begins.The Greek armies have waited for what seems an eternity for the winds to rise, blow eastward, and carry their boats to Troy. The men are tired, bored, hungry, and anxious to go into battle. In a public relations gesture intended to placate the men, Agamemnon (Costa Kazakos) directs them to go and help themselves to a flock of sheep that belong to the nearby temple dedicated to Artemis. In the ensuing mayhem, Artemis' sacred deer is accidentally slain. Calchas (Dimitris Aronis), high priest of Artemis' temple, is incensed by the sacrilege. He delivers an oracle to Agamemnon, with Menelaus (Kostas Karras) and Odysseus (Christos Tsagas) also present. The oracle, according to Calchas emanating from Artemis herself, demands that Agamemnon offers a sacrifice to atone for the defiling of the holy ground and the killing of the sacred stag. Once the sacrifice is made, Artemis will consent for the armies to sail to Troy by allowing the winds to blow eastward. The sacrifice is to be Agamemnon's first-born daughter, Iphigenia (Tatiana Papamoschou). The news of "the deal" soon spreads through the armies' ranks, although the nature of the sacrifice remains temporarily unknown to them.After considerable argument and recrimination between the two brothers, Agamemnon sends a message to his wife Clytemnestra (Irene Papas), in Argos. In his letter, Agamemnon is asking his wife to send their daughter Iphigenia, to Aulis, ostensibly to wed Achilles (Panos Mihalopoulos). Achilles, leader of the Mymirdon army, is a member of Agamemnon's expeditionary forces. Against her husband's instructions, Clytemnestra decides to accompany her daughter to Aulis.From this point forward to the climax, the tempo and the development of the tragedy stretches tighter. Agamemnon has second thoughts about his plan. After confessing his ruse to his old servant (Angelos Yannoulis), Agamemnon dispatches him with another letter to Clytemnestra that reveals the truth and tells her to cancel Iphigenia's trip. The old man is intercepted on the road by Menelaus' men and returned to Aulis. In the ensuing confrontation, Menelaus rebukes his brother for betraying the honor of Greece for his personal benefit. Agamemnon argues persuasively, and convinces Menelaus that no war is worth the life of a child. Following their understanding, Agamemnon decides to personally carry the letter to Clytemnestra. Too late. A messenger announces the imminent arrival of the wedding party, which includes Clytemnestra. Agamemnon is stunned by the announcement, and he resigns himself to the worst: "From now on fate rules. Not I."Clytemnestra arrives at Aulis filled with happiness over her daughter's prospective wedding the famous Myrmidon leader, Achilles. Iphigenia's first meeting with her father is couched in double entendre which is devastating: as she talks about her upcoming wedding, he talks about her upcoming sacrifice. They use the same words, but the meanings could not be more horribly apart. When Agamemnon meets with Clytemnestra, he still vainly tries to convince her to return to Argos without witnessing the "wedding." Clytemnestra and Achilles soon learn the truth from Agamemnon's old servant. Achilles is overcome with shame and rage when he learns of the deceit that has involved him in this tragedy. Clytemnestra rises into a fury, and in desperation, confronts her husband one last time. Agamemnon, however, is trapped in his own web and cannot now back down, as Odysseus has threatened to inform the army of the exact nature of the sacrifice if Agamemnon does not follow through on the oracle's demand.Meanwhile, preparations for the sacrifice are proceeding. "Let's not delay, the wind is rising," says Calchas. Odysseus finally forces the situation when he tells the army who is to be the sacrificial victim. Now, there is no turning back. Iphigenia briefly escapes, but she is soon recaptured by Odysseus' soldiers. In a poignant scene, suggestive of the scene of the slowly dying sacred stag at the beginning of the film, Iphigenia is caught lying down, panting and out of breath, "dying," on the forest floor. Her captors return her to the camp to face her executioners. Now resigned to her fate, she has a last, heartrending meeting with her father, before walking up the hill toward her final destiny. While Agamemnon, surrounded by his cheering army, watches helplessly on the steps below, Iphigenia reaches the top and is quickly grabbed by Calchas. At that same moment, upon seeing the wind rising. Agamemnon runs up the steps and as he reaches the top of hill, his face reflects what we assume is the sight of the dead Iphigenia. However, Cacoyannis chooses to leave the ending somewhat ambiguous: is Iphigenia supernaturally whisked away, as in Euripides' play, or is she sacrificed, in agreement with the tradition? Not having Agamemnon's eyes, we'll never know for sure.A strong wind now blows. The men run to the beach, push their ships into the sea, and sail toward Troy and its promised treasures.
    

Iphigenia


            
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The Odyssey


            In the small Southern Italian village of Accendura, three local boys, Bruno, Michele, and Tonino are engaged in mischief and other activities. Guiseppe Barra (Vito Passeri) a local simpleton and peeping tom, who is seen spying on two rowdy swinging couples, is surprised when which the three boys appear behind him and yell out, "Giuseppe's a big baby!" which goads him into a state of bitter resentment.Meanwhile, in the hills surrounding the village, a reclusive Gypsy witch named La Magiara (Florinda Bolkan), is conducting sinister black magic ceremonies, first by digging up the skeletal remains of an infant, and then plunging pins through the heads of three tiny clay dolls. It makes it clear that these are the three youths taunting Giuseppe.When Michele returns home, his housekeeper mother urges him to deliver some orange juice to their employer, Patrizia (Barbara Bouchet) a young woman from Milan who is laying low in the village after a drug scandal. It becomes apparent that Patrizia offers undefined sexual favors to the local adolescents when she's shown sexually taunting Michele.When Bruno Lo Casio goes missing, a media circus begins as reporters from all over Italy converge on the town. One of them is Andrea Martelli (Tomas Milian) a sharp-witted journalist from Rome whose insights into the case are acknowledged by the regional police commissioner (Virginio Gazzolo) working with the collaboration of the village chief of police Captain Modesti (Ugo D'Alessio). Amid local hysteria, Giuseppe is soon arrested when he's found near the dead body of Bruno. But he protests his innocence for he claims to have only discovered the body of the boy and then phoned the parents in a feeble attempt to extract a pitiful ransom of six million lira. When another dead body of a young boy, that of Tonino is found, the police realize that he really is innocent.A few nights later, during a raging thunderstorm, Michele Spriano, sneaks out of his house to meet with someone he speaks to over the phone, and he too is strangled by an unseen assailant and his body is found the following morning.Martelli soon meets and befriends Patrizia whom he recognizes from newspapers where he used to work in Milan. Patrizia is considered a slut by rest of the insular villagers mainly because of her modern style of dress with halter-tops and mini-skirts. Martelli also meets with the amiable young village priest, Don Alberto Avallone (Marc Poreli) and his strangely reserved mother Aurelia (Irene Papas). Don Alberto runs a boys group at the church (which the murder victims came from) and he also encourages the boys to play soccer on the church grounds to keep them off the streets and out of trouble. Since he is the priest and connected with the powerful Catholic Church (which holds the real power in Italy), he is well known and respected by everyone in the village and surrounding area. But Aurelia is a dour mysterious woman. A villager confides in Martelli that, "she is only tolerated because she is the priest's mother."Elsewhere, Captain Modesti and his aide meet with Francesco (George Wilson), an eccentric old hermit living in a tumbledown stone hut in the hills overlooking the town, who practices black magic and offers charms and potions to the superstitious. He claims to the police that he has passed his knowledge of black magic to his disciple, Magiara, and also shares time with the causal thrill-seeking Patrizia. He is also rumored to have had (and then disposed of) a baby from a tryst with Magiara.Angered by Francesco's unwillingness to co-operate with the investigation, the police proceed to hunt down and arrest Magiara. Under interrogation, the fevered woman gleefully confesses to the murders. However, it transpires to Modesti and the Commissioner that she believes her voodoo dolls and incantations have merely brought about the deaths of the three interfering boys, and she profess to have no interest or awareness of the physical methods used. An alibi provided by a policeman sighting Magiara miles away from the latest murder scene clinchers her legal innocence and she is released the following day.Nonetheless, the hostile and superstitious villagers are not convinced and the so-called "witch" is set upon in a local graveyard by a small mob of men who savagely beat her with heavy chains and then leave her for dead. The bloodied and mortally wounded Magiara drags herself quite a distance to the nearby expressway where she futilely tries to flag down a car, and then dies on the shoulder of the road. The following day, another young boy is found murdered, drowned in a local stream, which further increases police frustration to the case. However, the unsophisticated and religious townspeople are beside themselves with silent fear... continuing to believe that "the witch" is responsible for the killings and she is doing so from beyond the grave with a curse over the whole town.Patrizia herself briefly becomes a suspect when Martelli finds her gold-plated cigarette lighter at the scene of the latest killing and while being interrogated by the police, she refuses to supply an alibi for those nights of each killing. But under the threat of incarnation, she's forced to admit that she traveled outside Accendura to buy marijuana for herself. With little to hold her on, the police let her go as well.Martelli and Patrizia become more determined to track down the killer on their own. During further meetings with Don Alberto, Martelli also learns that Don Alberto's mother has another young child, a six-year-old girl born mentally retarded. Martelli becomes convinced that the little girl is a witness to the killings after seeing that she compulsively pulls the heads off her dolls, as if doing an imitation to the strangulation's. One doll's head, that of Donald Duck, is found near the latest crime scene, which this leap of reason proves accurate. But Martelli and Patrizia wonder: is the killer the priest or his mother?When Aurelia disappears with her daughter, Martelli and Patrizia track her down to a remote shack on a hill overlooking the town and when they arrive, Aurelia is found barely conscious begging them to help her stop her crazy son. It is Don Alberto who is the killer. It turns out that he straggled those young boys not for their sins, but to PREVENT them from committing sin when they grow up, as well as save them from the "horrors of sexuality", thus (in his mind) sending them to heaven with clean souls.In an act contrary to even his sick rationale, he attempts to throw his little sister, a witness to the crimes, off a remote cliff. Martelli arrives in the nick of time, and after a long and climatic fistfight between Martelli and Don Alberto, the twisted priest looses his balance and falls of the cliff to his gruesome death.
    

Irene Papas

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