Heroic bandit Hassan (Tab Hunter), the rightful Prince of Damascus, falls in love with the Princess Jamila (Rossana Podestà) and, with the help of three genies, searches for the mysterious 'Golden Arrow' before returning (by magic carpet) to save the city from the evil Prince of Basra (Renato Baldini) and win Jamila's hand in marriage. Directed by Antonio Margheriti (the hand behind the 'Gamma One tetralogy' of colourful low-budget space operas), this moderately-budgeted sword and sorcery demi-epic is an odd mix of excellent and awful. The sets and backgrounds are often impressive (the opening scenes especially), as are the location shots in Egypt, the climactic battle scene (before the genies arrive and inject some slapstick into the fight), and the model city Hassan flies over. Some of the 'practical' effects (such as the burning men or the flying carpet that Jamila steps onto at the end) are quite convincing but the optical effects (mattes, superimpositions etc) are terrible (notably the scenes involving the magic arrow or the three genies). In a triumph of colour-blind casting, Hunter may be the least likely-looking 'Hassan' to ever don curly-toed shoes, but the double-dubbed American teen idol seems to be having fun in the improbable role, athletically avoiding the mostly incompetent palace guards and performing his own horseback scenes. The rest of the cast dutifully discharges what is expected from them in an English dubbed peplum although the 'comic relief' genie antics get tiresome quickly. A colourful silly time-passer for kid's not too spoiled by CGI and for aficionados of this sort of endearingly goofy shtick.
Review of The Golden Arrow
