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Bjorkstrom
Reviews
The Golden Voyage of Sinbad (1973)
Formulaic Fantasy
Sinbad and his crew find a mysterious golden plate which may or may not be the key to the legendary island of Lemuria, once part of a prehistorical continent that sank into the sea. The crew sets out to find the island. Sinbad gets aid from a certain Grand Vizier who carries an iron mask, but there is also Koura, an evil wizard who wants to gain control of Lemuria, and he always gets in Sinbad's way.
Ray Harryhausen wrote the screen story and produced this film. Of course he also created the visual effects. They are the best part of the film, which otherwise is rather tame and formulaic. It's miles - even nautical miles - away from great fantasy masterpieces like Lord Of The Rings and The Never-Ending Story.
Live and Let Die (1973)
Bond!
Plot: James Bond is called upon to investigate the accidental (?) deaths of three MI-7 agents. The deaths took place on three different places of the world and they seem however to be connected in some way. Bond's path is crossed by witchcraft, voodoo, tarot, drug dealers, men with metallic body parts (in a Dr. Strangelove fashion!) and the gangsters (not angels) of Harlem.
Roger Moore's first outing as Agent 007 emerges not as an action flick but rather as a comic one. While most Bond movies have a darker tone, this one relies on light comedy, with Moore getting close to slapstick á la Blake Edwards. I like it, and I give it 8 stars outta 10.
Bamse - Världens starkaste björn! (1972)
Very entertaining Swedish cartoon
Being five or six years I watched, taped and re-watched almost all of the episodes of "Bamse - världens starkaste björn!" ("Bamse - the world's strongest bear!") when they where aired on TV. I was a great fan of the Bamse comics and I enjoyed the cartoon series.
Back in the late fifties or early sixties, Swedish comic strip drawer Rune Andréasson decided to make a comic about a bear who gets strong when eating a special kind of honey. The bear was to be named Bamse. Most of the characters in the Bamse comic was inspired by characters in Andréassons older works. The adventures of Bamse ran for several years in weekly magazines. In 1972 were the first TV episodes created and one year later the Bamse comics earned their own monthly magazine. In the nineties more TV episodes were aired.
The TV series is about Bamse, the strongest bear in the world. Unfortunately he is only strong after eating Dunderhonung, a special kind of honey that only Bamse's grandmother can make. Bamse's best friends are Skalman, the clever but lazy invent-all-thinkable-gadgets tortoise, and the shy little rabbit Lille Skutt. The bad guy of the series is Vargen, a wolf that is not really evil but truly misunderstood.
Bamse, Lille Skutt and Skalman travel on various adventures in the cartoon: They search for a sunken ship with a treasure, they find a flying carpet, they visit the jungle and the castle of a malevolent magician, they even shrink themselves to ant size and nearly get eaten by a spider!
The main point of the Bamse cartoon (and the comics) is that you get nowhere by being hard to your enemies, instead you should make them your friends. And it is also good entertainment for the kids.