Treasure of the Four Crowns (1983) User Reviews

It has its moments; it just doesn't have enough of them.

[Hey_Sweden · 5/10 · 8 August 2014]

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.

A Tale of Adventure, Romance, and FOUR...No Wait..TWO CROWNS

[FlyingWoodchuck · 4/10 · 7 April 2006]

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.

Now, what else can we make 3-D?

[Coventry · 3/10 · 11 December 2007]

Oh sweet irony, thy name be "Treasure of the Four Crowns"… This movie revolved its entire promotional campaign on the unique selling proposition of 3-D effects, but it's this exact same gimmick that continuously muddles up the pacing and negatively affects the script's coherence. Instead of dedicating all their time and efforts to searching for as many 3-D possibilities as humanly possible, the makers should have focused on their narrative structure and continuity a little more. It sounds like a rookie mistake, but in fact director Ferdinando Baldi and co-writer/main star Tony Anthony should have known better. The duo previously made the underrated but splendid spaghetti western "Blindman", and that movie strangely enough revolved entirely on detailed character drawings and story building instead of on effects. I haven't had the pleasure (?) yet of seeing their other 3-D film, the oddly titled western "Comin' At Ya!", but I fear it'll be as bad as this one, judging by the rating and user comments. As you can undoubtedly derive from the title and cover image, "Treasure of the Four Crowns" is another Italian attempt to cash in on the huge success of early 80's adventure movies, more particularly the Steven Spielberg classic "Raiders of the Lost Ark". You know the principle of these Italian rip offs: everything has to be a lot more grotesque! Tony Anthony pretends to be a genuine Indiana Jones and the adventurous opening sequence lasts at least three times as long as the intro of "Raiders". Anthony plays J.T. Stryker, a professional adventurer hired to recover two out of four magical crowns from the malicious hands of the occult sect leader Brother Jones. According to the assignor, these Crowns hold the power to solve all the earthly issues like war, poverty, famine etc … only it's never really explained HOW. The evil Jones keeps the crowns in a hi-tech secured temple with laser alarm systems and deadly booby traps, so Stryker and his team of hired circus artists spend the majority of the film climbing walls and hurling on ceilings. There's plenty of action & stunts in the film, but it quickly gets really boring because it's always the same. Of course, it didn't help that wasn't wearing my 3-D goggles, but still, even then the action sequences would rapidly get repetitive. The last half hour is utterly atrocious and full of twists & turns that don't make the slightest bit of sense. Heroic characters die in the most ridiculous ways imaginable, faces get deformed and go back to normal and the fate of the titular crowns is inconclusive. The only truly great element is, as usual, Ennio Morricone's music.

Browsing through IMDb, I learned that director Baldi passed away very recently; on the 12th of November 2007. I wished I could have written better things about his movie, but it's simply not very good. Personally, I'll remember him for the aforementioned western "Blindman".

Loved it as a kid...

[Wizard-8 · 2 June 1999]

When I was a kid, I saw this movie and I loved it. I thought it was one of the best movies I'd ever seen. Ten years later, I picked it up at the video store to take another look.

Ouch.

OUCH!

This is a bad movie! Really bad! Cheesy, badly dubbed, almost everything is done badly. Love those wires on the "floating" key! The climax is hilarious!

One good thing about the movie: Ever reliable Ennio Morricone gives the movie a good score.

Should have been on MST3K...

[hotbread · 1/10 · 4 August 1999]

This movie would have been a perfect feature for Mystery Science Theater 3000.

I saw this in the theater when it came out. I remember being really excited about getting to see a 3-D movie. I guess I was somewhere around 10 years old.

Even at 10, I thought it was one of the most ridiculous things I had ever seen. I did enjoy it though, as my friend and I sat in the nearly empty theater making fun of the movie, I enjoyed a real-life MST3K moment.

Serious scholars of horrible cinema should seek this movie

The cheesiest Indiana Jones copy ever

[Leofwine_draca · 4/10 · 22 November 2016]

TREASURE OF THE FOUR CROWNS may not be the best, but it's certainly the bizarrest of the various European Indiana Jones rip-offs that followed in the wake of RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK. This totally madcap film is bookended by two incredible scenes of action that will have you shaking your head in disbelief, whereas the slow middle section is for courageous viewers only who don't succumb to boredom too easily. And what the heck was Ennio Morricone thinking when writing a score for this trash?!

It's rip-off time from the start with this movie, which opens with some yellow scrolling introductory footage which will no doubt make any STAR WARS fan feel a sense of déjà vu. Immediately afterwards we're introduced to J.T. Striker, our red-quilted jacket wearing hero who has to brave the dangers of a booby-trapped castle in the search for a hidden key. As well as rabid dogs - who know what they survive on in a deserted castle in the middle of nowhere - Striker must face jumping snakes, opening pits, a fair quantity of dry ice, moving skeletons and suits of armour, loud wailing, and, most hilarious of all, a vulture - made of CARDBOARD - which comes flying at him on a plainly visible string! If this wasn't enough, as soon as he retrieves the key, flying bolts, spears and rockets (!) are launched at him, the building burns down and Striker must escape from burning wooden spheres which roll after him and threaten to engulf him (let's see if anyone can spot the influence of this last bit). He manages to jump (in slow motion of course) through a window and escape as the castle explodes behind him. I guess somebody happened to leave their dynamite behind by mistake when vacating the premises! The most incredible thing about all this action is that this all takes place in the first TWENTY minutes.

Well, it's a good thing that the film settles down at this point for some plot exposition or I might have had a heart attack from watching all that excitement! Basically, Striker must travel to a remote mountain-top castle which is inhabited by a religious cult led by the insane Brother Junas; there, he must retrieve three crowns which contain the power to stop evil in the world (one of the crowns is already owned by his local museum). For some unexplained reason, Striker must assemble a team of five to infiltrate the castle, get past the guard and booby-traps and steal the treasure.

The director is Ferdinando Baldi, who was responsible for some enjoyable peplum epics back in the early '60s. Baldi's direction is adequate and he keeps the film lively at all times; on occasion he inserts lots of slow-motion in an attempt to emulate fellow Italian action director Enzo G. Castellari, no doubt! This is one of those movies made to cash in on the short-lived 3D craze of the early '80s, so they really go overboard with things flying at the camera; we've got ropes, hands, traps, flames, crossbow bolts, harpoons, knives, candles, feet, snakes, and you name it at various points; the most hilarious bit is when two people constantly pass things to each other, towards the camera every time! Pointless of course but still unintentionally funny. Speaking of the camera, couldn't they afford a duster to wipe it? On numerous occasions there are bits of grit, grime, and dirt stuck on the lens which is really off-putting. Just a sign of the low budget I suppose. If you're a fan of cheesy, low-budget rip-offs then TREASURE OF THE FOUR CROWNS (that should read THREE, because there's no sign of the fourth!) is the film for you.

OK, if seen in 3D

[bukster007 · 4/10 · 14 March 2000]

I remember this movie being shown endlessly on HBO on Saturday afternoons in the 80's. Clearly trying to cash in on "Raiders of the Lost Ark", the only thing this film had going for it was the 3D and this is sadly missing on the video version. Strings are completely visible, repititous scenes of objects being poked at the camera and bad dubbing make for a difficult watch. Too bad MST3K didn't get a hold on this one.

In glorious 3D: Dreadfully Dull Drivelovision!

[BA_Harrison · 3/10 · 3 January 2007]

The Treasure of the 4 Crowns, a low budget Raiders of the Lost Ark ripoff, was part of a brief 3D revival in the early 80s; on video, shorn of the novelty of an extra dimension, the film loses any impact it once had and ends up a tedious and unexciting affair.

Tony Anthony, the rather piggy-faced star of Comin' at Ya! (another 80s 3D movie), stars as J. T. Stryker, a treasure hunter who gathers together a group of fellow adventurers to steal some mystical crowns from a heavily guarded fortress (owned by a strange cult).

Opening with a scene in a deserted castle, where J.T. faces deadly booby-traps in order to find a magical key, director Ferdinando Baldi makes known his intentions from the start: to steal liberally from Spielberg's movie whilst dangling everything possible into the foreground for maximum 3D effect.

The story is quite simply awful, the acting rather poor, and the special effects lousy. Scenes specially shot to make the most of the 3D technology look quite ridiculous, and the wires supporting many of the objects 'floating' in the foreground are clearly visible.

The finale, which sees J. T. and his team reaching the crowns and unleashing their 'awesome' power, is particularly confusing: J. T.'s head spins round and round, Exorcist style, and then he shoots flames from his hands. The main bad guy, cult leader Jonas, has his face sliced up by lasers and then gets roasted by J. T.'s flamethrowers. Bizarre.

And as if that wasn't enough, a final shot sees a strange snake-like creature leap out of a swamp, for no apparent reason.

On a positive note, Ennio Morricone's score is pretty good (well... far too good for this tripe, anyway!).

Even if Treasure of the 4 Crowns received a proper 3D release on DVD, I would still think twice about watching it again!

Whatever Happened To....The Fourth Crown?

[bsmith5552 · 4/10 · 15 May 2019]

This one is a little hard to review because frankly, it's not a good movie. It's about a group of soldiers of fortune who break into the castle of deadly cult headed by a fanatical cleric known as Brother Jones (Emiliano Redondo).

We first meet adventurer J.T. Striker (Tony Anthony ) as he roams through the catacombs of a deserted castle in search of a key to the mysterious four crowns which allegedly contain powers that will solve all of man's problems. Along the way, he encounters flying bats, wild dogs and slithery snakes (Don't know where they all came from). He finally retrieves the key and returns to Professor Montgomery's home.

Montgomery and his assistant Socrates (Francisco Rabal)) are in possession of one of the magical crowns. Two of the others are in the possession of Brother Jonas and his followers. The key opens a lock revealing a scroll that I missed the point of. At any rate Striker joins up with Socrated and Montgomery and recruits a team consisting of a drunk, Rick (Jerry Lazarus), an aging circus clown, Edmond (Gene Quintrano) and a trapeze artist Liz (Ana Obregon). They plan to sneak into Brother Jones castle like compound and steal two of the remaining crowns.

Along the way, the mysterious key takes on a life of its own creating all sorts of flashing light effects for whatever reason. The group consisting of Striker, Liz, Edmond ,Rick and Socrates manage to "slip into" the castle undetected with piles of equipment to pursue their goal. Nowc it seems the castle is protected by an elaborate laser system. (Don't know where the cult got the money or expertise for this).

By climbing over the security system using a series of trapeze like equipment, they finally reach their goal but not before the tragic loss of three of the five members of the team. Finally the survivors reach the two crowns and....................................................................................

"The Treasure of the Four Crowns" was filmed in 3-D and there are plenty of "comin' at ya" effects throughout the film. In 2-D, the effects are less effective thereby taking away from the "excitement" of the movie.

The ending is particularly bizarre and has to be seen to be believed (or not). And hey, where was the fourth crown in all of this.

It has its redeeming qualities

[lomedae · 7/10 · 27 March 2000]

No matter how you put it, this movie was created to contain as many gimmicks as possible to exploit the 3D theme. And as such it succeeded beautifully.

I have seen this movie when I was 13, close to when it came out.

Little other movies of the 80s have made quite the same impact. No, it's not a good movie by normal standards. But Yes, this is probably the best 3D movie ever made, and as such is worth a couple of lines in someone's book.

The Movie is horrible, but the story is there (you just have to look real hard)

[john-m-osborne · 1/10 · 11 February 2008]

This movie was horrible and everyone involved should be ashamed of themselves for ever having been associated with it. Having said that, there were a few aspects of this movie that appealed to me, namely that there was a history behind the crowns. I saw this a few years ago, so some of my details may be a little off, but you'll get the idea of just how horrible this movie is.

The movie opens with J.T. Striker (Tony Anthony) approaching some old castle. We quickly learn that this castle is booby-trapped to the max and our hero has to dodge everything from darts and flying buzzards to ancient torture racks to reach his goal, which is the coffin of some long-dead king. Inside this coffin is his goal: a key. He collects the key and then escapes, as the entire castle starts to "come to life" and eventually explodes. Just where this explosion came from is a mystery.

Back to the world goes our hero to meet up with Ed, who takes him to a museum where they hand over the key to Prof. Montgomery. Montgomery and Ed tell the story of the crowns, which they key will unlock. They actually have one of the crowns in their possession. I found this to be the best part of the movie and the only true attempt at meaningful dialog.

Ed speaking, as the crown slides out of its container: "This is one of the Four Golden Crowns created by the Visigoths in the 6th Century some time after the conquest of Spain."

Prof. Montgomery: "Legend held that the gold balls on top three of the four crowns contained secrets to unleashing incredible powers of good and evil. After a time they passed into the fabric of myth and legend." Ed: Until sometime in the late 1800's when they were discovered (somewhere in Spain).

Prof. Montgomery: "But when the Arabs invaded Spain three of the four crowns disappeared. The fourth fell into the Arabs' hands and attempting to unlock its secrets without the key, they destroyed the gold ball. Three years ago I learned the location of the key, but saw no sense in retrieving it since the other crowns were missing until this crown, reportedly the one containing the scroll surfaced. I found it in the possession of a Sherpa mountain climber in Nepal and convinced him to sell it to me. And now, we shall see." The professor opens the crown and there is the scroll and now the enlist Striker to help them steal the remaining two crowns from a cult leader who uses them to control people (we are never told just how the crowns help him do this). Striker reluctantly agrees and assembles the team of Rick The Drunk, the dying old clown Socrates and his daughter Liz, and Ed.

The hapless crew infiltrates the secure room where the crowns are kept and are very close to getting them without incident, but then a piece of equipment that is supposed to knock out the security systems, fails to function and J.T. decides to go for it anyway. What follows is a comical collection of deaths by each of the participants (except Liz and J.T.). First, Socrates has a heart attack (we were told earlier he had a heart condition). Rick is killed by arrows that shoot up from the floor. Ed is at first crushed by the arms of this statue that the crowns are sitting on and then a snake comes out of the statue and bites him on the cheek (leaving no fang marks). Before the entire ridiculousness of this scene can even be comprehended, J.T. who has been blinded by some steam that shot out of the statue (and set off the alarms), regains his feet and opens the crowns (I guess all of the security mechanisms had been exhausted at this point). The crowns (the green one evil, the gold one good) make breathing noises at him. He takes them in his hands and his head spins around a la The Exorcist and then his face is divided between good and evil, with the evil side corresponding to the hand he is holding the green ball in and the good corresponding with the had he is holding the gold ball in.

Brother Jonas, the cult leader, has by this time burst into the room with his machine-gun toting, mask wearing followers and J.T. shoots fire out of the two crowns and kills them all. He snaps back out of it after they are all dead and he and Liz are lifted out of the room by the professor, but not before he throws the crowns into the fire.

There is a final scene which makes no sense. We see this blob rise out of a swamp and snake-like thing shoots out.

But I want to point out that there were THREE crowns shown in this movie. People seemed to forget about the one with the scroll.

O.K., that's basically the movie. The 3D was horrible. Strings are visible everywhere, much of the 3D was wasted on things that didn't need it, and nothing was really explained about how the crowns could help mankind, even though this why they were all risking their lives for them.

None of the characters were complicated or compelling. There was nothing that made you root for these guys to win. And the director seemed to just do whatever he wanted without thoughts to continuity or credibility. A shining example of this would be the fact that Striker escapes from the castle in the beginning by breaking through a stain-glass window that leads right outside. Why didn't he just go through that window in the first place instead of risking his life maneuvering through the booby-trapped castle?

Hope this saves you a few bucks.

A gloriously ludicrous piece of pure chintzy schlock

[Woodyanders · 8/10 · 5 August 2014]

Diabolical cult leader Brother Jonas (a rabidly hammy portrayal by Emiliano Redondo) gains possession of a set of mystical artifacts that gives him the power to lord it over his mindless followers. It's up to devil-may-care mercenary J.T. Striker (blandly played with stunning blankness by Tony Anthony, who also co-produced) and his motley crew who include a drunken dude (insipid Jerry Lazarus), a strongman brute with a weak heart (brooding Francisco Rabal), and, naturally, a token feisty babe (fetching Ana Obregon) to retrieve said artifacts from Jonas's heavily guarded fortress. Boy, does this hilariously horrendous clunker possess all the so-wrong-that-they're-paradoxically-right stuff to qualify as a real four-star stinkeroonie: Ferdinando Baldi's ham-fisted (mis)direction, the plodding pace, a plethora of shoddy (far from) special effects (you can clearly see all the obvious strings that levitate various objects throughout the picture!), the cardboard characters, the maladroitly staged action set pieces, the laughably terrible acting, the ratty cinematography by Marcello Masciocchi and Giuseppe Ruzzolini, and the jaw-dropping outrageous climax all give this delectably dreadful doozy a considerable amount of lovably cruddy charm. Moreover, not only does this movie hurl every possible object at the camera (arrows, spears, snakes, birds, keys, flames, and much, much more!), but it also boasts more than enough explosions to make even Michael Bay green with envy. Only Ennio Morricone's robust majestic score manages to rise above the general unintentionally sidesplitting ineptitude. A tacky marvel.

I can see the string!

[Aaron1375 · 6/10 · 12 April 2001]

I remember this movie coming on numerous times on HBO and Cinemax when I was a kid and I watched it every chance I could. I know now that it was a cheesy movie and if I watched it again it would probably be not as good as I remembered, but I did like it when I was a kid. Sure most 3-d movies do the hokey sticking stuff in your face routine, and this movie is no different, but I still enjoyed it. Even though during one scene of the movie you can see the string on the "flying" key. The parts I enjoyed most are the first and last parts of the movie. The lead guy in the first part has to get through various traps to retrieve this key thing. I always love boobey traps. The middle just consists of him recruiting people to help retrieve the two crowns. Then it is like a spy movie as they break into some cults palace that has numerous traps. And yes there were only three crowns, one only had paper, the other two had gems, the forth one supposedly was broken by someone who tried to open it without the key. I don't think this was in the original foriegn version. I think it was mentioned only because Treasure of the Three Crowns just doesn't have the same type of ring to it. In the end many of the characters die, and perhaps they get the stones or not...I would say but I don't want to spoil the really dumb ending.

From the same team that kicked off the early 80s 3-D boom, comes the movie that signaled its downswing

[IonicBreezeMachine · 3/10 · 30 April 2023]

J. T. Strike (Tony Anthony) is a soldier of fortune who has just returned from acquiring a special key for his client Professor Montgomery (Francisco Villena) from a booby trapped ridden castle guarded by unseen supernatural forces. Upon return, the professor enlists Striker's help once again in acquiring four magic crowns from charismatic cult leader Leo Greene aka Brother Jonas (Emillano Redondo), a former petty thief who has since gather legions of loyal followers and plans to use the crowns to further his reach. Reluctantly, Strike assembles a team to break into Brother Jonas' mountain top fortress where the crowns are held.

Treasure of the Four Crowns was the follow-up film from the makers of the 3-D Spaghetti Western Comin' at Ya!, which became a sleeper hit earning $12 million against its $2.5 million budget and signaled a very brief resurgence in 3-D from 1981 to 1983 with the format having largely died off during the 60s. With the momentum from the success of Comin' at Ya!, the team behind the film decided to apply the format to a pulp adventure setting as popularized by another 1981 re-release, Steven Spielberg's Raiders of the Lost Ark. While the financial success of these films isn't easy to track down, per a 1983 Cinefantastique article with Tony Anthony, Treasure of the Four Crowns was supposedly successful enough that it's financiers Cannon Films were prepping a third film called Escape from Beyond that was going to be a space adventure, but the project appears to have been shelved largely due to Columbia's Spacehunter: Adventures in the Forbidden Zone. Treasure of the Four Crowns is about what you'd expect when someone tries to copy Raiders with a fraction of the budget so you're basically watching a massively inferior knock-off of a better movie....but it's in 3-D!

In the simplest terms possible, Treasure of the Four Crowns is basically elements of Raiders of the Lost Ark grafted onto the format of a heist film but think less Topkapi and more the old Mission: Impossible TV series down to how little the characters are defined outside of their roles.

From the opening sequence that lasts a punishing long 20 minutes that follows Tony Anthony's J. T. Striker stumbling through a bunch of awkwardly staged traps and hazards that move very slowly and make few attempts to hide gaffes in the effects work (including multiple visible wires), the movie shows more focus on making things pop out of the screen than making sure those things actually look good. Now thanks to the good people at Kino Lorber I was able to see this movie on blu-ray in anaglyph 3-D so it's about as close to the theatrical experience as you can get in this day and age. The 3-D worked perfectly fine in conveying depth of field or objects in the foreground, but the image never really synced up when it involved objects rushing at the screen past a certain point. Full disclosure: I do have amblyopia so 3-D doesn't work as well for me as others, but I can still experience it and this is how it looked to me so kudos to Kino Lorber for managing to get the anaglyph 3-D down. But of course once you look past the 3-D the movie itself is a hollow exercise that stretches its 100 minute runtime with numerous protracted shots of ropes or harnesses dangling or holding out objects while the actual plot is either not that interesting or unintentionally funny. Emillano Redondo is memorable for all the wrong reasons as he gives an over the top performance as the Jim Jones inspired Brother Jonas and his hammed up deliveries as the character are very funny (even if they're not meant to be). We also have some nice sounding Ennio Morricone music that couldn't be more ill placed if you tried as the score with its softer more romantic melodies really conflicts with the tone of something that's trying to be an Indiana Jones type adventure.

Treasure of the Four Crowns is a bad movie, but at least the 3-D looks good. If we're talking objective quality, then Treasure of the Four Crowns falls well short of the mark. If however you want to see someone make an ass of themselves but in 3-D!, then here's your opportunity.

Fatiguing adventure fantasy in 3-D

[lor_ · 23 January 2023]

My review was written in January 1983 after a screening on Manhattan's UES.

"Treasure of the Four Crowns" is topliner-producer Tony Anthony's failed attempt to emulate the adventure and fantasy of "Raiders of the Lost Ark" in 3-D format. Public interest in depth pictures (spurred by Anthony's previous "Comin' at Ya!" film) should assure good openings, but eye-taxing visuals and weak story values spell trouble in building a wider audience.

Sharing "Comin' at Ya!"'s problem in over-emphasizing gimmickry, "Treasure" often resembles a Silent Era trick film, stringing together 3-D gags art the expense of continuity and narrative. After the obligatory "Star Wars" serial-styled intro crawl, credits sequence presents the wording on a different plane from the action, creating focusing problems for the viewer. First 20 minute of the picture are sans dialog, as adventurer Stiker (Tony Anthony) undergoes an incoherent series of perils in a Spanish castle in order to fetch a magic key.

Delayed exposition establishes a quest byh Prof. Montgomery (Francisco Villena) to recover two ancient crowns containing golden balls that hold the powers of good and evil, fashioned by the visigoths. Striker organizes a "Mission: Impossible"crew to retrieve them from European relligious cult leader (hailing from Brooklyn) Brother Jonas (Emiliano Redondo): the prof's assistant Edmond (Gene Quintano), a drunken mountain climber Rick (Jerry Lazarus), circus strongman (now clown) Socrates (Francisco Rabal) and his trapeze artist daughter Liz (Ana Obregon).

Final 40 minutes of the picture detail the team's assault on Jonas's fortress, executed with fine physical action scenes, pyrotechnics and stunt work.

Problem is that the filmmakers include too frequent an array of negative parallax shots, that is, objects photographed to appear rapidly moving off the screen into theatre space. Combination of fast cutting and rapid movement of objects does not allow one's eyes to easily adjust to the changes in stereo convergence. Result is strain, fatigue and another setback in the effort to make 3-D a viable, standard filmmaking tool.

On the plus side, "Treasure" has effective sets and many pleasing depth shots amidst the flashy ones. Aerialists performing in a circus look good in 3-D, as do exploding miniatures and other fireworks. Hampered by inadequate dubbing the cast performs well physically, with no discernible doubles during the exciting hanging-from-the-ceiling caper to steal the crowns.

Special effects are hokey, with Anthony's spinning head and subsequent good/evil makeup when he gets the crowns' power proving to be laughable. Action is carried by solid sound effects and an alternately driving or romantic Ennio Morricone score.

Numerous raid on "Raiders" include Obregon's sassy intro to Anthony, which echoes Karen Allen's greeting to Harrison Ford, large flaming balls rolling after Anthony; a mist-filled trunk instead of ark holding the key and a silly finale with flamethrowers emanating from Anthoy's hands at the baddies. Instead of getting mad at this imitation, hopefully George Lucas and/or Steven Spielberg will make their own 3-D adventures and thereby validate the process.

seems like a "proof of concept" example of 3D

[davidm-14 · 4/10 · 10 October 2023]

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.

We used this movie as a punishment when I was a teenager!

[karaluciellepythiana · 3/10 · 19 January 2024]

Bet that title caught your eye! So, when I was a teenager, back in the 80's, my mother decided to rent this movie from the video store. She had probably THE worst luck ever when it came to picking out movies! She would read the back of the VHS boxes and if it sounded good then she'd rent it. I sat through more awful movies back then than probably at any other point in my life, but Treasure of the Four Crowns HAS to be the most memorable of all the terrible movies that my mother had the ill fortune of having rented. Needless to say, after a good while my mother started telling ME to pick out the movies instead, since I actually had good luck when it came to that kind of thing. For instance, I picked out Conan the Barbarian, Highlander, The Sword and the Sorcerer, Beastmaster and other awesome movies! And we would have a great time watching those. If Treasure of the Four Crowns is memorable to me today, it is for all the wrong reasons. It was, without a doubt, one of the worst movies I have ever seen in my entire life. Given I will be fifty this coming March, I've seen a LOT of movies in my lifetime too. Here begins my honest review of this movie, if one can all it a movie at all. At any rate...

It stars a man named Tony Anthony and boy did we have fun making fun of THAT back in the day given it's just basically the same name twice. It's like someone being named Steve Stephens, it just begs to be made fun of! Tony plays what can be best summed up as a sort of poor man's Indiana Jones. Pretty much everything that is cool about Indy... this guy is lacking ALL of that. He looks like someone's dad... if their dad was a deadbeat who skipped out in order to search for treasure in weird places. Which is where this movie begins! He is in what I swear must have been someone's basement made to appear like a castle dungeon or something, looking for treasure. He ends up encountering "walking" skeletons who are just being pulled about on strings, like pretty much anything else animate in this movie except for the people. Now THAT would have made things better! Pulling Tony's character about on strings for our entertainment. Sadly, this movie never gets that fun. He ends up diving out of the place, and the next thing we know we're in some guy's office who is telling him the legend of the Four Crowns and why they must never fall into the hands of evildoers. Sounds cool, doesn't it? Not the boring way this guy explains it! Also... the fourth crown was destroyed when some morons tried to open it way, way back in history. But we are meant to assume even three crowns are dangerous! So, our heroes, such as they are, have one of them... they open it, and all is cool. Stuff gets thrown around, on strings of course, and it's supposed to be creepy but totally isn't. The last two crowns are being held by a religious cult leader who is into the occult, and Tony is called upon to steal them back from him. He assembles a team of incompetent fools that are like the idiot's version of the Suicide Squad. Which includes, of all things, a retired clown with a heart condition and his hot daughter who (of course!) is an acrobat. What else would a movie circus do with a hot looking woman? Never mind what I would do with her! But I digress... the Circus Squad decides to infiltrate the bad guy's castle and there we learn he is actually a charlatan faith healer who seems to have zero interest in actually using the crowns for anything. I kid you not! They could have left him with the crowns and the world would be safe... he rants like a madman, but Brother Evil really just likes to put on silly faith healing routines for kicks. One can only assume, he only founded a cult to get chicks, and the exchange between him and a phony "possessed" woman shows he's a total con artist. The clown has a heart attack, as anyone with a brain could see coming, and the rest of the Circus Squad bites the dust pretty hard and pretty fast. I cheered at their deaths! Am I evil? Yes, but that is totally beside the point. Tony and the hot babe survive, of course, and Tony gets the last two crowns and decides to go nuts with them and kill every living thing in sight. He turns into what I can only describe as low budget Two Face from Batman crossed with Linda Blair's character from the Exorcist when get got possessed. Somehow, this sounds cooler than it actually looks! It's dorky, just like Tony's entire performance in this movie. I blame the writers, if they even had writers as such! I swear, this movie's script had to have been written by political prisoners held at gunpoint and told to come up with something on the fly... it's that insane and wacky. Like someone was just making all this up as they went along. So, Two Face demonic Tony suddenly has flamethrowers up his sleeves, and he uses them to blast the cultists into running away because they were too cheap to film their gruesome deaths... but they DID film the cult leader's death and it is silly. They appear to have just taken a max mockup of his face with a fake looking skull under it and melted it with ketchup squirting out of it here and there. With fire behind it, to make us think that his face is being melted by the flames Tony is shooting like some crazy arsonist from heck. The cult leader's bones fall to the floor, and Tony has to stop himself from killing the hot babe because yeah... he's possessed... and the cavalry comes to save the day and presumably arrest the remaining cultists whose only crime as far as I can see is that they were running a fake faith healing act. Good one Tony! All for two crowns that the bad guys had no use for. Tony gets the girl, and we hear the cult leader's voice as we get a dumb closeup on his skeleton. Next thing we know, we see a swamp and a... thing... rises up out of it, and out of the thing pops a snake head. Weirdest sequel tease ever! Zero context, zero explanation, and zero point. In my head canon I like to think the snake was the Devil who was just mad because he couldn't possess Tony and drive him to become the world's ugliest arsonist. And... that's the movie!

One of my cousins did not believe us when my mother and I told her how bad this movie was... so my grandmother had her watch it. After that, my grandmother said that if any of the kids in the family did not behave... they'd be forced to watch Treasure of the Four Crowns as punishment. Forget about spankings or being sent to your room... or being grounded for a week... THIS is truly an inhuman punishment! They could easily use this movie as a form of torture in Gitmo, that is how bad it truly, and most definitely, is. Well, that and the theme from Barney the purple dinosaur. If that combination doesn't get someone to crack, then nothing will! Wanna know the sad part? I HAVE seen worse movies than Treasure of the Four Crowns... but for the sake of human sanity, I will refrain from mentioning them here. Ta for now!

Treasure 3D

[BandSAboutMovies · 7/10 · 6 March 2022]

You can write this movie off as a ripoff of Raiders of the Lost Ark - and it is, right down to the scene with the boulder - but come on. It has an Ennio Morricone score, is a spiritual sequel to Comin' At Ya! And most importantly it's in 3D.

Made in "SuperVision" and "WonderVision," the film was actually shot using the Marks 3-Depix Converter, the same camera that had been used for Friday the 13th Part III. This system stacked its Techniscope-sized left and right images one above the other on a single band of 35mm film. It was projection using the Polarator projection attachment offered by the Marks Polarized Corporation, allowing the audience to watch the film through color-neutral linear polarizers, a system that lead actor Tony Anthony may have invented.

J. T. Striker (Anthony) has been hired to assemble a group of professional thieves to take two of the gems that will open the last two Mystical Crowns. To get there, he's going to make your eyes hurt with pop out skeletons, the soldiers of Brother Jonas (Emiliano Redondo) and tons of booby traps which pretty much wipe out everyone in his team, which includes the drunken Rick (Jerry Lazarus, who is also in Cannon's Hot Chili), a dying circus strongman named Socrates (Francisco Rabal, Nightmare City) and his daughter Liz (Ana Obregón, who was Catalina in another Cannon movie we'll be getting to soon, Bolero).

Roger Ebert himself broke down what gets thrown at the viewing in this one: "knives, spears, darts, bones, jeweled daggers, balls of fire, laser beams, boulders, ropes, attack dogs, bats, shards of stained glass, a set of dishes, a large kettle, a stove, a corpse, a python snake, an empty glove, birds (both real and artificial), arrows, unidentifiable glowing objects shot from guns, keys, letter openers, several human heads, skeletons, large sections of an exploding castle, one bottle of booze and assorted spoons."

This movie doesn't tease you with its 3D. It punches you right in the face with it.

By the end of the movie, Striker has the other gems and his ead spins around, gets all burned up and he starts shooting fire out of his hands melting all of the bad guys, then a giant sludge monster jumps out of a swamp and right into your lap, teasing a sequel that never came, as well as a space 3D movie that was announced, Seeing is Believing.

Director Ferdinando Baldi also made Blindman; Django, Prepare a Coffin; Get Mean, Warbus and Ten Zan: The Ultimate Mission, all deliriously strange movies that I wholeheartedly recommend.

Perhaps most amazingly, both Francisco Rabal and Emiliano Redondo are in Pedro Almodóvar's Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down!, so the Spanish film industry really does come together to make a movie.

I still own the 3D glasses I got for this movie

[mickiedsdad · 7/10 · 23 September 2023]

I saw this movie in the Theatre when it first came out, I kept and still own the 3D glasses with the movies title and poster art printed on them. I thought it was a bit Campy at that time, but Raiders of the Lost Ark was and still is my favorite movie of all time , so I love that kind of picture. Still fun to watch after all these years. The 3D effects for this movie are a bit over the top. They make a bit too much emphasis on spears and arrows flying at the audience plus just ropes dangling down and leaves bring used to showcase 3D effects was a bit too much to bare at times. Still fun though.

What Did I Just Watch?

[ethan_firl · 29 January 2003]

Watching this movie in the theater as a teenager with my friends was great fun - we howled and made fun of the film all of the way through, which was okay because everyone in the room was doing the same thing. That should tell you just how bad this movie is: so bad it's good. The thing is, I think the people responsible for this trainwreck meant for it to be a serious action film. Well, they didn't succeed. Instead what we got was really fake-looking special effects, bad acting and a story that barely held together. Other than the fact that the film is laughable the only reason to watch it would be to see Anna Obregon, the Spanish beauty.

Yes it's bad but hear me out...

[skankingcorpse · 6/10 · 19 January 2024]

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.

Four crowns, try two.

[JAKick · 6 October 1999]

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.

No story but plenty of 3-D

[yenlo · 21 March 2001]

Was there a story line to this movie? It seemed everything in it was simply to have a 3-D FX for the viewer. 3-D pictures made a brief comeback in the early 80's and this was one of them. I couldn't even imagine watching this without the 3-D bit. MST3K should have latched on to this one.

Raiders of the Lost Ark Wanna Be

[svanloon1 · 13 June 2004]

This movie is absolutely awful. As a kid of 8 years old, I saw this at the movies with my brother. I remember being bored during it then, but the idea of fantastic powers from crowns appealed to me.

I recently found it on Ebay and was excited to get it. Now, I look back on this movie as just trying to make a buck off of Raiders of the Lost Ark with the additional gimmick of 3D.

There is not character development. There isn't any point as to why the 3D effects have to happen. You can see all the strings used for the fireballs, darts, and the flying key.

I can just imagine the "creative team" thinking this movie up. "If one rolling ball was good for Indy, why not create 2 or 3 flaming rolling balls coming at the lead character."

This movie isn't even bad funny. To quote comic book guy, "worst movie ever."

3D flick of people trying to get wanted gems

[SonlightPics · 30 April 1999]

A bad movie with cheap 3D tricks (a spear in your face, looking at a rope hanging down). Now, I saw this when it originally came out, but I seem to remember that there were only three crowns. I guess they were hoping for a sequel. In any event, I could be wrong since it's been so long since I sat through this very thin, bad film.