The Erotic Adventures of Hercules (1971) User Reviews

Just as bad as its straight counterpart

[Davian_X · 2/10 · 18 December 2023]

No one can seem to survive the straight version of EROTIC ADVENTURES OF HERCULES without tearing it a new one, and AC/DC bandit Rik Taziner strikes again in this all-male counterpart, a farrago just as bereft of interest or eroticism.

As with all Rik's gay/straight remakes, the two versions follow each other to a T, with Herc even portrayed by the same guy, a very reluctant-seeming Adonio Chelemingois. Whisp-thin plot again finds Taziner as an evil emperor intent on ensnaring Hercules with - in this version - a comely blond prince, who he uses to sexually exhaust the titan so he can tie him up in his lair while everyone has an orgy. Once the party is exhausted, Herc again makes his escape and takes his revenge.

Nigh-interminable, either version of HERCULES barely has enough plot to fill a cocktail napkin - forget adventures, there's barely two locations! There are a couple nice shots of Chelemingois walking along a beach that smack of a bargain-basement peplum, but by and large this is woefully shoddy, thrown together on barely-dressed sets with actors who look like they've been coerced at gunpoint. Taziner again inflicts himself upon the audience, contributing a revolting scene where the young prince is forced to suck his flaccid phallus while Rik scarfs and slurps at a piece of chicken. For his part, poor Herc hardly seems interested in the male action, looking half drunk and barely able to maintain an erection. It's clear why he was ported over - Chelemingois has a hunky muscle-dad bod that fits perfectly in the Steve Reeves mold - and props to him for taking a walk on the wild side, but it's clear he's better suited for the straight copy. For viewers, however, either one's a stinker.

Slapdash early 70's porn clunker

[Woodyanders · 2/10 · 5 July 2016]

Hercules lives by himself on a rocky beach. An evil gluttonous king convinces a beautiful princess to seduce Hercules so that the king can make the legendary muscleman a prisoner in the dungeon of his castle.

While the premise has some promise, alas Rick Taziner's sloppy (mis)direction, a slight story that plods along at a painfully interminable pace, the crude cinematography, the cheap sets, a droning library score, an insipid monotone narrator who tries desperately to give the ramshackle plot some semblance of coherence, the badly dubbed in grunting and groaning, and, worst of all, sex scenes that are way too drawn out and flatly staged to deliver any necessary sizzle make this dud a real chore to endure. Only the pulchritudinous presence of the gal who portrays the princess manages to rise a tad above the overall fetid air of unmitigated stinkiness.

wasted potential

[mw1562 · 11 August 2016]

I saw this film when it first same out, and my hazy memory was that is was above average for its genre. It is now available on DVD and I managed to see it again. The premise of the film is promising, but the sets are cheap, the script is weak and the direction is spotty. On the plus side, one of the actresses is gorgeous, the sex is hardcore and filmed as well as the technology of the time allowed. The best scene for me is the last one where Hercules is chained and gets fake whipped and then felted for real,

With a larger budget this film could have been a contender. Casting a more muscular Hercules night have helped too. I think it is worth watching as a history lesson for what passed as smut in 1970. Beyond that, watch it at your own risk.

Very poorly made and cast early porn feature

[lor_ · 15 February 2017]

Rik Taziner is assumed to be director of this crummy 1971 porn film, resurrected for no apparent reason by Vinegar Syndrome, in one of its recent contradictions of its usual "great prints, original materials" policy. Unlike his signed films, this one doesn't have any familiar porn talent like Andrea True and Seka, and that makes it virtually worthless.

A lousy actor and not much of a physical specimen plays Hercules, whose adventures consist of humping, with an ugly female cast, except for a pretty blonde princess. Main performance is by a ham-bone actor as the emir of the Saracens, who hates Hercules and tries to enslave the muscle guy -the chains being the closest this junker comes to fetish action.

Many scenes have Herc wandering along a lonely shore, trying for a lyrical mood plus hoary narration. Taziner or whatever hack made this doesn't have a clue regarding even rudimentary filmmaking, so we're left with what back in the day when this was released would be termed a "chaser", a boring feature of no erotic or narrative merit, which might encourage recalcitrant all-day/all-night audience members to finally get up out of their seats and take a hike, especially on its third or fourth unspooling in the grindhouse rotation.

Bland Porno

[Michael_Elliott · 8 June 2016]

The Erotic Adventures of Hercules (1971)

* 1/2 (out of 4)

You know you're watching something rather rare when you go to look it up on the IMDb and there isn't a listing. After viewing the film I added it to the database but I wish I could give more of a plot description for it. Basically we have a bad guy having sex with women. We then see Hercules was up on a beach where he finds a woman and has sex with her. We get several other sex scenes while a narrator sometimes tells us something that is hard to understand.

THE EROTIC ADVENTURES OF HERCULES comes from director Rik Tazíner who did a couple dozen movies in his career. This one here came very early in his career and you can tell they didn't have too much of a budget. The film clocks in at just 58 minutes and it's pretty much all sex from start to finish. There's really isn't any sort of plot and it appears the film was shot silent with the sound effects and narration added later. None of the sex scenes are all that erotic or well-shot. The entire film has a very cheap feel to it as if they just found some actors willing to do the porn and threw a couple cheap costumes on them.