Tarkan vs The Vikings (Turkey 1971)

 The Terrific Turk Is Back - And This Time It's PERSONAL

A marauding band of brightly coloured Vikings raid a Hunnic fort and kidnap the daughter of Attila the Hun, planning to hand her over to a sexy, seductive and wicked Chinese princess. 

 It's never established why the Chinese want Attila's daughter .

Or why the Chinese hired Vikings in the first place. 

Just go with it, OK.  Historical accuracy, or indeed reality is not a big factor in this film. 

Tarkan, mightiest of Attila's warriors is left for dead by the Vikings and this turns out to be a big mistake.   You see, during the fight, the Vikings not only slaughtered women and babies but the bastards killed Tarkan's dog. 

Tarkan vows to go full-on John Wick on the entire Viking race.  And ain't nobody getting in his way. 

After watching the last "Tarkan" film I decided to check out this sequel and I can happily report that it is as much fun as the first one and, I felt, an improvement. 

  The story is a bit more focussed than before, with less blatant space-filling and Tarkan gets to display something more than "Turkish badass" 

 The costumes are still silly, and that's because they literally reused all the same props and costumes from the previous films. They also nicked the soundtrack from elsewhere (2001: A Space Odyssey" this time) 

"Tarkan vs..." may also have the least convincing depiction of Vikings since "The Norseman" but who cares.  Villainess Lotus (yes, really) is suitably slinky and evil. Tarkan has a brave new doggo who is adorable and awesome, and you get to see Tarkan fight a frigging giant octopus.  

In short, if you like your historical adventures a bit daft, "Tarkan vs The Vikings" could be the perfect way to spend a semi-drunk Sunday afternoon. 

That's All Folks. 

More Film Reviews Here: https://bigdassorted.blogspot.com/p/films-cartoons-and-anime.html?m=0

Film Review: Tarkan ( Turkey 1969)

 

  Attila the Hun wants the Sword of Mars, which will give him the power to conquer Europe.  He sends his mightiest warrior Tarkan off to get the sword for him. 

 The King of the Vandals and the Emperor of Rome also want the sword but while the Romans send the mighty gladiator Lucius,  the Vandals cheat by despatching more than one man.  

 Can Tarkan find the sword? 

 Will Tarkan take the hint that plucky female lead Bige is totally into him? 

Is Tarkan's doggy sidekick a Good Boy? 

Will Tarkan finally do something about that one lock of hair that's in his face for the entire movie? 

Spoilers ahead: Yes. Nope. Yes. No. 

This movie is made in 1969 although it does come across as something that could have been made earlier and probably by Italians.  If it wasn't for Tarkan resolutely refusing to bare his chest, he'd be a perfect peplum hero.  Weirdly enough, at times it also feels like something that could have been made in the 80s - also by Italians - as Tarkan wanders around, vanquishing foes, sleeping with hot women  and generally being very serious and manly. 

Very intense, is our Tarkan. Also Turkish.  He's very keen to emphasise that. 

The soundtrack is pretty good, it must be said.  Well the bits they blatantly nicked from "Zulu" anyway. 

Story? A bit disjointed and comes across as a series of episodes and I am convinced that there's some important scenes cut out.  There's definitely a few plot points that go nowhere. 

Lastly, there's some interesting costume choices. Personally I find it hard to take the "Vandal" warriors seriously when they are all wearing brightly coloured fake-fur rugs as skirts.

For all that, this was a fun film so if you want to see what a Conan movie might look like if it was made in Turkey, this might be for you.  

 

More film Reviews here: FILMS