For those of you who haven't read Homer's The Odyssey, it recounts the hero's journey of Odysseus (AKA Ulysses), the champion of the the Trojan War, who nonetheless angered the Gods enough that they cursed his return journey home, sending him on a decade of dead ends until he was finally able to nestle again in the arms of his wife, Penelope. Among the many adventures that Ulysses encountered were a battle with the Cyclops, and a battle of the sexes with Circe, the Goddess whose siren call (literally with the Sirens) lured seamen to their doom.

Ulysses the film covers these major points with a fair amount of invention, especially for a film made overseas in the early 1950s. While the Cyclops segments are largely laughable, with a badly made up actor shot from a low level which offers elements not even up to the now somewhat primitive seeming standards Ray Harryhausen would set a few years later with his beloved stop motion work, the interludes with Circe (Silvana Mangano, who does double duty as Penelope, evidently living out the male fantasy of a woman who is both wife and whore) are quite impressive. Circe is played as almost a living statue (something not helped by the idiotic dubbing job), but the lighting in this film is magical, with Circe's head and shoulders a captivating, if odd, glowing green.

The film has some passing attempts at a larger than life epic feel, notably a very short overview of the Trojan War in an opening montage, but this is a quieter, more introspective film than one might expect given its mammoth source material. Douglas is his usual clench-jawed self, but here that reticence plays to Ulysses' frustration at being kept from his goal so long, something made even worse by amnesia. Anthony Quinn makes for a pretty comical villain in this piece, with a Dutch Boy haircut and glowering visage, as Antinos, a suitor of Penelope who is through waiting for Ulysses to come back and wants the female spoils to himself.

While the film probably looked luscious and colorful in its original Technicolor release, and was early enough in the foreign film craze not to drive audiences too crazy with the lack of audio synchronization, more sophisticated contemporary eyes and ears can't overlook the film's glaring flaws. While I can write off the image quality due to what is probably a poor print (I doubt this film was ever archived properly and we're probably never going to see a better version), the soundtrack is such a mess that it seems ripe for some kind of Mystery Science parody.

While it's obvious that Douglas and Quinn spoke their dialogue in English, while the rest of the cast performed in Italian, the film, as was the tradition in Italy well into the 1960s (and even beyond), was filmed without sound and then post-dubbed. That means that even Douglas and Quinn, trying to synch their English dialogue with their miming mouths, are often not quite on the mark. The less said about the English dubbed Italian actors, the better. Several online sites are full of derogatory comments about Mangano's performance especially, but I personally think that's mostly due to the completely inept dubbing--if one simply pays attention to the actress, turning off the sound for example, she does a beautiful job in emoting through facial expressions. It would have been interesting to have been offered both the original Italian version and the English dub on this DVD so that we could hear the Italian cast with their real voices and inflections, but alas that was evidently not meant to be.

Often dramatically inert, this is still a colorful and often fun fantasy laden film, one that might appeal to young children whose critical discernment might not yet be quite at the level of their parents. While Ulysses fails spectacularly to humanize these characters, leaving them exactly as they're sadly too often thought of--as two dimensional "names" in a musty ode--the film still offers a sort of mid-50s spectacle that, if nothing else, should appeal to lovers of camp. Douglas fans especially will probably love seeing the actor in one of his lesser known (and lesser seen) roles, despite the drawbacks of the film itself.

The DVD

Video:
It's probably pointless to complain very much about Ulysses' 1.33:1 image quality, as there's probably little to no interest in this title and it will never receive any sort of restoration, if in fact decent source elements are even still available. There's still a glimmer of the film's original Technicolor sheen, especially in some of the blues and greens, but this is a pretty badly faded print, with registration problems throughout. Skin tones are murky, and contrast is very poor at times, making, for example, the cave scenes with the Cyclops a muddy mess. The print is also hampered by a lot of damage, with specks, scratches and even a missing frame or two along the way.

Sound:
It's also near impossible to divorce oneself from the actually comical dubbing fiasco to address the actual state of the soundtrack itself. The fact is, the original mono soundtrack is reproduced here in adequate shape, but with noticeable compression and at times equally noticeable hiss. You'll notice a high end drop off in the music cues, but the overall sound here is uncomfortably boxy and sonically curtailed. English subtitles are available.

Extras:
None are offered.

Final Thoughts:
This is exactly the sort of quasi B-movie fodder you'd expect to see at a second run movie house on a Saturday afternoon in the mid 1960s, something stuck up on a screen to keep the kiddies entertained for a couple of hours while Mom and Dad did their shopping. Fun, at least from a historical perspective in terms of Douglas' storied career, but awfully inert and plastic, Ulysses will still appeal to those with a penchant for camp, or for revisiting what mid-50s audience took for splendor. Rent It.

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"G-d made stars galore" & "Hey, what kind of a crappy fortune is this?" ZMK, modern prophet