Santo and the Vengeance of the Mummy (1971)
Article 6088 by Dave Sindelar
Directed by Rene Cardona
Featuring Santo, Eric del Castillo, Mary Montiel
Country: Mexico
What it is: Mexican Wrestler in Scooby-Doo territory
Santo is part of a group that raids an ancient crypt and finds himself under the mummy’s curse. Can his wrestling moves prevail against such an opponent?
Before I start in the ‘review proper’, I’d like to recount a scene from this movie. In the tomb, there is a path where the explorers go through a hole in the wall and climb down some rocks. We see the first explorer do this. Then we see the second explorer do this. Then the third. Then the fourth, then the….. and finally, the last. This sequence exists in its full glory in the middle of the film.
Now about the movie. The mummy make-up is actually pretty good in this one, and it’s nice to encounter one with energy and gusto rather than one who plods until his victim falls into his arms. Even given that we’re in Scooby-Doo territory a little here, I’d like to see more of this monster, who even offs his victims with bow and arrow. So why don’t we? Don’t tell me they would have to have had cut important scenes to fit more mummy activity into the movie, because if you do, I’ll just point you to the previous paragraph and ask you whether that scene was vital to the story.
There’s some other good points here and there to this one, such as the way that the final extraneous wrestling match actually has a nice parallel to the ending of the “movie “. But the movie is hard to recommend when it features scenes of such committed tedium as the one described above.