Hundra

Last updated
Hundra
Hundra poster.jpg
Poster
Directed by Matt Cimber
Written byJosé Truchado
John F. Goff
Matt Cimber
Produced by John Ghaffari
José Truchado
Eric Bruckner
Starring Laurene Landon
John Ghaffari
Marisa Casel
Cinematography John Cabrera
Edited byClaudio M. Cutry
Juan Serra
Music by Ennio Morricone
Production
company
Continental Movie Productions
Distributed by Cinema Epoch (DVD Reissue)
Release date
  • 1 August 1983 (1983-08-01)
Running time
109 minutes (DVD version)
90 minutes
CountriesItaly
United States
Spain
LanguagesEnglish
Spanish

Hundra is a 1983 sword-and-sorcery film co-written and directed by Matt Cimber and starring Laurene Landon.

Contents

Plot

Hundra belongs to a tribe of Amazons. She is the only tribe member of her age who has never been with a man. She declares she will keep it like that. One day when she goes hunting, her tribe is outnumbered and slaughtered by barbarians. As the only survivor she travels to an old wise woman and asks her for advice, but to her surprise she is told she ought to become a mother in order to prevent the final extinction of the Amazons.

Hundra seeks a father for her child. The first candidate has bad manners and it turns out that he is a sadist. While she continues her search she is confronted by a murderous robber baron who only wants to kill her. Later she encounters an effeminate pimp. Eventually she gets to know a gentleman who works as a healer. She asks him to become the father of her child but she is told that a man won't get in the right mood if he is approached too bluntly. Hundra asks other women to help her to live up to his expectations. She succeeds in seducing him, gets pregnant and delivers a child.

An evil pagan priest kidnaps Hundra's daughter. Thus Hundra is coerced into joining a sinister ritual where the priest's followers humiliate her. During this session she is informed that her new friends have freed the child. She fights back and returns to her home lands. The female narrator explains there was proof that Hundra's spirit kept on living in all women ever since.

Cast

Production

There was originally a body double for the nude scene, which Laurene Landon was not going to do. However, the double had a different body type than Landon's. "They had her in the water because I wasn't going to show my boobs. She was maybe five-feet-five. I think Matt Cimber did that on purpose to get me to do that nude scene in the water", Landon said, "I saw the footage of that and said, 'That's not me. My ass isn't that big. I'll do it myself'". [1]

Reception

Paul Mavis of Dvdtalk.com described Hundra as a "genial, rollicking, comic book sword and sandals fantasy" and argued for the film's cult status. [2] "Monster Pictures" stated "Hundra" was "one of the great underrated films of the era". [3] John Shatzer of BloodTypeOnline.com wrote a negative review but gave Hundra credit by saying a few action scenes were exciting. [4] Judge David Johnson of DVD Verdict instead regarded the action scenes and Landon's general performance as "stilted," [5] only allowing the film's "camp" value. Keith Breese of Filmcritic.com praised Laurene Landon as "a striking action lead" and compared Hundra to "Xena". [6]

Comparison to contemporary genre films

Mondo-Digital categorised Hundra as one of the better contemporary copies of Conan the Barbarian and pointed out that Hundra preceded the film adaptation of Red Sonja . [7] Richard Scheib of Moria.co.nz called Hundra a "better incarnation of the spirit of the Red Sonja stories than the Red Sonja (1985) film ever was". [8] Landon herself called the film "a female version of Conan the Barbarian". [9]

DVD release

In 2007 the DVD label Subversive published "Hundra" with a commentary by Matt Cimber and Laurene Landon and a making-of. The edition also includes a comic book and Ennio Morricone's soundtrack on a CD. Andrew Borntreger of badmovies.org complained about missing subtitles and closing credits being hard to read. [10] Jonathan Doyle of media-party.com criticised the anamorphic transfer and the sound quality of what he called a "cult oddity". [11]

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References

  1. ↑ "Interview With Actress Laurene Landon: A Cult Star's Journey". www.pophorror.com. 19 May 2018. Retrieved 5 February 2022.
  2. ↑ "1983's Hundra, the genial, rollicking, comic book sword and sandals fantasy, has generated a minor cult" . Retrieved 2007-03-25.
  3. ↑ "HUNDRA is one of the great underrated films of the era" . Retrieved 2012-12-29.
  4. ↑ "I will give credit and say that a few of the fights are effective and even exciting". Archived from the original on 2013-03-13. Retrieved 2012-12-29.
  5. ↑ "Landon's stitled performance combined with the stilted action sequences lend the entire film a camp value" . Retrieved 2007-04-06.
  6. ↑ "While Hundra practically vanished after a short theatrical run (studio troubles), 'Xena' ran with the same theme and made mint more than a decade later" . Retrieved 2011-10-20.
  7. ↑ "Hundra, is one of many, many Conan copies which flooded theaters around the world, though in this case it also predates another Schwarzenegger film as well, Red Sonja. One of the more accomplished of its ilk" . Retrieved 2012-12-29.
  8. ↑ "the film is in fact a far better incarnation of the spirit of the Red Sonja stories than the Red Sonja (1985) film ever was". 2 June 2000. Retrieved 2012-12-29.
  9. ↑ Watson, Chris. Bad Ass Women of Cinema: A Collection of Interviews. BearManor Media.
  10. ↑ "the end credits are difficult to read, and the DVD lacks subtitles" . Retrieved 2007-04-20.
  11. ↑ "anamorphic transfer on this disc is flawed and the sound is quite poor (most of the thickly-accented voice-over is indecipherable unless you crank the volume to dangerous levels), but it is currently the best way to see this forgotten cult oddity" . Retrieved 2007-04-03.
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