Watch The War Goddess For Free

Pretty good movie overall. First half was nothing special but it got better as it went along.

In truth, there is barely enough story here to make a film.

The film makes a home in your brain and the only cure is to see it again.

The movie turns out to be a little better than the average. Starting from a romantic formula often seen in the cinema, it ends in the most predictable (and somewhat bland) way.

If you want to see some naked women, riding horses, throwing spears, female warriors fighting each other or with men, or Angelo Infanti eating an apple in almost any scene, this is the film for you. A pile of barren beauty contest and they gave for making this film. There is even a pathetic ballet scene that takes place in a cave. The whole movie is boring. Except maybe the fighting scene between Antiope(Alena Johnston, a beautiful blonde) and Orytheia(a not so beautiful Sabine Sun but, she was the wife of the director, Terence Young). Luciana Paluzzi, the beautiful Fiona from Thunderball(directed by the same Terence Young), has a small role as Phaedra . Riz Ortolani's music (which is very talented) is not great in this one.

What can one expect of a film about raving amazons from 1973? I expected something really terrible but it wasn't at all as bad as I expected. The basic story of a competition between two female leaders is kind of silly, but it has not at all the campy weirdness one would expect with all these big breasted women doing naked oil wrestling, throwing javelin, riding on horses, sleeping together, fighting, et cetera.There are even sincere dialogues, nice looking sets and mass fight scenes. It has the looks of an expensive film. The story line of Antiope finding affection of a man, and being troubled by it, is not very interesting, but believable in a sense, also thanks to the reasonable acting by Angelo Infanti. All other acting is not very good, but never the cringing kind of bad.But how to watch this? It is not too bad to get the predicate 'camp'. It is not funny enough to be a comedy (only a slight bit, when women are torn between aversion and lust for men). And it is certainly not factual to be enjoyed as an historical drama, as many others already have pointed out.And what about an erotic film? There are pretty women in it, often naked. But the characters themselves HARDLY seem to enjoy sexuality. They have to ENDURE it in order not to die out. Which was perhaps the whole joke of the film, I guess, but only director Terence Young could have told us that. I rate this 5/10.

"War Goddess", a 70's vintage sword-and-sandal movie that depicts life in a strong Amazon nation, is worth watching for two reasons. First, although it was remastered onto DVD from several VHS versions, it does a good job explaining how an Amazon becomes a warrior, how the nation was ruled, and, how the Amazon army fought.Unlike other Amazon movies that portrayed women warriors as bimbos or inaccurately dressed with little fighting skills, "War Goddess" depicts women dressed as a warrior should be dressed, with the light leather armor of the time. And, you will be most impressed with the three battle scenes that show a high amount of training in horsemanship, throwing the javelin, and fencing with the short sword. Sadly, they aren't shown wielding the labrys and their shields are round and not half-moon. But, their bravery and ferociousness in battle are great examples of what a real Amazon of the Bronze Age would be like.There is some gratuitous nudity which I didn't' care for, but overall, this movie was fantastic. You can rent or buy it from Netflix, Blockbusters, and Amazon.com.

A sexually-liberated (if not terribly explicit) peplum which inconceivably attracted an assortment of talent - director Young, cinematographer Aldo Tonti, production designer Mario Garbuglia, composer Riz Ortolani - but the result is jaw-droppingly awful, so much so that I can't remember the last time I laughed so hard (for all the wrong reasons) during a film! The warriors of the title are man-hating (i.e. lesbian) Amazonian women who must go through the 'humiliation' of mating once a year with strong men (settling on a garrison of the Greek army, despite their well-known reputation as homosexuals) in order to bear females to continue their line! It's well and good that the film doesn't take itself too seriously - as can be witnessed from the self-deprecating text which opens and closes the picture - but that doesn't excuse the sheer insanity of some of its concepts: the Amazonians being able to avoid an ambush or detect an intruder in their camp because one of them is allergic to males and has a sneezing fit whenever she senses their presence; the mating is preceded by a ritual of anti-male chanting that is supposed to 'insulate' the women in the call of their duty, thus making submission (even if temporary) to the opposite sex tolerable. Also worth mentioning are the Olympian challenges between the two armies (which the men invariably lose?!), not one but two all-nude wrestling matches - no doubt inspired by the notorious male equivalent which forms the centerpiece of Ken Russell's WOMEN IN LOVE (1969) - between the current Amazonian Queen and her jealous and scheming rival (belatedly revealed as her own sibling, but which doesn't prevent them from subsequently becoming lovers!!), the stupid mugging of a love-struck servant girl who drinks an aphrodisiac prepared for the Queen by the conspirators...not forgetting the ludicrous art direction (everything in the Amazonian court, including the Queen's throne and scepter, seems to be made in the shape of an axe for no apparent reason!), the incongruous costumes (from the much later Roman Empire era), or the battle scenes in which the fighting Amazonians are barely-concealed stuntmen in drag!! Apparently, LE GUERRIERE DAL SENO NUDO (which literally translates to THE BARE-BREASTED WARRIORS but was known internationally as THE AMAZONS) was a rival production with the equally irresistible-sounding LE AMAZZONI - DONNE D' AMORE E DI GUERRA aka BATTLE OF THE AMAZONS (1973), directed by Al Bradley...er...Alfonso Brescia!