Thursday 22 December 2011

Sinbad


In Heart of Flame my hero, Rafiq, is based on the archetype character Sinbad, so I thought I'd post some eyecandy Sinbad pics from various movies. In the original stories from The One Thousand and One Nights, he's a merchant with a habit of getting shipwrecked and not making it home for years. In the film and TV interpretations he's rather more heroic and less incompetent. And he always gets the girl :-)



This picture shows Douglas Fairbanks Junior from the 1947 Sinbad the Sailor, in seriously dodgy technicolor. Hot Hero Rating: Ugh. Why did heroes in those days look so old? (He was 38 when this was made. He just looks like a bank manager in his fifties.) Monster rating: there aren't any in the movie.



Dale Robertson in 1955 movie Son of Sinbad (also called Sinbad, ahem). Hot Hero Rating: Um ...okay. Monster rating: none, still, and much of the content of this movie can be surmised by this shot of sidekick hero Vincent Price trying to free this young lady from her pointy-breasted harem outfit and even more unlikely shoes.



Woohooo! Sinbad leaves home! Ray Harryhausen hoves into view!


Kerwin Matthews in The 7th Voyage of Sinbad (1958). Hot Hero Rating: Um ... okay. Monsters: Yes! Giant two-headed rocs, an animated skeleton, a dragon and a cyclops!


The dragon and the cyclops fight! Oh, I'm in stop-motion heaven.



John Philip Law in The Golden Voyage of Sinbad (1974). Hot Hero Rating: Yeah, pretty hot actually, although the medallions are getting insanely big by this point. Monsters: a cyclops/centaur, a giant animated statue of Kali, some other stuff but nobody remembers what, because we were all staring at CAROLINE MUNRO'S COSTUME:


Holy cow. My eyeballs have melted. Let's just sit here for a few moments...



Patrick Wayne in the 1977 Sinbad and the Eye of the Tiger. Hot Hero Rating: Oh good grief no, not with that hair. He's not even as hot as the Minoton, and he's only mechanical:


Phwor. Another nail in the coffin of my sexual conformity.
Monsters: under-used.


Zen Gesner in The Adventures of Sinbad (1996-8). Hot Hero Rating: Please, bring back Xena: warrior princess.



Sinbad: Legend of the Seven Seas (2003). Hot Hero Rating: Hell yes - despite the peculiar lack of underarm hair. And he's got Brad Pitt's voice! Monsters: Didn't notice anything but the Sirens, because I was too busy grousing that SINBAD IS SUDDENLY NOT ARABIC ANYMORE, IS HE? HE'S GREEK, EH? WHAT, WE'VE DECIDED TO PRETEND THE MIDDLE EAST NEVER EXISTED, JUST BECAUSE WE'VE INCONVENIENTLY GONE TO WAR THERE?



Manu Bennett in Sinbad and the Minotaur (2010). Hot Hero Rating: Look, it's Crixus from Spartacus! I've seen his willy! Monsters: It's not a minotaur, it's a bull. And I haven't watched this DVD because I saw the trailer and it looks crap.



Elliot Knight in this, due out from Sky TV in 2012, I believe. Hot Hero Rating: Looks interesting ... but why does he look so young?
;-)

6 comments:

Eloise said...

Comes back after Googling Caroline Munro... mmmm.

You do realise of course Sinbad started too old and is now too young for you. Except for a Greek cartoon version apparently!

Does that say more about you and how you also view policemen I wonder?

Janine Ashbless said...

Uh, yes. Blooming teenaged policemen...

Jo said...

:) heh.

Nice - I went to see the first 1970s one, I guess, with my dad, in the local cinema, all red velour and wonderful grubbiness, now defunct, sadly. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8NAX8ikqozM

Janine Ashbless said...

You really do find the strangest things on Youtube!

Jo said...

That's not strange, that was my cinema! Ireland used to have a thriving family cinema business. People are quiet sentimental about it, hence the clip on youtube.

Janine Ashbless said...

Ah! I remember my old local cinema with no nostalgia at all ... *shudders* ... the carpet was sticky underfoot and there was feces smeared up the wall of the ladies' loo. Never again. Hurray for Vue!