THE THRONE OF FIRE (1983)

 

PHENOMENALITY: *marvelous*
MYTHICITY: *fair*
FRYEAN MYTHOS: *adventure*
CAMPBELLIAN FUNCTION: *metaphysical*

Aside from the naturalistic thriller LAST HOUSE ON THE BEACH, the only directorial works I've seen from Franco Prosperi have been the two sword-and-sorcery movies with which he apparently ended his movie career. The first of the two, THE INVINCIBLE BARBARIAN, shared the same star as THRONE OF FIRE, Italian actor Pierro Torrisi, billed as "Peter McCoy." Unfortunately, BARBARIAN suffered from a mostly incoherent script. I don't know anything else produced by the two credited writers of THRONE. But THRONE, whatever its flaws, at least makes some degree of sense.

Like a lot of sword-and-sorcery movies, THRONE takes place in a polyglot world, one mingling pagan and Christian references, and both are used to justify a larger-than-life pattern of "dueling destinies." The first destiny begin when a widow named Azira (Beni Cardoso, confusingly billed as "Benny") has a supernatural visitor. She's later said to be a witch, and though there's no evidence of this, maybe that's why her visitor feels free to impose himself on her, telling her that they're going to spawn a son who will rule the world. This sounds like it's right from the ROSEMARY'S BABY playbook, but strangely, the fellow making it with Azira is not Satan, but Satan's messenger Belial (Harrison Muller). I'm not sure why the writers chose to settle for a functionary to spawn a mortal king of evil. But in any case Azira and Belial conceive a child named Morak, who in his adulthood will also be played by Harrison Muller.

However, a good magician named Antar figures out the lay of the mystic land, and he brings into being-- with very little details presented-- a heroic avatar of good, Seigfried (McCoy). The audience doesn't see the upbringing of either Morak or Seigfried, which may be all to the good, given that how badly those tropes worked out in BARBARIAN. 

So we fast-forward to adulthood for hero and villain. Morak gathers an army and assails the castle of the rightful king, killing everyone except the king's nubile daughter Valkari (Sabrina Siani). Morak wants to force Valkari into marriage to secure his reign, but there's an additional hurdle involved. To master the realm, Morak must not only marry into the rightful bloodline. In order to gain total sovereignty, the usurper must also sit upon the Throne of Fire, a magical item of furniture sent to Earth by the high god Odin. Moreover, the Throne--which will literally burn up anyone who sits upon it without being entitled to do so-- can only bestow sovereignty to the princess' usurper-husband on a special date: "the day of the night of the day"-- which cryptic riddle Morak doesn't know how to interpret.

(Incidentally, in Nordic myth the hero Seigfried is the grandson of Odin, and his lover is a valkyrie-- and that Seigfried possesses two of the powers that this Seigfried will eventually receive.)

Complicated? Sure, but once the script puts across this setup, the rest of the film is largely decent if not exceptional action-fodder. Seigfried, knowing that Morak's plans hinge upon marrying Valkari, infiltrates Morak's castle and tries to abscond with the princess. However, Morak's guards overpower the hero and consign him to a "pit of madness" beneath the castle. (Maybe a subsection of the Hell occupied by Morak's never-seen-again daddy?) The doughty fighter manages to battle his way past a handful of low-budget menaces and finds his way into the castle's dungeon-- and to his surprise, he also finds his father Magician Antar in one of the cells. Seigfried believed Morak had killed Antar, but it seems Morak kept the wizard alive to interpret the cryptic prophecy. The swordsman wants to liberate his dad, but Antar insists that rescuing Valkari has to be their priority. Antar uses magic to endow his son with the twin powers of invisibility and invulnerability, though he will lose both powers if struck by fire.

Invisible Seigfried enters Valkari's boudoir and tries to talk her into leaving with him. Being no fool, she gives him a little static, but finally agrees to his plan. Unfortunately, for some reason Morak's listening in on their conversation, and in the process of convincing Valkari, Seigfriend reveals his vulnerability (also a minor feature of the original Seigfried tale). Hero and princess make some limited progress in their escape, but Morak shoots Seigfried with a flaming arrow, and that's the end of the champion's super-powers. 

A little later, while Seigfriend languishes in prison, Valkari manages to escape by using both guile and her considerable sword-skill. Morak releases Seigfried so that Morak's forces can follow the hero to the princess, and this ends Valkari's brief freedom. Back at the castle, Morak sentences Seigfried to be killed in an arena by a big bald fighter, but doesn't stay to watch, so of course Seigfried wins the bout and escapes again. Yet his efforts to prevent the marriage, amusingly enough, are aided by the marital priest taking his sweet time with the ceremony. Meanwhile, the prophecy's mystery is solved-- the assumption has to take place during the just commencing eclipse. But the marriage is averted and guess who ends up roasting his chestnuts on the Throne of Fire.

There's no great depth in the script's cherry-picked myth-tropes, but at least they don't undermine one another. McCoy and Siani are both good-looking heroic characters and they have some OK fight-scenes. My verdict on the movie: if one wants a decent if very basic sword-and-sorcery flick, THRONE is worth sitting through.