Self-important, over-dramatic, uninspired.

Let's be realistic.

Instead, you get a movie that's enjoyable enough, but leaves you feeling like it could have been much, much more.

A clunky actioner with a handful of cool moments.

I've watched some utter codswallop in my time, but CROSS OF THE SEVEN JEWELS reaches new lows in almost every respect. This is a painfully bad attempt at an Italian werewolf film (I believe the previous attempt was 1976's NAKED WEREWOLF WOMAN) which would have been halfway decent had it anything resembling a budget. Instead, the film appears to have been made out of the director's loose change. Said director, Marco Antonio Andolfi, also acted as a producer, did the special effects (what special effects?) and took the leading role under a pseudonym, which would have been good had he possessed any movie-making talent whatsoever. Instead, all he has is enthusiasm, which sadly isn't enough.The painfully slow and poorly-filmed movie begins with a red-lit scene in a brothel which looks like it has come straight out of a cheap Asian porno. In it, S&M-clad cult members indulge in kinky sexual acts such as whipping. Presiding over the weird orgy is the craggy-faced cult leader, played by former peplum star Gordon Mitchell (BLOOD DELIRIUM). Poor Gordon. Undoubtedly the star's worst ever film appearance, he gets barely a line of dialogue here and for the most part stands around grimacing and occasionally gurning into the camera in inserts randomly stuck into the middle of other scenes.The incredibly wooden Andolfi stars as a middle-aged guy vacationing in Italy with his girlfriend when his magic lucky necklace is stolen by a petty motorbike thief. From here on, the rest of the film concerns Andolfi attempting to get his necklace back, by visiting all the local criminals and usually getting beaten up as a result. It goes without saying that the criminals are an utterly uninteresting and badly-dressed bunch and the terrible locations seem to use the same set every time, just dressed differently.After an hour of mindless wandering around and uninteresting tame violence, the film comes to an abrupt and unsatisfying end. The dull crime action (which also includes a plodding police investigation, God knows why) is occasionally punctuated with bursts of werewolf violence; the only reason to watch this film being to laugh at just how bad the werewolf in this film is.When reviewing the Peter Cushing film LEGEND OF THE WEREWOLF, critics usually comment on how cheap and derivative the makeup is in it. Similarly, when the Brit horror flick DOG SOLDIERS was recently released, the werewolves were criticised as being unrealistic. Both makeup jobs look like artistic masterpieces in comparison to the shaggy wolfman on display here. Even the werewolf in 1935's creaky WEREWOLF OF London is 100 times more realistic. Remember that ultra-cheap peplum film THE INVINCIBLE BROTHER MACISTE with the race of leopard men? Probably not, but the same 'technology' is used in this film. Namely, a fur mask worn over the head by a fully naked male actor (thankfully, the Japanese version I saw uses genital fogging) and a pair of fur mittens. AWFUL! The end result transforms a normal actor into... a naked guy with a werewolf mask and mittens on.The transformation scene is hilarious, lasting about ten minutes and utilising a "mooing" sound effect to add to the 'horror' of the piece. Sadly, it has the opposite effect. Watch out for the wacky death-by-werewolf scene in which a guy's face melts off like in THE BEYOND, but even cheaper and not as much fun. The less said about the plastic stomach explosion the better. Finally, the slightly controversial werewolf rape sequence is made ludicrous by the fact that the 'werewolf' is quite obviously a guy holding a fur rug over his head. Yes, it's that bad. The editing on this film is choppy and the gratuitous sex scenes involve unappealing actors and actresses, prompting liberal use of the fast-forward button. In all respects, this is terrible and a real bore, and only fans of REALLY BAD movies might get a kick out of it. Just leave your taste at the door beforehand.

Who would have thought that there could be worse werewolf movies than HOWLING II: YOUR SISTER IS A WEREWOLF (1985)? Or worse Italian fantasy films than THE PUMAMAN (1981)? Or that these two unenviable crowns could be worn by the very same title?! This is not to mention that the film in question (and under review) also dabbles in the Camorra, erotica and Satanism fields and makes a shambles of them all! One of the undeniable pleasures of listening to well-researched audio commentaries is when the film historian goes into detail about the actors' careers as a whole and singles out particular titles for whatever reason; this is just how I came to learn about this terminally goofy film when Tim Lucas mentioned it while speaking about Giorgio Ardisson's career during his audio commentary for Mario Bava's ERIK THE CONQUEROR (1961); luckily, even a movie as obscure and thankless as this can be tracked down by intrepid film buffs courtesy of other enterprising fans who are generous enough to share their inexhaustible collections with unknown and far-away members of their 'community'! Even so, the film was also dealt with (albeit very briefly) in the Italian TV programme "Stracult".The film's only two familiar faces – one wonders how they were persuaded to be involved – are Gordon Mitchell (prone to the most hideous overacting as the leader of the Satanists) and the afore-mentioned Ardisson (as a Mafia big-wig who hilariously lapses into English 3 times during his meeting with the local boss whom he addresses as "Don Raffaele of my balls!" in a fit of exasperation). Eddy Endolf is the star, writer, director, editor and special effects designer!; the werewolf make-up is limited to the hands and wrists, the top half of the face and, yes, his private parts – for whatever reason, whenever the change occurs, the man loses his clothing, only to magically regain them upon resuming human form! The first time this occurs he literally does a double-take at the fact that it is that time of the night, even if he had looked at a clock in his victim's house merely seconds before!; the second time it is when he is captured and being grilled by the gangsters…except that they just happen to exit the room at this instance, which leaves us to witness his transformation via a series of dissolves for nearly 5 minutes, the odd facial hair being applied with each successive cut! The film begins with a black mass, presided over by Mitchell, and involving several masked/naked men and women engaged in sexual activity; one of them is actually getting it on with a Swamp Thing-like demon! The latter, called Aborym, has actually been invoked during the ceremony and it transpires that one of his mistresses was the hero's mother (hence his monstrous legacy). However, when she tells her master/lover she wants out, he bursts in repeated cries of "Slut!" and inflates her body so much that it cracks open, unleashing much goo (for the record, the first werewolf victim and Mitchell's own unexplained demise are similarly grisly)! Incidentally, 20 years after the fact, Endolf resurrected this particular character in a 30-minute short entitled HERE'S ABORYM AGAIN! At the core of the film is a demented (and drawn-out) dream sequence made up of random snippets from earlier scenes – including that hilarious pre-transformation look of surprise upon the hero's face! The leading man is protected by the titular talisman – incidentally, the film was also released as TALISMAN in some quarters and had sequences dealing with the war in Bosnia included for Japanese screenings! – but early on it is stolen in a daylight street robbery (the culprits being motorcycle-riding junkies whom we had just seen shooting up by the sea, with Mitchell himself doubling as the pusher!). The protagonist's many attempts to retrieve it land him in a disco (cue bad music and worse dancing) where he even gets one hell of a beating; deposited outside the establishment, he is found and nursed back to health by a young woman. During the fracas in the mobsters' lair, he learns that the priceless artifact has been donated by Don Raffaele to a lady friend (when Ardisson had made him contact her but he is unable to get through, the latter spits: "What's this bitch doing – humping the phone?"); when the hero finally locates her, she proves to be a horny fortune teller (an old woman he asked for directions tells him: "If she's a lady, I'm the Madonna!") who, not currently having what he wanted at her disposal, suggests they pass the time in bed. Endolf obliges, having no choice but, predictably, at midnight (not the rising of the moon, mind you!) he turns into a monster yet again: the ecstatic woman is oblivious to the change but, even though starting to foam at the mouth, he keeps at it! Ultimately, he is yet again saved, in the typically disorientated state after each metamorphosis, by the girl he loves and the two go to the Vatican to give thanks (I kid you not!).The music is by Paolo Rustichelli, son of esteemed composer and Bava regular Carlo. The copy I watched was culled from an Italian TV broadcast (though the channel name has been digitally erased) which suffered from audio glitches during the aftermath-of-the-robbery sequence. In the end, all one can do here is surmise that a lot of thought must have gone into concocting such a bizarrely improbable concept, and just as much to rally a conglomeration of non-talents to execute it!

This appallingly awful hodgepodge affair is a dull, confused and meandering snorefest about Marco (insipidly played by the ultra-boring Eddy Endolf, who also misdirected this putrid mess), a drab numbskull doofus whose mother practiced black magic and worshiped an evil ape creature. When dear mom renounced her unholy faith in the foul, hairy beast, ape thing got ticked off: he brutally butchered mommy and put a curse on Marco, who has to always wear a cross with seven jewels on it or otherwise he will transform into a hokey murderous werewolf-type hirsute humanoid creature. Marco has his cross swiped, a disastrous event which leads to several gory killings, seriously stupid and cheesy solarized nightmares, a bittersweet reunion with his loving cousin Carmelita (the pretty, but colorless Anne Belle), nasty run-ins with a stolen jewelry ring, corrupt government officials, bumbling cops, and a phony whore fortune teller (this later gal Marco makes love to; he transforms into his lethal hairball alter ego in mid-coitus and tears out her throat!), and creepy visions of a kinky devil cult who are not only led by famed Italian muscleman actor Gordon Mitchell (who mostly just stands around and glowers), but also like to hold sick and twisted S&M-themed orgies in a smoky, reddish-hued dungeon basement (even ape thing participates in the wicked debauchery; he copulates with a beautiful blonde babe!). Despite the wacky plot's largely unrealized potential for hardcore sleazy trash fright flick thrills, a few raunchy sex scenes, and the abundant violence and nudity, this hideously botched cinematic abomination sure ain't no gem. It's fatally undermined by flat direction, sluggish pacing, poor acting, shoddy make-up f/x, indifferently drawn characters, and, worst of all, an overly talky, rambling and ineptly structured script that awkwardly combines dumbfounding flashbacks and flashforwards, sloppily integrated subplots, dopey dream sequences and a horribly anti-climactic non-ending into one horrendously abysmal melange that doesn't possess the slightest trace of either cohesion or narrative drive. A real stinker.

This is probably the cheapest horror film ever made in Italy, and that surely means something. It's about a hapless man who suffers under a strange werewolf-curse which is related to an even stranger occult sect (led by Cameron Mitchell!). In a way it pays homage to the Spanish werewolf-flics starring Paul Naschy as Valdemar Daninsky. But the Naschy-films look like big budget epics compared to this mess, which is so bad that one has to see it to believe it. Director Andolfi not only plays the lead role (credited as Eddy Endolf) but also handles the special effects and many other things. Sometimes one might believe he was the only one behind the camera (maybe he was, who knows?).Besides the cursed man and the sect, the incoherent plot involves the least threatening mafia killers ever banned on celluloid; with such mobsters, "The Godfather" would have been the comedy of the 20th century. All the actors seem to be amateurs, probably good friends of director/everything Andolfi. The special effects (especially the werewolf-make-up and the old fashioned transformation sequences) are less convincing than most monster scenes from, shall we say, films by Ed Wood jr. All in all, this shoddy mess is unbelievably ridiculous.Despite the fact that the film is inept from every imaginable aspect, it is good fun and highly entertaining, at least for watching once - a party tape and a master example of a film that lacks any quality. You have been warned...