THE STRANGLERS OF BOMBAY
Wow, I really miss this kind of picture. Real men's adventure magazine stuff with exotic locales, women, villains, heroes with guts and honor-basically all the stuff that got neutered out of adventure films to make them more P.C. Yeah, thanks a lot. What I was really missing in my escapist entertainment was historical accuracy. This is all the fault of the dick-head know it alls that like to point out various mistakes in everything from dinosaur pictures to movies like 300. The current champ of this brand of joy killing douchery is comics author and British she-male Alan Moore. THE STRANGLERS OF BOMBAY is definitely the kind of picture he would label "stupid and racist" but fortunately he ain't here.
It all begins with Guy Rolfe playing an officer overseeing operations of the East India Company in Bombay. Trade routes are being attacked and people are disappearing with the British unable to do anything. Rolfe who plays a sharp man's man and not your typical British fop, has worked to understand the locals and believes a sinister organization has corrupted the Indian population to the highest official. Turns out he is right as the Thugee Cult is operating secretly to great effect by causing the British a huge loss of profit and generally being a huge strangling pain in the ass. Of course Rolfe has annoyed his clueless superiors and is replaced by a effete kiss ass we'll call Captain Sillynanny. Of course the killings continue and eventually Rolfe has to take matters in hand. Fairly simple but filled with great cracking pulp adventure along the way. It's stuffed with Kali statues, secret rites, ritual eye gouging and tongue removal, torture by cobra, rescue by mongoose, hand chopping, hot Indian babe who seems to get wet watching torture, thugee home invsion, secret graveyards, boy abduction, a hell of a lot of strangling and it's all crafted under the great direction of the awesome Terence Fisher. Rolfe has the perfect face for this kind of stuff, all strapping and strong jawed. The B & W photography is sharp and the disc, a part of the Icons of Adventure set, is perfect. I loved it.