HERCULES IN THE HAUNTED WORLD
(Hercules in the Center of the Earth, 1961; dir. Mario Bava, w. Alessandro Continenza)

While Herc washes atop waterfall (cf pure Black Sunday girl + river, water below to also cf fiery hell he soon to delve), pal Theseus (whose mythological Cretan labyrinth parallels hell) makes out w/ friend’s fiancée Jocasta (mother of Oedipus, for whom T doubling, drama to follow similar oedipal quest into maze of past/self in order to solve mystery of own identity) as thugs lay siege to workers below (complex impeding quotidian progress/development) + finally disturb lovers (interfering on libido – psychic agents rousing personality out of oedi idyll); H+T bust them up (might/will + inquisitiveness will dispel dis-ease) then discuss H’s imminent marriage to Deianira (T+J acting out H's prenuptial issues), niece of evil king Lyco (not-the-father whose elimination will free not-the-mother to be lover) who sent thugs (Complex itself bedeviling hero-superego) + who summons her from sarcophagus (Sleeping Beauty + fem spirit held captive by sadistic masculine, marriage 2B uniting of both principles), she ostensibly taken ill (weakened anima in self) by both father Uretes’ death (Lyco-bro, dad good-masc to which bathing/cleansing H hopes to aspire) + H’s long absence (1 + same: loss of positive male img sending Self into limbo, for which cure will be, paradoxically, to rescue + integrate "pure" fem).

Finds her in garden (drama 2B of restoration - as of Her eve-il Eden-img; curing, also, of nature, as later rescue of Persephone from Underworld) in trance (she dreamer of film, Herc own positive animus that will free her from patriarchal rule), yearning to join father "in the deep sea" (unconscious to which animus has been repressed, H’s job to bring figure up from depths instead – into social rather’n schizo private world), elder friend Kyros (inner wisdom) telling him entire city under curse (Deianira = polis/Self) only H can cure (verbal xchg à la Tiresias + Oedipus on similar scourge latter discovers 2B own doing, ie w/i himself); Lyco fills in city's backstory (diagnosis): "The forces of evil dominated this land before the father of Uretes [after ureter: malaise sexual/constitutional male inheritance] defeated them + banished them forever into the kingdom o/t dead" (ie repression, rather’n resolution, dark forces aka complex/trauma; narrated by embodiment/result of same), curse to afflict all till last descendant dead (story recycling Sunday plot, indicating issue not resolved w/ that picture; shift of focus now onto male evildoer admission of failure in "demonizing" fem, family malediction thru-line to much Bava from Sunday + this to Whip + the Body, Hatchet f/t Honeymoon, Lisa + the Devil and Shock).

Consults sensuous oracle Medea (vs Sunday’s celibate friar, religion having lost connection w/ physicality/real world by that film) hampered by oath of silence till Herc trades immortality for knowledge (relinquishing body the mind transcending physical plane on dream-descent, where found "untold" wisdom): living stone (contradictory language of drm/unconscious – aka hard-on) beyond Hesperides (nymphs – goal mature sexuality; Hesperides also garden in which grow golden apples [eggs in fecund womb H sent there to fertilize + to bring one back]) "in the depths of Hades" (cf Uretes’ "deep sea" – physical underworld to match his psychic [+ not too complimentary to wmn]) will restore Deianira (his active sexuality – à la comic relief Theseus – will inspire hers); calls T away from Jocasta (1st step separating from mother-attraction, he needed for labyrinthine problem-solving skill) + together w/ her slapstick fiancée Telemachus (body, mind + comical-naïve soul united in goal) get magic boat (after H rescues Tele from "Test o/t Horse" – cutting them loose as Self from phys’l realm), on which all overcome w/ sleep (Magic Boat itself), delivering them to subterranean shore o/t Hesperides (underworld-unconscious, in which lie valuable, organic elements that will promote health + wholeness in world).

On waking, Queen o/t Hesperides tells men (1st they’ve ever seen: Deianira’s awakening sexuality + arousal of Herc’s own anima) they'll help if men don’t steal treasure (virginity; absence of de rigueur horniness on men’s part respect for wmn commensurate w/ wmn’s hands-off non-curiosity: strictly an intellectual/spiritual conjoining) + lead Herc to sacred tree "undefiled by the greed of men" (like I was saying), where he hurls boulder on sling at apple (interplay btwn rock + organic matter thru’out hell + beyond – Queen emerging from stone, etc – playing out interior struggle btwn hard macho + yielding femininity) when unsuccessful climbing after it (difficulty w/ phallus), freeing Hesps from Pluto’s pwr ("will live in darkness no more": fem img brought to light, as in subsequent verbal faux pas "…nor kill" – deadliness of wronged/repressed wmn/fem’y, à la Sunday); meanwhile, rockman Procrustes puts Theseus + Telemachus on rack ("You’re not long enuf" vis à vis Herc’s "difficulty"), H arriving to hurl him thru wall, producing foretold gate to Hades (1: phallus breaking hymen + 2: defeating negative phallus, yielding fem opening), where Herc + Theseus leave Tele to guard apple (transcending body again on dream-descent), their "only chance of getting out alive" à la thread which led Theseus out of labyrinth: "seed" to latter umbilical cord, which will enable their rebirth.

Brave 2 mindgames (defense mechanisms against plumbing psychological depths for deeply-guarded secret threatening to ego), including dive into river of fire – no! water (cf opening shot, both elements of cleansing) – + use living vines (passage thru which à la Fantastic Voyage capillaries: quest now biological) as rope bridge (tethered to rock à la apple sling: reiterative mode signifying metaphoric replaying of essential material – using physical elements to achieve spiritual treasure, img again à la sperm) across lava to sacred stone (living rock sim to Procrustes + reiteration of apple: egg, which will similarly bestow life), Theseus falling along way (separation from mind on further progress into unconscious); he wakes in cave (womb) to his "beauty of Hades" (unconscious fem-ideal, bestowing kiss of life opposite sim Sunday womb-an), Persephone (whose story traditional allegory for changing seasons/regenerating Nature), who knows stone being taken (because from own body, action allegory of similarly cyclical menses: aware of conjoining of waiting, life-giving fem w/ adventuresome, pwrful masc, she not-Deianira acting out latter’s somnolent inner working), he pledging love to her – in secret ("came here to help Herc save his beloved – now he will help me save mine" – ie, 2 wmn 1 + same, P part of D which must come out as well).

All 3 men meet back up (Theseus declaring he "can't be swallowed whole even by the prince of Hades himself," ahem) + set sail for home (rebirth, reunited + modified) w/ Persephone secreted below (unrealized new fem facet to i.d.), who tells Th to toss apple overboard (imbalance on ship w/ her + it; vestigial tie to mother-womb no longer needed à la umbilical cord, apple serving as equal passage out of hell as from Eden) when ship wracked by storm (inner turmoil, audience’s unsureness of P the ego’s own uncertainty about fem/self), Herc + Th amused by Tele’s entanglement in ropes aftwd (u-cord, again, now topic for jocularity); return to Icalia to find scourge worsened (ravages to Self of journey inwd), Lyco plotting to "take Deianira’s blood in his veins" (introjecting the feminine, à la Persephone in ship’s hold: transfiguration taking place in "dark" self awa surface) at lunar eclipse (as of personality, earth interceding btwn sun + moon as btwn Herc+Dei/masc+fem; "fem" lunar imgry continuation/culmination of apple + stone – cf also Caltiki’s enrichment by celestial body) so to "become king for all eternity" (dominate personality: threat of cruel macho eclipsing fem self; also Dei’s sense that own animus potential threat to Herc’s romantic regard of her).

Lyco advises Herc to consult Oracle on Deianira’s malady (she already in eclipse, celestial phenomenon projection of inner so to alert consciousness) + sez he’ll guard threshold to her room (aka her "honor"), O telling Herc gods angry (conscience/better judgment in uproar) for wanting to bring beloved back to life (not-Dei Persephone, daughter of Pluto/death: part of self still attached to mother dredged out of Underworld-unconscious [cf similar plight of Universal Mummies]; anger directed at Herc tho it’s Theseus’s issue [+ tho malaise preceded P’s discovery] telling confusion – 1 + same, again, each issue demonstrative echo of other); Dei’s handmaiden investigates missing sentries + gets throat slashed (maidenhead, while Dei’s "threshold" unguarded), while resentful Th duels Herc (conflicted self), insisting Perse "left her father" for him (not-Dei, whose late fr left her: goddess acting out Dei’s unresolved father-attachment + unconscious demonstrating her next developmental step) + Lyco menaces Dei (he dark – dysfunctional – vestigial not-the-father who must be "left"/dispelled so she can be Herc’s) till repelled by stone (zygote now fertilized by H’s seed: life-img repulsing death/regression).

Persephone returns to Underworld + gives Theseus sleep of forgetfulness (awaking after therapeutic dream, unaware of internal development/transformation) same time Lyco abducts Deianira underground (loss of one fem img = danger to other, both wmn returning to womb so one may be reborn [Dei absorbing Perse]) pursued by Herc (his torch extinguishing à la light in similar Sunday labyrinth: pilot-light of unconscious + mind wiping slate clean) while dead rise ("buried" issues coming to surface while surface goes below to meet them aka lucid dreaming, where sleeper reenters dream informed as to meaning/mission: to save lifegiving fem from murderous masc) + are squished in closing passage (drm-censor holding threatening material at bay till ready to deal); stops Lyco from sacrificing Dei (in similar setup to later Chris Lee To the Devil a Daughter) at eclipse (submersion o/t ego allowing for transformative event) + hurls Stonehenge-style boulders at him (pinned by phalluses, culminating rock imgry [formations à la Procrustes]), as at corpses slipped thru psg (birth of death, released in order to defeat once + for all) + Lyco flames out (consumed by cleansing fire à la opening waters).

On beach at day (sea to which opening river has run, rocks reduced to sand), Theseus tells Herc + Dei about strange dream ("I seemed 2B w/ a wonderful girl – like a goddess who said she loved me" aka drm itself, where we are one w/t gods aka archetypes), when Telemachus arrives w/ Jocasta, of whom Th declares "You were the one I dreamed about!" (the ideal wmn, Mom) + runs off w/ her, Herc’s "As long as Th steals other men’s girls, I have nothing to worry about" verifying resolution of own oedipal issue, expelled from self by projecting it onto another.