LA DONNA IL SESSO IL SUPERUOMO - "Fantabulous" (1967)

Tonight's special Pre-Turkey Day flick is brought to you once again courtesy of Brian Horrorwitz over at the Trash Palace. I do hope that's where you plan on spending all that Black Friday dinero, cause you're damn sure to get more bang for your buck! This 1967 Italian film is titled "La Donna Il Sesso Il Superuomo," or roughly translated, "The Woman, Sex, and Superman!"

But the real title in English is "FANTABULOUS!" That's a hybrid combination of fantastic and fabulous, and the insane theme song of the same name is by some krazy kat named Alessandro Brugnolini who as far as I can tell was a jazz composer and saxophonist. I have no idea who is doing the whacked out vocals! Just dig it!!

It's pretty easy to spot the bad guys, they all wear sunglasses at night!!!

The head cheese on the evil side is Adolfo Celi as Karl Maria van Beethoven! I think he's got a chip on his shoulder because his Mom gave him a girl's middle name! Always stirring up trouble, Adolfo was Largo in "Thunderball," and  Ralph Valmont in "Danger: Diabolik!" Adolfo checked out in 1986!

There's a couple of things you need to know about "Fantabulous"  There is a lot of dialogue, which leaves me out some, since it's all in Italian, and when they feel like it, they throw in crazy collages of super heroes and cartoon imagery! They also use a lot of stock footage to flesh out the whole thing!

PTUNG!? An arrow through the head AND a can of beans!!

Can't go wrong with girls and guns!

And indeed this film contains a "Fantabulous" bevy of beauties!

So, what's it all about Ralphie?? Richard Harrison is some poor schmuck named Richard Werner! In the beginning of the movie, after he finishes making love to his girlfriend Judi West as Deborah Sandor, he gets scooped up by all those guys in the sunglasses, and taken off to this place where he is held captive, but he doesn't know why! After a couple of days he tries to escape and ends up in this room full of weird balloons, that he uses to float to safety, so he thinks! But as it turns out, it was just a set up to see how tricky and free form thinking he was, so they could tell whether he was the right guy chosen to be turned into Fantabulous, the Superman!

So they implant a special capsule into his head that does indeed turn him into a Superman! After not being able to land any lead roles in America, in 1961 Richard went to Italy to be in "The Invincible Gladiator!" It was all Sword and Sandal, and spaghetti westerns for almost 20 years after that, and in the 1980's Richard Harrison was in at least 20 movies that had the word ninja in the title!

They can't freeze him!!

And they can't burn him, he is truly indestructible!!!

Here's what one guy looked like who didn't pass the test!!!

Next, they had to strengthen his mind and his will power!! So they test him to see if he has got the balls to machine down these innocent civilians standing on the other side of some plexiglass!

Time for more Pop cartoon imagery, and at one point they even use some uncredited music from the first Mother's of Invention album, and the song, "Help, I'm A Rock!"

Like I said, it's very wordy, and my Italian is terrible at best, but there are Russians and Americans and other Euro military characters melded into the mess, and I'm pretty sure Mr. van Beethoven has his sights set on world domination in some form!

When Fantabulous sees himself as a doll on TV, it brings him back to reality and his former self a bit, and he takes off lickity split to find his girlfriend again!

After another rousing sex session (Deborah has a big sign above her bed that says "I Like Sex!") and some questionable 60's fashion, Fantabulous returns to van Beethoven!

Torn between worlds, Fantabulous is forced to make the final decision as to where his loyalty lies, the boss or the bed, and the musicians just keep on playing the same song over and over but in different variations! If there was ever a truly quintessential WTF?! movie, this one is without a doubt a top contender!!!!!