The Revenge of the Ghost of the Son of the 31 Days of Cheese Day 3 – Superargo and the Faceless Giants.

Strange as it may seem to one, Mexico was not the only country that made films about masked Wrestlers – (warning we are going into a bit of sidebar with the next three films being on this subject) – this is an Italian version the second (of two films) featuring one Superargo (I don’t have the slightest idea what the name means – Argo was the name of the ship Jason sailed on to find the golden fleece so his name means supership? Really?  Well, let us let this pass) a former professional wrestler turned secret agent for the police.

While still wearing the wrestling costume which is mostly red or red-orange tights with a black mask.  While it does make it hard for him so say infiltrate a gang it does have some useful features like being bullet proof.

Anyway – per the ever infallible IMDB this film is about how ‘a masked wrestler/superhero goes up against a madman and his army of Robots’

The Robots being the faceless giants of the title – but they really aren’t faceless they have stockings or some such like thing pulled over their heads which mash the features a bit.

The story such as it is, involves said mad scientist using his robot army to kidnap elite athletes (and professional wrestlers are included in this) and then making his kidnap victims into more robots (cyborgs technically but let’s not quibble life is too short). This does beggar the question of how he got started (Did he start by kidnapping 98 pound weaklings and then worked his way up?) but let’s just let that idea go, otherwise we could be here all evening.

The rash of kidnappings leads the head of the whatever country this Secret Service to ask the acting head of the Police – in an utterly meaningless bit of business we are told the head of the police is in Florida for fishing – for help, he suggests Superargo, the Secret Service head is, as any normal human being would be, somewhat leery of trusting the biggest case he has to a man how wears well, what he wears.

In any event they go to meet Superargo who whatever his other powers are, is more than a bit of a smug dick showing up his powers of levitation, mind reading (‘your mind is very shallow and it’s easy to pick up your thoughts’ is a quote) and using the power of his mind to break things.

(Some of this is used later in the film so at least they bothered to establish his abilities rather than just make them up when they needed them)

He also has an Indian swami or something as a companion who has been teaching him all this – I forget his name so let’s just call him Bill.

Anyway, what transpires is that Superargo is such a dick to the cops that they leave but later after yet another kidnapping the head of the Secret Service comes groveling to Superargo who then demands to be allowed to run the case his way. And this is kind of mistake.

Because despite his abilities, Superargo is awful at this. His first plan is to guard the sister of one of the kidnapped athletes – the faceless giants come in and after a long fight the girl is kidnapped Superargo gives chase in his jaguar and promptly loses the trail.

His next plan is to announce that he is going to return to the ring setting himself up as a potential kidnap target by the faceless giants who aren’t all that big six foot or a bit taller with the weird helmet thing they wear.

And yes the robots promptly kidnap Superargo after his match. But wait that wasn’t Superargo! It was someone dressed as Superargo, Superargo and Bill give chase and again loses the trail.

0-2 guys.

As they are stumbling about in the woods looking for the Giants and the guy dressed as Superargo (who is never mentioned again and one assumes killed in a messy way once his deception is discovered) they meet the granddaughter or something of a famous scientist who has gone mad but was, before he went mad, working on something similar to whatever is creating the Faceless Giants – and she says well I live in that castle over there with some scientist chap who was the mad doctor’s assistant.

Connection? Yah think?

Superargo tries interviewing the mad doctor which doesn’t work (0-3) then tries breaking into the castle and is caught (0-4) eventually discoverers how the cyborgs are built, equips himself and Bill with a gun that can knock out the giants goes into the woods again and promptly loses the fight with the giants (0-5 really he’s just awful at this) and it put into a cell where the assistant who is the madman decides to pour poison gas into the cell but Superargo and Bill levitate over the gas until they are rescued by the Granddaughter who is later killed by the madman (0-6) – he does manage by using his mind power to break the chains holding the cell doors closed that house the kidnapped athletes not yet turned into machines. There is a final fight were the robots are destroyed and the madman is chased into the woods were a very very convenient  bit a quicksand takes him while Superargo and the others look in not making a move to rescue him.

Here’s the thing, this isn’t some vigilante dressed up as a well whatever he’s is dressed up as he’s last we checked an government law enforcement official (albeit dressed very oddly) it’s not his place to say well we’ll save the cost of a trial this way (and save the world hearing about the number of times you screwed up trying to stop him Superargo and especially abandoning the man who dressed up as you to a very dire fate – at best being turned into a Robot as worst fed to the Madman’s giant Octopus – they all have them. Trust me)

Not really as much fun as it could be really as Superargo’s continual failures during most of the film kind of undercut his superheroing thing.

Enjoy with Indian take out.