Part 3 - Jungle Raiders (La Leggenda del Rubino Malese)

You know, you would think that two Indiana Jones rip offs from the same director in a four year period would be plenty, but good old Antonio Margheriti wasn’t finished yet (in case you’re just joining us, he was also the man behind the last two films in our series, Hunters of the Golden Cobra and Ark of the Sun God). Enter the third film in his loosely related Indiana Jones style trilogy, Jungle Raiders.

This time around there’s no David Warbeck; instead we get Christopher Connelly (Manhattan Baby, lots and lots of TV shows) as Duke Howard, aka Captain Yankee, a scam artist who leads rich thriller seekers on what they think are real life jungle adventures, but in actuality are all an elaborate hoax played out by Howard and some of the friendlier local natives. When he’s approached by Warren, a representative of the U.S. government played by Lee Van Cleef (Escape From New York, a ton of spaghetti westerns) with an offer to lead a group of explorers on a search for the Ruby of Gloom, a mythical gemstone, he can’t turn down the promise of a real adventure, or the handsome reward that goes along with it.

So he rounds up his crew - Maria, the museum curator who knows the location of the gem, Professor Langski, her assistant, and his trusty sidekick, Gin Fizz (yes, that’s really the character’s name, and he’s played by none other than Margheriti mainstay Alan Collins, back again to round out the trilogy) - and heads out in search of the Ruby.

What dangers will they face along the way? How about the mercenary forces of the smuggler DeSilva or the ruthless tyrant Tiger (I swear I’m not making these names up) and his bloodthirsty band of Borneo pirates who are also after the treasure? Does Captain Yankee have what it takes to recover the Ruby and put and end to the corrupt deeds of these fiendish villains?

By this point Margheriti had the formula down pat, with this film feeling more like an actual Indy film than any of the others (the entire opening sequence is practically lifted directly out of Raiders of the Lost Ark, complete with our heroes carefully snatching an idol from its pedestal in order to avoid setting off a trap). But overall it’s basically Hunters of the Golden Cobra with some slight improvements. Once again it’s a period piece (set in 1938), albeit a little more believable this time (but still not entirely). It also has the jungle setting (this time Malaysia), the same wannabe IJ style of humor, another bad car chase utilizing models, more double crossing characters, and transforms into more of an explosion packed war movie than a straightforward adventure romp towards the end.

These comparisons aside, it’s also got some pretty awesome things that are entirely its own, like a sword/torch fight with some ferocious temple guards, a bulldozer with an attached flamethrower that becomes a makeshift tank, and a bizarre subplot about a native boy who assists Captain Yankee and company by communicating with his pet snake (which even involves a snake love story!). The whole anti-hero/con artist angle that kicks things off is a nice twist too, and serves as a much more interesting back story for the character than if he was simply your typical heroic do-gooder.

One thing that I find particularly interesting about this film is that it’s the first of the Indiana Jones clones that we’ve looked at to be made post-Temple of Doom (which was released in 1984), yet surprisingly it still focuses mainly on Raiders of the Lost Ark for inspiration (it even has the word “raiders” in its international title). The only real element to show up that is more along the lines of the Indy sequel than the original is that the temple housing the treasure is built in a volcano and therefore full of streams of searing hot lava (c’mon, you knew it was coming!), but any of you who’ve been following along and reading our reviews of Margheriti’s other IJ knockoffs know that that’s a plot feature he’d already been no stranger to (seriously, I wonder what percentage of his budget he allotted toward fire and fake lava on these films?!).

Here’s what else it’s got to offer: