''Jungle Adventurer'' ( it, La montagna di luce, lit=The Mountain of Light) is an Italian adventure film. It starred Richard Harrison. The film is loosely based on

Emilio Salgari Emilio Salgari (, but often erroneously ; 21 August 1862 – 25 April 1911) was an Italian writer of action adventure swashbucklers and a pioneer of science fiction Science fiction (sometimes shortened to Sci-Fi or SF) is a genre of spe ...

's 1902 adventure novel ''La montagna di luce'' (''The Mountain of Light''), which narrates a fictitious attempt to steal the priceless

Koh-i-Noor The Koh-i-Noor ( ; from ), also spelled Kohinoor and Koh-i-Nur, is one of the largest cut diamonds in the world, weighing . It is part of the Crown Jewels of the United Kingdom. The diamond is currently set in the Crown of Queen Elizabeth The ...

diamond, concocted in 19th-century

India India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...

by the

Thuggee Thuggee (, ) are actions and crimes carried out by Thugs, historically, organised gangs of professional robbers and murderers in India. The English word ''thug'' traces its roots to the Hindi ठग (), which means 'swindler' or 'deceiver'. Rela ...

and the dacoits. The original Italian title of both the film and the source novel refers to the name of the jewel. The film was re-released under several alternate titles, one of which, ''Sandok'', was an attempt to capitalize on the popularity of Salgari's fictional pirate

Sandokan Sandokan is a fictional late 19th-century pirate created by Italian author Emilio Salgari. His adventures first appeared in publication in 1883. Sandokan is the protagonist of 11 adventure novels. Sandokan is known throughout the South China S ...

, even though neither the novel, nor the film had anything to do with Sandokan's character or the settings of his adventures.

Cast

* Richard Harrison as Alan Foster *

Luciana Gilli Luciana Gilli (born 1944) is a former Italian film actress. During the 1960s she starred in a number of Italian films or European co-productions, particularly adventure stories and westerns.Weisser p.237 Her film debut was the role of Luciana ...

as Lilamani * Wilbert Bradley as Sitama *

Daniele Vargas Daniele Vargas, stage name of Daniele Pitani (20 April 1922 – 7 January 1981) was an Italian film actor. Life and career Born in Imola, a small town in the district of Bologna, after attending high school with Pier Paolo Pasolini, Daniel ...

as Rajah Sindar * Andrea Scotti *

Nerio Bernardi Nerio Bernardi (23 July 1899 – 12 January 1971) was an Italian film actor. He appeared in nearly 200 films between 1918 and 1970. He was born in Bologna, Italy and died in Rome, Italy. Selected filmography * ''Nero'' (1922) * '' The Shep ...

Giovanni Cianfriglia Giovanni Cianfriglia (born 5 April 1935) is an Italian film actor. He has appeared in more than 100 films since 1958. Born in Anzio, Cianfriglia debuted as the body double of Steve Reeves in ''Hercules'', then he started appearing, often unc ...

as Sergeant *

Nazzareno Zamperla Nazzareno Zamperla (25 April 1937 – 19 March 2020) was an Italian actor and stuntman. Career Born in Treviso into a circus family, Zamperla came to Rome in 1949 and worked primarily in the 1950s and 1960s as a stunt performer. His focus was on ...

as Sitama's Man #1 *

Dakar Dakar ( ; ; wo, Ndakaaru) (from :wo:daqaar, daqaar ''tamarind''), is the capital city, capital and List of cities in Senegal, largest city of Senegal. The city of Dakar proper has a population of 1,030,594, whereas the population of the Dakar ...

as Sitama's Man #2

Reception

From contemporary reviews, an anonymous reviewer in the ''

Monthly Film Bulletin ''The Monthly Film Bulletin'' was a periodical of the British Film Institute published monthly from February 1934 to April 1991, when it merged with '' Sight & Sound''. It reviewed all films on release in the United Kingdom, including those with ...

'' reviewed a dubbed 87 minute version of the film. The reviewer noted that Malaysian locations were put to good use for the film, and that it "is treated lightly enough to seem a good deal less corny than its well-worn theme." The reviewer found

Richard Harrison (actor) Richard Harrison (born May 26, 1936) is an American actor, writer, director and producer. Harrison was very prolific and worked with most of the better-known names in European B-movies during the 1960s and 1970s, branching out to exploitation f ...

as "an adequate hero" while Wilbert Bradley was "as superbly gleeful rogue."

References

External links

* Italian adventure films 1960s Italian-language films 1960s adventure films Films based on works by Emilio Salgari Films directed by Umberto Lenzi 1960s Italian films {{adventure-film-stub