King Solomon's Treasure (1979)

An adventurer (John Colicos) accompanied by two English gentlemen (David McCallum, Patrick McNee) goes into an uncharted area of Africa in search of the legendary treasure of King Solomon. Very loosely based on two novels by H. Rider Haggard, KING SOLOMON'S MINES and SHE, and directed by Alvin Rakoff. This silly adventure film benefits from being filmed on location in Swaziland and the volcanic destruction of the Queen's (Britt Ekland) palace is impressive. But other than that, the movie is pretty lame. Once they get to Africa, they discover prehistoric rubber dinosaurs right out of a cheesy Japanese sci-fi movie. Bizarrely, no one expresses any shock or surprise at prehistoric creatures in 19th century Africa! The dialog tries at times to be witty but it doesn't make any sense. For example, when the safari's French cook (Yvon Dufour) says he'll make hot soup for everyone but is told he can't build a fire, he says he'll make vichyssoise instead. The script ignores the fact that he still has to cook the potatoes to make the cold vichyssoise. It's that sloppy a movie. With Wilfrid Hyde White and Ken Gampu.