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Starts with shirtless man in prison stripe pants chained to overhead frame to receive the lash. Good close-up views from behind and in front, as whip realistically cuts his chest and back. After whipping, man is shown collapsed in suspension.
Later in film, Alan Ladd works in a cave shirtless, hot and sweaty and all man. |
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Well, geez... how much beef do you need? Here's a collection of 10 sword and sandal classics, with chained and sweat-drenched muscle-men flexing non-stop. Steve Reeves, Gordon Scott, they're all here, as is the one and only film of this genre featuring Rod Taylor, called Colossus and the Amazon Queens. Rod and Ed Fury become prisoners of horny females, who pretty much use them to repopulate the tribe. |
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British gangster film featuring Bob Hoskins in shower stall. No torture, but good full view as camera pans to the lowest part of his belly allowed. Don't know why this one excites me so. Maybe it's the nearly erotic way he applies the soap, or the extreme closeup of his handsomely hair-topped feet. Features Helen Mirren in one of her earliest film roles. |
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Anthony Quinn crucified. Good closeups of arm pits and chest. Plus, gladiators are always good for excitement. Midway through there's a scene of a man chained to vertical backboard. It's raining, he's stripped to loin cloth and his muscular body glistens as he awaits his execution by spear. |
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Get the picture from the cover? Besides Steve McQueen, Arthur Kennedy and Brian Keith spread more macho around, especially when Kennedy escapes from a chain gang, only to be captured and brutally whipped sans shirt with arms bound overhead. It's a good one. |
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Speaking of leather to skin, this film has one of the best ever, with a gloriously primed Charles Bronson hung in full suspension from a cross beam, feet dangling. Various angles and distances are shown, as Bronson heroically takes his lashes. Lowering him afterwards is nearly as good as the torture itself. His feet touch and body bends chest forward, arms stretched. |
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John Derek gets whipped by Vincent Price, from the front with good closeups. Meanwhile, Charlton Heston and Yul Brynner do plenty of nearly-naked strutting throughout the film. Even Edward G. Robinson gets to bare his hairy chest, giving you plenty of body-types to ogle over. |
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A very young William Shatner gets worked over good in this one. He's chained shirtless to a cross and then raised for some inverted torture, but the best scene has him bent backwards over a stone altar, two robed goons holding his wrists while Ernest Borgnine performs some bizarre satanic procedures. |
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One of the best torture scenes ever. Victor Mature bound spread eagle to round table. Lashes to his chest in a nice, tight shot. Then a spiked board is pressed into his belly. He knows what's coming, and the side view of his massive chest expanding in prepared resistance is why slow-mo should be used repeatedly on this and all other scenes I've listed. |
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There's no torture here, but there's more machismo than most can handle, courtesy of Robert Mitchum. He plays the psycho, sexual deviant to perfection, and his ruggedly masculine torso not only mesmerizes but also intimidates, especially at the end when he's stripped to the waist and wet with river water to do battle with Gregory Peck and family. |
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Finally, a gut punching scene worth watching, again courtesy of Robert Mitchum. Man oh man, the sounds he makes. His belly is so hard the bad guys have to rip open his shirt looking for vulnerable muscle. Surviving the belly punches is only the beginning for him, as his shirtless body is tied to a post for the taste of leather to his back, then he's thrown into the ship's engine room to sweat it out before being returned for more torture. |
- the original series, where William Shatner as Kirk frequently displayed his bare-chested prowess. Two episodes in particular have excellent scenes of torment. First is called THE EMPATH, where Kirk is stripped to his waist, suspended by the wrists and tortured by some sort of hand-held punishment emitter. See him writhe and arch his back when the evil beam ravages his insides. Second is called THAT'S WHAT LITTLE GIRLS ARE MADE OF, where Kirk is naked, but middle hidden by metal covering. He's laying flat on a table and duplicated as the table spins rapidly. Two Kirks! Both exposed except for the groin. 