NEUTRON, THE ATOMIC SUPERMAN VS. THE DEATH ROBOTS (1962) *** ½

 

Neutron, the Atomic Superman vs. the Death Robots.  Just say that title out loud.  Even if you aren’t totally addicted to Mexican Wrestling Movies like I am, I guarantee the poetry of that title alone is enough to bring a smile to your face. 

This is the sequel to the enormously entertaining Neutron, the Man in the Black Mask, and for my money, it’s even better.  I think it helped that the version of Death Robots I saw was dubbed, rather poorly, into English.  Because of that, when the masked mad scientist tells his helium-voiced dwarf assistant lines like “I need blood!  Blood!  Lots of blood!”, it gives the movie an added tinge of bizarreness. 

Yes, that masked madman, Dr. Caronte (Julio Aleman) is at it again.  Narrowly escaping certain death in the first film, he sets out on conquering the world by stealing the bodies of three noted scientists and using their brains to reformulate a neutron bomb.  Naturally, the only one who stands in his way is the black-masked crimefighter, Neutron (Wolf Ruvinskis).

This movie has it all.  Zombies, mad scientists, Mexican wrestlers, and gratuitous musical numbers.  Basically, anything you could possibly want from a ‘60s Lucha Libre flick.  I guess the one thing it doesn’t have is… you know, death robots.  Unless you count Caronte’s mindless zombies as “death robots”.  Or maybe the talking brains he keeps in his lab.  Regardless, it’s a blast from start to finish.

Once again, director Federico Curiel infuses the movie with a lot of atmosphere and style.  The sequence where Caronte’s zombies go out and attack innocent civilians is particularly well done.  He also gives us cool bits like Neutron pulling a Rick Dalton and using a flamethrower on a zombie, a surprising scene where a zombie self-destructs itself by ripping off its own head, and a fun sequence where a zombie dresses up like Neutron to foil the police. 

One could complain about the fact that Neutron doesn’t wrestle inside the squared circle, but his hand-to-hand bouts with Dr. Caronte in laboratories and dungeons pack a real punch, so it’s easily forgivable, to me anyway.  Or you could bitch that it has maybe two too many cheesy musical numbers.  Or the love triangle between Nora the nightclub singer (Rosita Arenas) and her three suitors (wait, would that make it a love rectangle?) kind of bogs things down.  All that doesn’t really amount to a hill of beans, because whenever Neutron is front and center beating the crap out of mush-faced zombies, Neutron, the Atomic Superman vs. the Death Robots is stellar south of the border entertainment.  

AKA:  Neutron vs. the Death Robots.  AKA:  Robots of Death.