Great epic plenty of action and adventure with glamorous gowns and luxurious sets from Venice .This Spaghetti adventure is plenty of action , thrills , court intrigue , spectacular feats and a lot of sword-play . In 1620 pirates are terrorizing the Adriatic coast . Manrico (Gordon Scott) , son of Venice Dux (Feodor Chaliapin Jr.) , becomes ¨The Lion of St. Mark¨ to vanquish the invader pirates . Our hero sets out to defeat them while posing as a masked knight . But things go wrong when Manrico falls in love for the gorgeous pirate lady Rossana (Gianna Maria Canale) , now both are two suspicious on their sides , and they're considered as traitors . The picture is set in the end of middle ages , next to the Italian Rennaisance period. Was partially based on historical ¨Dux¨ derived from Latin dux, "military leader" , sometimes translated as Duke . Doges were the chief magistrates and leaders of the Most Serene Republic of Venice for over a thousand years. Doges of Venice were elected for life by the city-state's aristocracy. Commonly the man selected as Doge was the shrewdest elder in the city. The doge was not a duke in the modern sense, nor was a doge the equivalent of a hereditary duke. The "doge" was the senior-most elected official of Venice and Genoa; both cities were republics and elected doges .
This is an entertaining swashbuckling, full of action , thrills , romance , double-crosses and of course , a lot of fencing . It's Gordon Scott against Alberto Farnese and while our beautiful starring Gian Maria Canale changes sides due to her strong love to Lion of St. Mark . Lavish production by Octavio Poggi with excellent gowns , evocative sets , spectacular gondolieri , wonderful palaces , bridges , Venice canals , all right cinematography by Alvaro Mancori and powerful score by Carlo Rustichelli . Containg lots of court intrigue , treason, twists and turns . Gordon Scott is pretty well as a masked hero relishing his secret identity dressed in black and throughly enjoying himself , he made lots of roman-epic-Italian films also called ¨Musclemen movies¨ or ¨Sword and sandals¨ as well as costumer sword-fight and a few Spaghetti Western . Luck's Gordon Scott changed when Italian director Sergio Corbucci persuaded him to go overseas to star ¨Romulo and Remo¨ along with Steve Reeves and later on , he continued to play several others . Scott played the mythic Maciste in great number of movies was randomly assigned the identity of Hercules , Goliath , Samson or Aron for U. S. viewing . Gordon was an American bouncing who emigrated Europe where starred several Tarzan movies , subsequently was to Italy and created a true star-system based on pumped-up heroes . Scott and specially Steve Reeves paved the way for others actors to seek their fame and fortune in Italy playing stocky adventurers . Other stars by the time on this type of movies were Mark Forest , Gordon Mitchell , Dan Vadis , Kirk Morris , Brad Harris , Ken Wood ; furthermore 'Gordon Scott' made more important competence to Steve Reeves . Nobody , nevertheless, topped Steve Reeves and Gordon Scott in popularity . Gordon Scott played other epic characters : ¨Gladiator of Rome¨ , ¨Hero of Rome¨ , ¨Hercules and Princess of Troy¨ , ¨Conquest of Micene¨ , though also made some Spaghetti as ¨The tramplers¨ and ¨Buffalo Bill ¨, Spy-genre as ¨Secretissimo¨ , ¨Death ray¨ and , of course , his famous Tarzan movies as ¨Tarzan's greatest adventure¨, ¨Tarzan's Fight for Life¨ , ¨Tarzan and the hunters¨ and ¨Tarzan and the trappers ¨ , among others . In the movie appears usual support actors , all of them habitual in Horror/Peplum/Western genres , such as : Rik Battaglia , Alberto Farnese , Franca Bettoia , Giulio Marchetti , Feodor Chaliapin Jr. , Mirko Ellis , John Bartha and Franco Fantasia , an ordinary master of arms who played a number of secondary roles .
The motion picture was professionally directed by Luigi Capuano who also made in similar style ¨Il boia di Venezia¨ or ¨The executioner of Venice¨ (1963) also set in Venice and same period piece with the Venetian¨Dux¨. Capuano was a good craftsman who made all kind of genres , and especially adventure movie . Capuano directed Spaghetti Western such as "Il Magnifico Texano" , Peplum as ¨Revenge of Ursus¨ ,"Revenge of the Gladiators" , "Hercules and the Black Pirates" and of course Adventures such as "Zorro in the Court of Spain" , "Zorro, Rider of Vengeance" , ¨Zorro and three musketeers¨ ,"Tiger of the Seven Seas" , ¨leopard of Sarawak¨ , ¨Vengeance of Sandokan¨ , "Terror of the Red Mask" starred by Lex Barker and this "The Lion of St. Mark" starred by the unforgettable Gordon Scott .
