text: This good-guy-vs-the-evil-tyrant story, set in 19th century Russia, may have been an attempt to extend Steve Reeves' career beyond those "Hercules" movies. However, despite the different costumes, it's still a "Hercules" movie with the usual stilted dialog, haphazard dubbing, and cardboard characters. On the other hand, there's lots of action, the pace rarely flags, and Reeves gets to do yet another one of those scenes where he's stripped to the waist, bound with ropes, and given a vigorous whipping which, needless to say, has little effect on his defiant character.