3 Dev Adam

aka 3 Mighty Men aka Turkish Spiderman

1973
Starring
Aytekin Akkaya as Captain America
Yavuz Selekman as El Santo

From deep in the bowels of Turkey comes this instant winner of insanity! The Turkish film industry has an obsession with making low budget rip offs of American films, and in this case, they’ve pilfered Spiderman, and threw in Captain America, and even El Santo! Direct from bootleg tape to your computer. Subtitles? Who needs them! It’s not like this movie was long on plot anyway. Knowing what was going on would probably make it unwatchable.

Begins with “Spiderman” or at least his cheap Turkish knockoff, complete with bushy eyebrows emerging from where his eyepatches should be, and some goons burying a woman up to her neck. Then, Spiderman pushes some sort of drill forward and it enters her mouth and blood splatters everywhere. It would seem that J. Jonah Jameson was correct and Spiderman is a menace. So what does Turkey do? Sends for help, and help arrives, in the form of Captain America from the USA, and famous superhero/wrestler El Santo from Mexico. And the opening credits play!

The heroes and a woman talk with some guy who I guess is the police chief. Then two guys are following a third guy. Third Guy kills one of the followers, and then Spiderman stabs the other follower, while saying “Adios, Mafia!” This is something that has to be seen to get the full surreal effect. Then we jump to a fashion show, where some woman is taking pictures of something, when a redheaded girl named Nadia bursts in with some goons and grabs the girl. Nadia is Spiderman’s main squeeze, when he went evil he must have dumped Mary Jane, but still has a thing for redheads.

The captured woman is being transported in a car, and uses her wristwatch to signal for help. A car chase is on! The bad guys, or at least the people who kidnapped the girl, escape the pursuers and tie the girl up at a hideout. One of the pursuers is Captain America, who dons his Captain America costume and smashes into the hideout beating up all the bad guys in his way. As he escapes with the captured girl, Spiderman lurks outside, and runs away after taking one look at Captain America. Captain America takes off in hot pursuit. They fight their way through a graveyard, scare a drunk, and Spiderman steals a car. Cap grabs the door, but Spiderman punches him off, and speeds off.

Meanwhile, some guy who has very bad skin is tooling away in his office, when El Santo sneaks in, and waits for the guy to depart. Then El Santo goes through the office and shoves some papers down his pants. The office worker returns having forgot his keys, and pulls a gun on the wrestler. El Santo knocks him out, but outside are some guys just practicing Karate, because all offices in Turkey overlook Karate stadiums. But El Santo beats the crap out of them.

Spiderman is upset at the performance of his goons versus the superheroes (I bet he doesn’t mention running like a little pansy from Captain America) and yells at them, then he and his girl Nadia look as some statues that he keeps stealing for some reason. Then some other girl is being followed by some guy in a pinstripe suit as she visits other characters. The two superheroes wander around a small Greek island for a while, and El Santo sees three suspicious looking guys bury something in the sand, so he fights them.

Spiderman talks to a girl wearing red, then gets mad at the businessman who was robbed by El Santo earlier. The businessman is tied up, and some sort of long tube is put in front of his eyes. Spiderman puts two guinea pigs in the tube, and they crawl forward and EAT THE DUDES EYES! WTF???? Seriously, this is very disturbing, I used to have guinea pigs, and I was unaware of their eye devouring fetishes. How close I came to blindness over the years without knowing? The very thoughts chill my soul.

After that horror, some guy talks to some bartender. And some goons go into a mannequin warehouse, while Captain America and El Santo follow. They beat up the goons, who try to escape in a car, but El Santo and Captain America lift the car’s rear end up, and then let it drop so it flies forward and crushes a stack of blocks that were placed directly in front of the car for some reason in the back alley. Spiderman then breaks into the house where a random Turkish guy lives who is sexing up a girl in the shower, and Spiderman stabs them both with a long BBQ skewer.

Some Guy with a mustache kills two maids. Why? Only his hairdresser knows for sure. Spiderman has sex with Nadia, then has a fight with El Santo and Captain America at some house. Captain America and El Santo each knock out a Spiderman, but another Spiderman appears and laughs at them. There may even be a fourth Spiderman, I lost count at this point. Obviously the Turkish people came up with the Spider-Clone saga twenty-five years before Marvel, and it makes as much sense in this movie as it did in the comic (but unlike the comics, I didn’t abandon this movie, at least not yet). The last Spiderman escapes.

The heroes go to a bellydancing club. A brawl breaks out, not sure why. Something to do with a Bald Guy who looks like a Turkish Jesse Ventura. Friend of the hero’s Julia captures the woman who was wearing red clothes earlier. But our heroes are brought at gunpoint to a warehouse and locked up. The Chief interrogates the girl that was wearing read once, and she cracks, I guess. Something happens that lets everyone know where the heroes are. At the warehouse, Captain America does the old “fake fighting” routine and pretends to kill El Santo. The guards come rushing in, and Our Heroes lay the smack down. During the fight, Turkish Jessie Ventura (Jessie Venturkish?) tries to shoot Captain America, but bullets are deflected off his chest.

Spiderman (one of them) shows up and the epic final battle begins. Captain America is briefly delayed by a fast fan, but tails Spiderman to another warehouse, defeating him, but the parade of Spidermen has only begun, another appears. This Spiderman gets his head crushed. But, Lo and Behold, Spiderman number 3 (or 7) shows up. Spiderman is making the classic bad guys vs. Kung Fu man mistake of only attacking one at a time. If all the Spidermen united, Captain America would be history. But instead, Captain America defeats him one by one, and this one is no exception, as he gets crushed. Spiderman 8 appears (Spiderman has more lives than a cat, it would seem). At this point I am reminded of the end of Three Amigos with the whole town dressed as the Amigos, the whole gang must be dressed as Spiderman. This Spiderman gets his head ran over because he is too stupid to duck. Amazingly, that is the last one, as the movie ends a few minutes later.

What a horrible ride. And yet, now that it’s over, I miss it somewhat. This movie taught me that eventually, even the greatest of heroes can become sleazy gang villains in Turkey with bushy eyebrows, pot bellies, a fetish for stealing bizarre statues, and 8 lives/clones/doppelgangers/decoys.

Gah!

Rated 9/10 Spidermen with guns of HORROR!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

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