This film is beyond description......Yeah, it's that bad!Let's put it this way, if Ed Wood had been making films in the Soviet Union and had had a big budget.........Ta daaaaa! "Sadko" would likely be the outcome.This film in it's original Russian format was overly talky - even for a Russian film...The dubbed version just goes on and on and on....Yakkety yak.......Some of the most inept rewrites I've ever heard/seen.....Lotsa' boring goody goody Soviet propaganda messages here....Especially in the opening part of the film with the nasty guys with all the goodies are keepin' it from all the deserving poor....Awwwwww! Enter Sinbad/Sadko and woosh! The nasty types head for the hills and Sadco/Sinbad sees to it that all the goods are properly distributed among the poor.......How quaintly soviet!Sadco sets off on a quest that takes him 'round the world in search of goodies to bring back to all those deserving peasants .......He meets the "uber budgie" in the form of a half bird/half woman.......Rather creepy looking.....Kind of like sitting through the end of Tod Browning's "Freaks" for the first time, but not as satisfying.The highlight (if you can call it that!) of the film is when Sadko comes up against a couple of totally twisted Hindu cats that look like a pair of New York drag queens - oh pleeeeeezzzzze! These clowns wear enough makeup to make Tammy Faye Baker Blush, in addition, their dialog is an absolute riot......It's as if the voice/over guys thought the same about their appearance and actions and played them to the campy hilt.Overall the film seems to meander in such a way that screams: "lookit all the money we spent on this gem, praise Lenin!" Big scenes, sprawling vistas would make a nice travelogue if it weren't for the plodding script and banal dialog....I can't imagine those drones with MST3K even wasting their so-called "talent" on this one, it doesn't need any embellishment. As Jay Sherman of "The Critic" fame was known to say: "It stinks!"Robert Hill

Sadko (not Sinbad, ugh) is a hunk of a poet with a harp. He's got two girls in love with him: one is a nice village girl with a weird pigeon habit, and the other is the Princess of the Sea.... Clearly the thing to do is get out of town quick, so Sadko trades 3 goldfish for 3 boats (they were magic goldfish) and sets sail to find the Bird of Happiness. Along with a small army are Uncle Klepto, Big John, and Timmy the brash young mascot of the group -- these are not their actual names but they might as well be. The heroes are so cliché they're almost iconic.Sadko and Co. spend the rest of the movie traveling to exotic places and getting into trouble with the locals. They battle Vikings, and play chess with the King of India. They bet a laughing horse for the Bird of Happiness and discover her true nature is not what they thought. They fight and are heroic, and on the return trip a storm threatens to sink the ships, so Sadko goes to the bottom of the sea to soothe an argument between King Neptune and his wife by entertaining them with his harp. Although the Princess loves Sadko she knows he prefers the pigeon girl. She helps him get home again on a speedy seahorse.This is a very nice looking film. The story is fantastical without being too familiar. There is plenty of Russian flavor to make it semi-exotic to American tastes, and the Russian folk dancing is amazing. The special fx are charming and obvious, like stage tricks. When Sadko lifts a magic fish the light rays emitting from it are actually hundreds of metal wires sticking out of the fish! Most of the exotic locations are drawings, but the India sequence is full of elephants and dancing girls and over the top temples. The Bird of Paradise is satisfyingly surreal in a way that just wouldn't happen now with CGI. The final act in Neptune's Kingdom is a campy delight.I rate it 8 out of 10. I'd originally seen the Sinbad version and I had to turn the sound down. It was that bad, and obvious the visuals were from a better movie. I'm glad I saw the restored Russian version because the visuals are much clearer and the original soundtrack is pleasant with strong music and the deep serious voices of the men. The story also made a lot more sense. Highly recommend! Would love to see more of this kind of film.

Charming and naive, Alexandr Ptushko's version of Sadko maintains the ingenuity of the fairy tale through the golden touch of imaginative coloring and splendid characters ingrained in the Russian folklore, which at the same time are part of the universal lore. Add to this Rimmsky-Korsakov's magical music, and lo and behold, a dearest masterpiece to feast eyes and endear hearts. Ptushko used to work under stressing circumstances, political as well as cultural, within a government-controlled industry, where ideology ruled over imagination. However, the artist surpassed the militant many times. Sadko concedes to the nationalistic trend in tyrannies proclaiming, in this case, the 'proud of been a Russian", heard as an echo of fascistic hypes on 'selected people or race"; but it is done with such an obvious declarative tone that the imposition of dialogs and lines comes clear to the viewer. Hail to a filmmaker who conceived films as a domain for the illusive and the innocence.

What have you fiends done with Sinbad?One goofy russo-finnish tale starring Sinbad a.k.a. the guy with the evil looks. He gives guys free drinks and then proceeds to smash their chests in! Sinbad enjoys spending leisure time playing harp at local coffee shops. Don't miss his encore performance by the lake in one of the goofiest dub songs ever. Definitely lost in translation.Confused yet? You will be. You've also got maniacal laughing horse, chess duel, jester party (those nuts!), a bear in Hammer pants, plywood surfing, and so much more. By the way, were vikings ever enemies of Sinbad? It's also not good to have sleep inducing magic in your movie because it may tend to affect even the audience! This film's chock full of schlock including an underwater rave in Neptune's kingdom and a whole lot of wackiness. Oh, and some hokey moral about how money can't bring happiness and that girls really dig guys with golden fish. I know this is a dubbed movie version, but the bad voice acting and hilarious Sinbad "solo" to Neptune's daughter really up the kampiness factor!Watch this one MST style. It's a keeper!