Gordon Mitchell

Tall, massively built, imposing-looking blond 'Gordon Mitchell' (qv) (early on dubbed the "The Bronze Giant") was one of those perfectly developed bodybuilders who jumped on the 'Steve Reeves' (qv) bandwagon and hightailed it to Italy to seek movie stardom as a Herculean strongman. Born Charles Allen Pendleton in Denver, Colorado on July 29, 1923, and raised in Inglewood, California, Mitchell served in WWII and, at one point, became a prisoner of war at the Battle of the Bulge. After the war, Gordon went to USC in Los Angeles under the G.I. bill and became a high school teacher and guidance counselor.A fitness nut with an incredible physique, he soon became part of the Venice, California "Muscle Beach" crowd and it took over. He literally flexed his way into the entertainment business as part of 'Mae West' (qv)'s musclebound revue. He toured everywhere with Ms. West from Las Vegas to the Latin Quarter with other "abs"normal actor wannabes 'Mickey Hargitay' (qv), 'Brad Harris' (qv) and 'Reg Lewis' (qv). In between, Gordon obscurely posed as beefcake in such films as _The Ten Commandments (1956)_ (qv), _Li'l Abner (1959)_ (qv) and _Spartacus (1960)_ (qv), which, of course, did little to advance his acting career.In 1961, after Reeves' _Hercules (1958)_ (qv) proved a box-office smash, the non-Italian-speaking Mitchell, among others, headed off to Europe to compete on the peplum film pedestal. With his fierce and progressively hardened features, Gordon wound up playing both hero and villain, appearing regularly in the popular, if poorly dubbed, sandal-and-spear epics. In the usual over-the-top style. Gordon started off as the title strongman in _Atlas Against the Cyclops (1961)_ (qv); and went on to play the Roman warrior General Metellus in _The Centurion (1961)_ (qv); massively muscled hero Obro in _The Giant of Metropolis (1961)_ (qv); Pluto, the God of War in _Vulcan, Son of Jupiter (1962)_ (qv); the villainous pirate Hamar in _Caesar Against the Pirates (1962)_ (qv); the title hero _Fury of Achilles (1962)_ (qv); the barbarous villain Brenno in _Brennus, Enemy of Rome (1963)_ (qv); a slave and co-hero in _Seven Slaves Against Rome (1964)_ (qv); evil tyrant Omar in _Die sieben Rachen des Adlers (1964)_ (qv); villainous assassin Sven in _Erik, the Viking (1965)_ (qv); and the villainous Hunding in _The Stone Forest (1965)_ (qv);Gordon developed a strong core of fans during this brief reign. When the film fad wore off by 1965, Mitchell, unlike many of his pectoral partners who chose to drop out of sight, moved on and muscled his way into more than 100 additional films. Many of his later 60's and 70's offerings were further down the credits list in the "spaghetti western" or "giallo mystery" categories -- staying true to the country that made him a star -- _Three Graves for a Winchester (1966)_ (qv), _Für eine Handvoll Blei (1966)_ (qv) (Kill or Be Killed), _È mezzanotte... butta giù il cadavere (1966)_ (qv), _Born to Kill (1967)_ (qv), _Crazy Westerners (1967)_ (qv), _Death on the Run (1967)_ (qv), _John the Bastard (1967)_ (qv), _Cheers to Cyanide (1968)_ (qv), _Die letzte Rechnung zahlst Du selbst (1968)_ (qv), _Trusting Is Good... Shooting Is Better (1968)_ (qv), _Cry of Death (1968)_ (qv), _I Am Sartana, Your Angel of Death (1969)_ (qv), _Django and Sartana Are Coming... It's the End (1970)_ (qv), _Stranger That Kneels Beside the Shadow of a Corpse (1970)_ (qv), _Finders Killers (1971)_ (qv), _Coffin Full of Dollars (1971)_ (qv), _Down with Your Hands... You Scum! (1971)_ (qv), _Let's Go and Kill Sartana (1971)_ (qv), _Day of Judgment (1971)_ (qv), _His Name Was Pot... But They Called Him Allegria (1971)_ (qv), _His Name Was Sam Walbash, But They Call Him Amen (1971)_ (qv), _A Gunman Called Dakota (1972)_ (qv), _Stay Away from Trinity... When He Comes to Eldorado (1972)_ (qv), _His Colt, Himself, His Revenge (1972)_ (qv), _Seven Devils on Horseback (1975)_ (qv) and _Special Squad Shoots on Sight (1976)_ (qv).As the years went on, Gordon would branch out more internationally. Some of these films included _The Arizona Kid (1970)_ (qv) (Philippines); _Angel's Leap (1971)_ (qv) (France); _Seven Times Seven (1969)_ (qv) (Hong Kong); _Tiger from River Kwai (1975)_ (qv) (Germany); _A Very Special Woman (1979)_ (qv) (France); _Kopfschuß (1981)_ (qv) (Germany); _Inchon (1981)_ (qv) (US); the international mini-series _Marco Polo (1982)_ (qv); _White Fire (1984)_ (qv) (France); _Kommando Invasion (1986)_ (qv) (Germany) and _Evil Spawn (1987)_ (qv) (Taiwan).Returning to the States around 1990, Gordon continued to work sporadically (_Bikini Drive-In (1995)_ (qv) and _An Enraged New World (2002)_ (qv)) until his last film -- the crime action flick _Malevolence (2004)_ (qv). The actor, briefly married in the early 1950's, died of a heart attack on September 20, 2003, in Marina del Rey, California. He was 80 years old.::Gary Brumburgh / [email protected]]