cult film freak: CHARLTON HESTON & NICOLE MAUREY IN 'SECRET OF THE INCAS'

Year: 1953 Rates: **1/2

Jerry Hopper's cult film SECRET OF THE INCAS is already established to have inspired not only the iconic Harrison Ford as Indiana Jones outfit including leather jacket and fedora, but both get reminded how attractive they are... girl student eyelids there and smitten lady tourists Marion Ross and Glenda Farrell here...

More importantly, each adventurous hero... paired with an equally rogue dame... piece together an incomplete curio to find out exactly where the archeological treasure is, and that's the SECRET...

Nicole Maurey in SECRET OF THE INCAS with Yma Sumec

Sadly, by the time we reach the Inca mountaintop village where local crooner Yma Sumac chants songs from mystic opera to what sounds like Indian scat blues, Charlton Heston's Harry Steele sits and waits for that gold while scheming double-crosser Thomas Mitchell sits and waits to steal it...

However the real scene STEALER is THE WEAPON French beauty Nicole Maurey, banded with Heston for a dream ride to America before reluctantly winding up on his fortune-hunting escapade...

Nicole Maurey in SECRET OF THE INCAS

But their scenes back in a small airstrip town that includes an attempted assassination, pulpy tavern dialogue and stealing a plane puts some terrific action into an otherwise bland adventure...

If only they stayed where they started, and not reached the destination so soon, and for so long: Unlike the inspired RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK, there aren't enough layers/levels here.