AllMovie

Filmed several years before its 1931 American release, Maciste in Hell was based (it says here) on Dante's Inferno. Replacing Dante's protagonist is legendary muscleman Maciste, played as usual by Bartolomeo Pagano. A pillar of virtue, Maciste incurs the wrath of Pluto, king of the Underworld, who dispatches several lesser demons to Earth, where they attempt to goad our hero into committing a mortal sin. Ultimately, Maciste does go to hell, but he easily punches and pummels his way out of the Dark Domain. The moral, apparently, is that if you're pure of heart and have pecs of iron, not even old Satan can drag you down.