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| Images courtesy of Arrow Video |
With Star Wars renewing interest in pulpy old
fashioned sci-fi/fantasy serials ala Buck Rogers or Flash Gordon,
it was a matter of time before the long-dormant sword, sandals and sorcery epic
soon got a top-to-bottom makeover.
Originating from a 1932 series of fantasy stories published in the Weird
Tales magazine by pulp author Robert E. Howard, the character of Conan
the Cimmerian otherwise known as Conan the Barbarian emerged on the
fantasy-adventure epic world stage. Often
characterized by the musclebound superhero interacting with princesses and
wizards amid a cacophony of fantasy lore akin to Tolkien, the series
established the Hyborian Age where the Conan was born on the battlefield and
the son of a blacksmith.
Usually on the rescue of damsels in distress when he isn’t
fighting alongside skillful warrioresses, the loinclothed hero armed with a
heavy sword first made his real big screen appearance in writer-director John
Milius’ 1982 film Conan the Barbarian which effectively catapulted
then-newcomer bodybuilder Arnold Schwarzenegger into the global mainstream and
immediately became a huge box office draw.
Revitalizing the sword-and-sorcery epic and paving the way for far more
adult oriented fare ala John Boorman’s Excalibur and even comedy sendups
as with Rob Reiner’s The Princess Bride, Conan the Barbarian was
so successful two years later it spawned a sequel film from stock trade director
Richard Fleischer Conan the Destroyer which further attempted to emulate
the Star Wars ensemble cast of characters with mixed results.
A brawny yet magically realistic fantasy adventure epic
featuring Arnold Schwarzenegger in effectively his first real major film, Conan
the Barbarian and it’s sequel film Conan the Destroyer have both been
curated and restored by Arrow Video in a new 4K UHD limited edition boxed set
replete with original mono as well as newly created Dolby Atmos tracks,
archival commentaries and interviews, isolated scores, archival documentaries
as well as new and a video tribute to composer Basil Poledouris (Robocop)
who scored both Conan movies.
Also included are two double-sided posters for the film and a new
collector’s booklet featuring an original essay from FilmFreakCentral’s Walter
Chaw. Having owned these films on
previous editions, do these new 4Ks measure up and merit the double
dipping? The answer would be most
certainly yes!
Conan the Barbarian (1982) – Reviewed
In an opening sequence Darren Aronofsky most certainly
lifted for his fantasy action epic Noah, we find Conan the Barbarian as
a child being gifted a sword by a blacksmith who tells him of the ‘Riddle of
Steel’ and it’s importance to his people the Cimmerians who are in the throes
of being bludgeoned to death by raiders led by Thulsa Doom (James Earl Jones). After his parents are killed and he’s
enslaved as a mill worker on the Wheel of Pain, Conan grows up to become a
mighty warrior trained as a gladiator who successfully kills every adversary sent
his way.
Having won enough fights, Conan is freed to wander the world
aimlessly but not before encountering a witch who tries to kill him during
lovemaking and he soon encounters an archer named Subotai (Gerry Lopez) whom he
takes under his wing. Also drawn into
his circle is a female fighter named Valeria (Sandahl Bergman), effectively
Conan’s physical and intellectual equal who becomes the warrior’s mate. From here, having formed a band of outsiders,
Conan and crew are tasked with rescuing a woman from the very cult that killed Conan’s
family. Bloodthirsty for sweet revenge,
the barbarian accepts the suicidal mission.
Produced by Dino De Laurentiis and co-written by John Milius
and Platoon director Oliver Stone, Conan the Barbarian manages to
return the fantasy action-adventure epic sword-and-sorcery film back to its
contemporary adult roots replete with sexuality, nudity, bloodletting and
graphic decapitations. Invariably paving
the way for such carnally conscious Dungeons & Dragons fare as Excalibur
and more recently Troy, the film also helped coin what would eventually
become the Arnold Schwarzenegger action-adventure film replete with his snarky
one-liners and superhuman strengths including but not limited to bending metal
bars and taking on inhuman monsters including a giant shape-shifting snake and
evading a succubus witch.
Shot beautifully in panoramic 2.35:1 widescreen by Duke
Callaghan and given a rousing adventure score by future Robocop composer
Basil Poledouris, Conan the Barbarian looks splendid with vast wide
vistas of the Spanish countryside though the monaural audio is somewhat rough
around the edges (bless Arrow for including the original mono track and the
remix). Performance wise, Arnold was
still fresh off of Hercules in New York and his English is still a
little rusty but the supporting performances by James Earl Jones, Max von Sydow,
Sandahl Bergman, Gerry Lopez and Mako as the wizard help prop up Schwarzenegger
when he was still finding his cinematic legs.
Released in 1982, the film was generally panned by the
critics for its violence and screenwriting but nevertheless went on to become a
commercial success, garnering around $80 million against a $20 million
budget. All but completely ushering in
the resurgence of the sword-and-sorcery epic which would later blossom into Cannon
Films fare such as The Barbarians and shortly thereafter the Deathstalker
movies from Roger Corman for good or for ill, Conan the Barbarian became
a benchmark for the subgenre and would later spawn not only a sequel two years
later but a top-to-bottom remake in 2011 with actor Jason Momoa in the role
with The Texas Chainsaw Massacre remake director Marcus Nispel at the
helm. Sadly however following the
release of director Richard Fleischer’s official sequel Conan the Destroyer and
spinoff Red Sonja a year later, plans for future Conan the Barbarian films
came to a swift end.
Conan the Destroyer (1984) – Reviewed
So successful was the 1982 sword-and-sorcery epic Conan
the Barbarian for Universal Studios and Dino De Laurentiis, it was
inevitable they would turn around and crank out another one ready or not. In what became director-for-hire Richard
Fleischer’s Conan the Destroyer with Arnold Schwarzenegger and Mako
reprising their respective roles, the film this time around is written for the
screen by Stanley Mann from a story by Roy Thomas and Gerry Conway and the film’s
violence and sexuality from the previous film have been toned down to bring the
proceedings from an R to a PG. The
resulting film feels somewhere between John Milius’ vision, George Miller’s The
Road Warrior dystopia and just a few forthcoming hints of the creature-effects
mania of Peter Yates’ Krull including but not limited to an unholy
monster rendered by Alien and E.T. animatronic puppet master
Carlo Rambaldi.
Ditching Subotai in favor of Repo Man actor Tracey
Walter as Malak and also casting basketball star Wilt Chamberlain and at one
point Andre the Giant in the monster costume puppeteered by Rambaldi, Conan
the Destroyer more or less picks up where the last film left off with Conan
escorting a young Princess Jehnna (Olivia d’Abo) in search of a sacred bull horn
capable of resurrecting a long-dormant god intent on bringing about the end of
humankind. Interspersed with cannibals
that feel lifted out of a Deodato film, a gorilla-man beast (Pat Roach from A
Clockwork Orange and Raiders of the Lost Ark) in a hall of mirrors
echoing the finale of Enter the Dragon and more than a few effects heavy
vistas rendered hastily in green screen, this Conan film tries to
compensate with more while ending up with less.
Shot by Jack Cardiff in panoramic widescreen who rather
legendarily lensed John Huston’s The African Queen, the film sports more
production values and colorful set pieces that are neon-lit for surreal effect
in some scenes and Basile Poledouris’ score is dependable if not forgettable
this time around. The film while more
expensive than the first didn’t make quite the same box office landing as the
previous one. Originally shot with an R
rating in mind before being hastily cut down to a PG for more ticket sales, Conan
the Destroyer tends to shove its titular hero to the backseat though the
addition of Grace Jones as Zula a warrioress prisoner who is freed by Conan and
comes to his aide is a most welcome one.
While the trio of Schwarzenegger, Fleischer and Laurentiis
would reunite once more on the ill-fated Red Sonja, this would be the
last anyone would see of Conan the Barbarian for almost twenty years and
Schwarzenegger himself would move on to vastly different action-adventure
projects. Still, the influence of what
both Conan films promised for fantasy lore fiction while pushing towards
progressive themes of strong-willed female characters fighting alongside the
male lead became a staple in pop culture particularly with toys and video
games. For instance, the Golden Axe games
not only pattern themselves conceptually after the Conan series but
several sound effects are sampled directly from the films themselves. While the fantasy swords-and-sorcery epic never
really completely went away, Red Sonja tragically did put a damper on
them.
Still, for all of its flaws and shortcomings that place it
beneath its predecessor, Conan the Destroyer still provides an expensive
looking screen entertainment with some wild creature effects makeup further
ahead. Arrow Video’s restoration of both
films is exquisite and the amount of extras provided for both films is so
plentiful it’ll take you days to wade through everything. Known primarily as the film series that
introduced one of the world’s greatest action movie stars and an important
chapter in the emergence of fantasy sword-and-sorcery lore into the mainstream,
The Conan Chronicles represents another home run for Arrow Video in a
beautifully detailed boxed set fans and newcomers are sure to eat up.
--Andrew Kotwicki
