The progenitor of hack and slash fantasy is brought to life by Arnold Schwarzenegger, and it is a load of fun to watch. This movie captures the spirit of Conan, has surprisingly good acting and story, and features all of those Arnold sounds everyone loves. James Earl Jones makes a great menacing villain as Thulsa Doom. It also features Iwamatsu Mako ( you probably know him as Uncle Iroh) as narrator and wizard companion of Conan, and Max von Sydow as King Osric. The movie was co-written and directed by John Millius, with Oliver Stone(yes that one) assisting in the writing. This movie is great from start to finish and features tons of memorable lines, great effects and exciting action sequences.
The plot revolves around the early life of Conan and his desire to claim vengeance on the snake-cult leader Thulsa Doom for killing his family and destroying his village. Along the way he gathers his companions Subotai and Valeria and undertakes a quest that allows him to strike back at Doom while getting rich and saving the king's daughter from the clutches of the Cult of Set. What follows is a fantasy adventure worthy of the Conan legacy, with just the right balance of humor, emotion and action to keep you on the edge of your seat. While no one would ever accuse Arnold Schwarzenegger of being the world's best actor, I think that this has to be one of, if not his best performance ever, which is funny considering this is the movie that put him on the map. The only other I would say even comes close would be Predator, but that's for another Thursday.
I would be remiss if I didn't talk about the great effects in this movie. Not only are the fight scenes shot brilliantly, the makeup and props departments really go all out to make the decapitations and rending impacts feel real. The mechanical effects used for the snakes are really a step beyond even what you see today, this movie makes you believe that Conan is fighting a giant snake, it looks amazing and you can almost feel Conan's bones snapping under the pressure( the prop could generate upwards of 9 tons of pressure). The stunt work by Terry Leonard and Kyoshi Yamazaki is amazing and the main trio received martial arts training and did nearly all of their own stunt work, so non of those awkward fight-scene face cutaways.
This movie is definitely worth your time if you enjoy fantasy even a little bit. I don't know if we will ever get anything like it again the way Hollywood is going. Thank you for reading and have a great day!
