Guest Druust Posted June 19, 2006 Share Posted June 19, 2006 Wow how can you call the Action Scenes in Conan boring? Especially considering it was an early 80's film. The battle on the mounds finale and the first assault on his village brutal scenes full of action and tension. Pit Fighting Conan chopping people apart? Giant snake decapitated? I can't think of any cooler American action film at the time. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest rockandrolltroy Posted June 20, 2006 Share Posted June 20, 2006 I'm baffled by those statements as well. There was alot more to that scene that just a human stew being tipped over. The stealth entrance with the body paint was brilliant. There are several realistic slices that both Conan and Subotai and the chick do. In fact I enjoyed all the action scenes in the entire movie. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Dion Brother Posted June 21, 2006 Share Posted June 21, 2006 The year before I saw RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK, so Conan had alot to live up to. ESCAPE FROM NEW YORK was on cable, THE ROAD WARRIOR in theaters. I thought Arnie moved like an ox. The movie was paced like an ox as well. I'm telling ya, the flick was not well-liked when it was released. Seeing it in a theater is very different from watching it on tv, where you can pause the disc, take a break, make coffee, whatever. You'll notice there wasn't much of a sword and sorcery boom in CONAN's wake. Hell, THE BEASTMASTER is more fun. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest sevenhooks Posted June 22, 2006 Share Posted June 22, 2006 Gotta agree with Dion here. Like him, I saw this with my pops the friday it opened and I'll never forget how hyped everyone in the theater was. There were even a couple of grown men in the audience dressed up like Hagar The Horrible. It was quite an event for the time. That said, I distictly remember coming away disappointed. I remember the reviews warning of the film's violence - and it was graphic to be sure. But the action itself, even for the time, just seemd very sluggish to me. I think it says something that by the time the sequel was released, I had absolutely no interest in seeing it. The Road Warrior/Mad Max 2 on the other hand, had me returning to the movies every weekend for another taste. I couldn't get enough of that film. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Tosh Posted June 23, 2006 Share Posted June 23, 2006 Well, being a kung fu fan (even at that time), I have to say the action was slower, it's like Wuxia Pian on steriods (literally:rollin ) but that sword Arnorld is swinging is real, and weighs about 25 or so pounds, that thing would rip you in half, if he could hit you with it;) I've always liked the art of Frazetta, Conan is kind of like one of his drawings. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Druust Posted June 26, 2006 Share Posted June 26, 2006 Well the action in Conan was slower than Road Warrior, since they were fighting with cars going 100mph and the director sped up the camera quite a bit Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest kenichiku Posted June 26, 2006 Share Posted June 26, 2006 Well, being a kung fu fan (even at that time), I have to say the action was slower, it's like Wuxia Pian on steriods Same here but I say you can't compare 'Conan' with Asian action flicks even from a decade before that with films like 'Heroic Ones' or 'Samurai Banners'. If you already seen tons of Euro-S&S/Arthurian films by then like with the Italo-Hercules, Boorman's 'Excalibur', Robbins/ILM's 'Dragonslayer', pre-'Cyborg' Albert Pyun's underrated (& Asian influenced) 'Sword & the Sorcerer' or even "Yor: Hunter from the Future', you wouldn't expect anything from the genre to be anything but slow - it all depends on your point of reference & viewing history up to that. Hell, even Errol Flynn & Basil Rathbone in the 30s were more nimble & quicker than Ahnold, James Earl, Lopez, Ben Davison, et al. but like appreciating elements of any film, 'Conan' still rocks. It wasn't until watching McTernian's 'The 13th Warrior' that this skimpy genre had another decent representative. They just don't make em' like that anymore. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest vengeanceofhumanlanterns Posted June 26, 2006 Share Posted June 26, 2006 Well put Tosh. Frazetta's artwork exists to be applied to the covers of Robert E. Howard's Conan stories. IMO, the movie actually is a little more true to what (a barbarian) Conan would be in a real life setting. I only say this, because Robert E. Howard's depiction of Conan as some, mountain scaling madman with viciously quick reactions, are understandable enough for a bloodthirsty savage, but his overly verbose speach and gentleman like manners contradict Conan's wildman from the Cimmerian mountains in the cold, unforgiving northlands. Don't misunderstand me, I have all of the Conan stories and then some, but they were much more enjoyable to read at around fifteen years old. Though the monsters, settings, and action are still an excellent means of escapisim. The movie did the stories of Conan justice no doubt about it. If anyone wants to check out some Frazetta: www.frazettaartgallery.com/ff/index.html Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest sevenhooks Posted June 26, 2006 Share Posted June 26, 2006 There's a good Frazetta doc called "Printing With Fire" that I thought to be informative and revealing. Picked it up at Best Buy last year. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest vengeanceofhumanlanterns Posted June 27, 2006 Share Posted June 27, 2006 I saw that. Looked interesting. I'll have to check it out sometime. I actually visited his museum in Pennsylvania like 16 yrs ago. Very cool little showrooms with all his originals on the walls etc. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest WarBeer1 Posted June 29, 2006 Share Posted June 29, 2006 Man I'm a HUGE "Conan" fan as well! What a great fantasy movie. Yeah, sure I suppose (like any movie) you can pick it apart and bitch about the things that could have been done better. But, agreeing with an earlier coment....the score is absolutely one of the most fitting EVER! For me, it really makes the movie...that and the fact that it's a GREAT example of "less is more". Someone earlier said something about being disappointed with the fight scenes...well, IMHO...not every movie has to have blatant "naked sex scene" to understand that you people are in love....sometimes it can cheapen it...I think that unless you have the actors/experts that can make a really tough fight scene work...sometimes it's better to go with less is more...and not mess it up. I thought that mood, imagery and music made up for it. I heard someone also mention that it was "campy"...hmmmm....uh...doesn't this seem like the wrong message room to be in....if you have some issues with campy?...lol... OK....enough of my 2 cents!..lol Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Tosh Posted June 29, 2006 Share Posted June 29, 2006 Conan the Destroyer was "campy":x , I mean what was they thinking?!! If you guys like Frazzeta, check out some Brom and Simon Bisley, who draws everything to the extreme, check out the TMNinja Turtles graphic novels he drew before they became a cute cartoon. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest WarBeer1 Posted July 7, 2006 Share Posted July 7, 2006 I agree....the 2nd Conan was nothing compaired to the first one. The music really ruined it for me. The orchestration was much weaker...and the electric guitar/pop sound was just a cheap and bad move. It's really hard to match that first movie. Scott Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Dion Brother Posted July 9, 2006 Share Posted July 9, 2006 I say you can compare CONAN to Asian action films. Japanese samurai films in particular, because Milius was influenced by them while making CONAN. One scene is swiped from KWAIDAN, the fights were a sloppy attempt at combining the gore splatter of the KOZURE OGAMIs with swordplay from Kurosawa's 1950s period. To excuse the film's underwhelming action because it was a new genre of sorts is not really an honest assessment. CONAN was an updating of the peplums, combined with Samurai imagery and Nietzchean philosophy. and lacking the spirit of Robert E. Howard. Oliver Stone bragged that his original script was truer to Howard's original stories (Despite the credit, very little of it remains in Milius' version). By the way, THE SWORD AND THE SORCEROR beat CONAN to the theaters by several months and was actually more successful. It was even re-released the following year with tagline: "Relive the magic." It's funny how people view things today when you remember how things really were. And I never felt Frazetta or Windsor-Smith drew Conan as a bodybuilder. More like a gymnast or a boxer. Boris Vallejo and John Buscema started the bodybuilder look for Conan. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest vengeanceofhumanlanterns Posted July 9, 2006 Share Posted July 9, 2006 "Boris Vallejo and John Buscema started the bodybuilder look for Conan." At first i kinda liked Boris Vallejo but ended up feeling he was too pretty boyish with his paintings. Frazetta captured the barbaric intensity that really (I thought) complimented Robert E. Howard's character. The Sword And The Sorceror, I don't remember this film, I'm gonna have to pick it up. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Dion Brother Posted July 9, 2006 Share Posted July 9, 2006 Very true. Vallejo's heroes were always in bodybuilding poses. Frazetta's were always in action or getting ready for it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest DrunknMaster Posted July 15, 2006 Share Posted July 15, 2006 Conan the Barbarian is certainly Arnie's best movie by far. The pit fighting scene was awesome!!! Man, they should so do another conan movie. Not sure about the rock - could turn out like "The Scorpion King". Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Liu chung liang Posted August 17, 2006 Share Posted August 17, 2006 The 1st Conan is good. The 2nd one is just different, but it didn't suck. What I like about Destroyer is that, Schwarzenegger's fight scenes were a lot better this time, because he got used to using a sword I guess. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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