leeper@mtgzz.UUCP (m.r.leeper) (07/07/85)
RED SONJA
A film review by Mark R. Leeper
Three years ago Dino De Laurentiis produced the first of his Robert E.
Howard films, CONAN THE BARBARIAN, directed by John Milius. It was a film
of blood and steel. It had a literate script, a great villain, and a really
superior musical score. Apparently, De Laurentiis wanted a lighter touch
and last year's CONAN THE DESTROYER was directed by Richard Fleischer. A
number of people seem to prefer the second film, though to my mind it was a
step down, a +2 rather than the +3 I gave the first film (on a -4 to +4
scale). Now the third film is out--RED SONJA. It is set in Conan's world
of Hyberborea and supposedly also based on Howard's writings. Robert E.
Howard fans tell me that Red Sonja is a minor character in Howard and her
story is, I believe, set in the Fifteenth Century, a far cry from the
barbarian age in which the film was set. By all accounts, the film is based
more on the similarly misplaced character appearing in a comic book.
Well, by comparison to either of the Conan films, RED SONJA is a giant
step down. Apparently only a few scenes of what was probably the first half
hour of the film were filmed. We are told in a few sentences that when
Sonja (Brigitte Nielsen) repulsed the lesbian advances of the evil queen
Gedren (Sandahl Bergman), the queen had most of Sonja's family killed. As
the story opens, the queen is in the process of killing Sonja's sister, who
is one of the priestesses who guard a glowing green sphere that gives
ultimate power (people who saw HEAVY METAL will immediately think of it as
the Loc Nar). Gedren gets the sphere and through mis-use will destroy the
world with it unless Sonja can get it back. (It's the old theory from James
Bond films: if your hero is trying to save the world, the story has got to
be a lot more exciting than if he is just trying to get an enemy decoder,
right?) Just to help the film along, Arnold Schwarzenegger is along, not as
Conan, but as Kalidor, a poor slob who keeps arriving in the nick of time to
save Sonja and wins only ingratitude from her.
And here's one for Ripley's "Believe It or Not"--Schwarzenegger is
probably the best actor in the film. Sandahl Bergman, who was so good in
the first film, seems to have recently graduated from the Tanya Roberts
school of acting. Brigitte Nielsen does a little better by the title role,
but not much. Both women seem to have visited Conan the Cosmetician and
have come away with large supplies of Hyperborean mascara and lipstick,
amazingly like the 20th Century equivalents.
The script is exceptionally unimaginative, with few of the fantasy
elements of its predecessors. What is in the script is never explained. At
one point, a mechanical robot-monster shows up totally without explanation
as to where the technology to build it came from. The music is just barely
adequate, perhaps due to having been contributed by Ennio Morricone instead
of Basil Poledouris, who did the CONAN films. The fight scenes, much better
orchestrated in the earlier films, are laughable and even less convincing
than the acting.
Perhaps with the first half-hour returned and with better acting, RED
SONJA might have been acceptable, but what got to the screen is short and a
mess. Rate it -1.
Mark R. Leeper
...ihnp4!mtgzz!leeperschuetz@via.DEC (DTN 381-2647 or system REGAL, GLIVET, or LAGER) (07/11/85)
Basicly, I agree with Mark Leeper's assessment of the CONAN movies and RED SONJA too. These people spend so much money on sets and special effects, it would be nice to have actors and scripts to match. While I agree than Arnold's acting was better in this film, saying he was the best was going a bit too far. I thought the kid that played Prince Tarn was best. And the lead bimbo who played RED SONJA was mis-cast. Like Arnold, they should have hired one of the Miss Universe contestants; after all, RED SONJA was supposed to have super strength. Picture this, the poor disheveled Sonja is standing in the forest when the Vision grants her superior strength - our Miss Universe actor does a muscle flex and now really looks impressive. The current actress was not. Nothing in the plot or acting lead you to believe that she had any unusual strength at all, and this is what her legendary power was supposed to be, unless you count her being able to wield a sword at all. The sword play was boring and repetitious. Not having a convincine lead character killed off any chance of rating a 2. I'd give it a 1 on a scale of 0 to 4. Go see Cocoon, Pale RIder, Silverado, anything else first.