|
|
Set in the mythical Hyborian Age, a grim period in the world's pre-history, Conan the Barbarian is a fantasy-adventure focusing on a man described as "thief, reiver, slayer with gigantic melancholies and gigantic mirth." Cimmerian by birth, Conan (Arnold) had been captured as a child by Thulsa Doom (James Earl Jones), head of the snake cult of Set and leader of the raiding Vanir; Conan's parents were savagely murdered by the Vanir. After fifteen years of agonizing slavery -including periods chained to the Wheel of Pain to grind grain, and messy work as a Pit Fighter- Conan emerges as a man of formidable physique and an indomitable spirit.
Freed one day by his owner, Conan joins forces with Subotai the Mongol (Gerry Lopez) and Valeria, Queen of Thieves (Sandahl Bergman). They resolve to kill the vicious Thulsa Doom, and seek the solution to "the riddle of steel," rumored to confer the ultimate power. The three embark on hair-raising adventures that climax with the rescue of the king's daughter.
Conan the Barbarian was the first sword and sorcery picture to be released by a major studio in a long time, and it clicked with audiences right away, mostly because of the images of the very muscular Arnold fighting a 40-foot snake, making love to a witch who turns into a whirlwind, and engaging in breathtaking swowd fights. These visual feasts had been absent from the screen since the early 1960s heyday of Steve Reeves, who also had muscles, but nothing to match the Schwarzenegger charisma.
The $20 million movie, based on the hero created during the 1930s by pulp-magazine writer Robert E. Howard, was shot in Spain. For heightened realism, Schwarzenegger, Bergman (a trained dancer), and Lopez (a surfer) performed nearly all of their own stunts. Arnold endured some pain during the production: He tore a ligament in a fall from his horse; had the back of his head bitten by camel; and fell down a 20-foot rock on his back. But he remained unfazed. "[Director] John Milius promised us dirt and pain, and there's been a lot of both - as well as fun, "Arnold laughed at the time. And he was amply rewarded. The movie, which grossed over $50 million, established him as an action hero to be reckoned with.
"The picture is a winner because Conan is a winner," Arnold told the New York Post. "Conan is an honorable man. His life is based on strength: of body, mind, and spirit. He's the kind of person an audience can identify with. He never gives up". No doubt about that, for, as moviegoers discovered, Conan is the sort of man who can bite off the head of a marauding vulture while tied to a cross!
"Conan doesn't think he just acts," Schwarzenegger added. "No ones gives him a break. He has to do everything himself." Schwarzenegger told Pulse magazine, "I understood the character. He got strong through adversity. I was meant to play the part · · · [Even] my accent was an asset in Conan, because I was supposed to be from a different era, so they wanted me to talk differently from everyone else."
Not everyone cheered the movie. Some critics lamented its excessive gore and violence. Others sneered at its pretentiousness and macho philosophy, a trademark of director Milius. Still others saw it as heavy-handed and compared the epic unfavorably with the more humorous Star Wars and Raiders Ot The Lost Arc. One critic termed Arnold "silly" and Vincent Canby of The New York Times, who described Conan as "the archetypal escapist film ... a kiddie fantasy for grown-ups," described Arnold as "the male equivalent of the late Jayne Mansfield," and complained that he lacked grace. "He often looks as if he hadn't done his warm-up exercises properly," Canby quipped.
Criticism of this sort apparently didn't hurt the picture's box-office performance, and didn't bother the star too much, either. Discussing the film's violence with Pulse, Schwarzenegger remarked, "Face it, this is not a movie about babysitters. It's about a barbarian!"
