A quote from admired graphic novelist Maximilian Uriarte (MARINE CORPS; BATTLE BORN) impetus for today’s post: ‘Battle Born was inspired heavily by John Milius’s 1982 film ‘Conan the Barbarian.’ ‘Conan’ has one of the most beautiful visual & film soundtracks of all time. The first 30 minutes are some of the greatest shots ever made, and then the movie kind of goes on for another hour and a half.’ Recommendation enough to fill in what's long been a personal film lacunae. And Uriate’s entirely right about that last hour & a half. Dogged is the word that comes to mind as Milius (co-writing with Oliver Stone) sends Arnold Schwarzenegger’s mighty Conan off on a quest for glory, a kidnapped princess & private revenge to a Shangri-La lorded over by James Earl Jones’s blue-eyed menace (his parents' killer), accompanied by three sidekicks. Arnold a sort of a big beefy WIZARD OF OZ Dorothy in an alternate cream-colored, testosterone-loaded Emerald City. But if Uriate’s right about the last two acts, he’s overly generous about the first. With even the much lauded Basil Poledouris score sounding like warmed over Rózsa.* Milius’s does his best work in the smaller scaled moments of that first 30 minutes, but even there the action is poorly staged, as when young Conan’s home, village & family are leveled by Jones and his marauders. And while we can appreciate the isometric benefits to the Schwarzenegger build from an adolescence spent pushing the beam of a circular mill as a prisoner, application remains doubtful. Thank goodness that fine character actor Mako shows up as mysterious shaman/mentor to our desert-wandering Conan for a few winking gags. But this is one of those films that needs to be seen at just the right age to make its mark.
WATCH THIS, NOT THAT: *Speaking of Mikós Rózsa, Anthony Mann & Charlton Heston’s EL CID/’62 makes for constructive comparison.
SCREWY THOUGHT OF THE DAY: In spite (or is it because?) of an oversized personality and oversized rep, John Milius only directed seven feature films over his career. Now in his mid-seventies, his last feature came out three decades ago. Just how difficult a guy is he?
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