1982, United States. Starring Arnold Schwarzenegger, James Earl Jones, Max von Sydow, Sandahl Bergman, Ben Davidson, Cassandra Gaviola, Gerry Lopez, Mako, Valerie Quennessen, William Smith, Luis Barboo. Directed by John Milius. Available on DVD (Amazon).

I remember the scene as if it was yesterday, probably because not much has changed since it first happened. I was over at my friend Robby's house. Though we lived out in the sticks and couldn't get cable television yet, his family had a satellite dish and all the trimmings that came with such a device, like porno channels and movie channels.

Ah yes, countless were the nights we stayed up 'til the wee small hours, reading his dad's monumental stash of porn magazines or watching movies like Angel of HEAT and Emmanuelle. With dry mouths and trembling bodies we'd lie in the floor and ogle Sylvia Kristel's boobs and watch all manner of perversions parade themselves in front of our young and eager eyes.

We were members of an elite group who knew Laura Gemser before they knew Molly Ringwald, who knew about the existence of the Kama Sutra before they had read Are You There God? It's me, Margaret?. Sadly, none of this made me a smooth, suave Derek Flint style love machine, but I'm working on it. We would come to school and regale people with the tales of lust and nudity we had witnessed over the weekend. Like I said, few things have changed, including be witness far more than actual participant. I want to live the wild, funky life of a swingin', jet setting sex machine, but somehow, I usually end up at home watching Lina Romay videos and eating Bagel Bites instead.

One of the greatest discoveries of those formative years was the barbarian boom of the 1980s. These films features lots of gore, lots of breasts, and lots of little weird demony monster thingies. I still remember the mind blowing night we stayed up and watched Excalibur, Sword and the Sorcerer, and Conan the Barbarian. Man alive, witnessing that carnage made me forget all about Sylvia Kristel, at least for a while. I was seeing heads roll, people torn limb from limb, wild orgies, wizards, and all kinds of crazy shit no one at school would believe.

Conan has always been my favorite of the sword and sandal movies. It was the standard setter, the prototype all other barbarian movies would imitate. None would be as much fun, however. Well, Sword and the Sorcerer was close. But when compared to the films it inspired, abysmal junk like Death Stalker and that Barbarians movie with those two weird twins, Conan emerges so far ahead of the pack that it almost seems a shame it's associated with the rest of those films.

It's no real surprise then that Conan features the only cast of characters to go on and do anything else with their lives after the barbarian craze died out. The lead, Arnold Schwarzenegger, went on to be the biggest action star in America, at least until years of steroid abuse finally caught up with him and he started smoking cigars and hanging out at the Kennedy compound. Lead villain James Earl Jones has starred in some of the best and some of the worst films around, yet continues to maintain respect no matter what he does, since his voice is so damn cool. The script was co-written by Oliver Stone, no doubt during his heavy drug phase. And Sandahl Bergman has gone on to a lucrative and prolific career as the star of many made for Cinemax erotic thrillers.

Okay, so it's not a perfect record, but it's more impressive than anything the cast of Outlaw of Gor pulled off.

When viewing the film, audiences will be met by the warning, "A Dino De Laurentiis Production." Depending on your taste, then could be either a blessing or something tantamount to the inscription above the gate to Hell. There's no denying that, for all the sleaziness associated with the De Laurentiis name, they gave us many of the biggest trends in film history. Ninja movies, Barbarian movies. No disreputable genre is without the name of Dino De Laurentiis upon its flagship vehicle.

Conan has so much going for it that even being associated with Dino can't drag it down. The production is lavish and expensive looking. The sets are exotic. The music is extremely cool. And the cast is competent, and sometimes even good. The plot makes little sense, but not many people go into a barbarian movie looking for Woody Allen. Though I must admit, as no big fan of Woody Allen I wouldn't mind seeing him in at least one barbarian movie as a rolling head.

Schwarzenegger, then a relative unknown whose only major starring role had been alongside Arnold Stang in the delightfully terrible Hercules in New York, stars as Conan, subject of a long-running series of pulp novels and a Marvel comic book. During his early days, Conan sees his family of nomads slaughtered by a warrior who looks just like James Earl Jones in a goofy wig. Wait! It is James Earl Jones! Jones plays Thulsa Doom, and up and coming bad guy who rides under the banner of two snakes. That image is burned into Conan's mind.

Conan himself is sent to the "pointless toil" factory, where he has to turn a big wheel for like fifteen years. This turns him into the huge Arnold Schwarzenegger. He is later captured by some rowdy Viking looking guys who teach him to fight and tell him about Crom and the "Riddle Of Steel." Conan later becomes a wanderer, finding a sword of his own in the clutches of a dead warrior in a cave.

He soon teams up with Subotai, a thief played by surfing star Gerry Lopez. For my money, Subotai is the best thing about the film. He's cool and is a much better actor than Arnie. Subotai and Conan trek. The trek and trek and trek. This movie is packed with trekking. The best reasons I can come up with for all this trekking is that 1) Dino is showing off the fact that he has the largest budget ever afforded to any barbarian film, 2) Subotai and Conan look really cool trotting over dunes and deserts, and 30 the music composer wrote some really great trekking music.

On their trek, Conan and Subotai get to do many things, like laugh at a man screwing a llama, yell at prostitutes, and steal things. Conan is also interested in tracking down that old snake cult and getting a little revenge for having to turn that wheel all those years. Oh, and for the murder of his people. Although Arnold was no actor back then, and may still not be much of one now, he gets to deliver some choice lines. One of the best comes when a prostitute invites him into her bed, a warm bed to "protect him from evil." Conan grins and says, "But I am evil."

While preparing to climb into a tower that is rumored to contain a valuable jewel, Conan and Subotai run into another thief, the tough as leather jerkins Valeria, played by Sandahl Bergman. It's nice that when faced with casting a woman who is supposed to be tough and strong, they actually picked one who was. Nothing annoys me about Hollywood more these days than when they have some super bad-ass female character and she is played by some 90 pound model. Milla Jovovich as a kungfu bad-ass in The Fifth Element? Please. Sandahl Bergman, though -- now her I believe.

The three thieves infiltrate the tower, steal the jewel, get to witness a naked virgin, and kill a very real looking giant snake. Conan also discovers the mark of the two serpents and realizes he is getting closer to finding the men who killed his family.

The trio become famous and filthy rich thieves, which causes Conan to fall asleep in his oatmeal. When a distressed king played by Max Von Sydow (a well respected actor whose work includes the Ingmar Bergman classic The Seventh Seal and the Dino De Laurentiis classic Flash Gordon) hires the three to kidnap his daughter away from the evil snake cult of Thulsa Doom, only Conan seems interested. Subotai and Valeria are happy to enjoy their wealth and comfortable lifestyle.

But Conan has revenge in his heart. He sets out alone to trek across more scenery to cool music. Along the way, he runs into a desert dwelling wizard played by Mako, who would go on to star in all sorts of low budget films. Mako seems more con man than wizard, but so it goes. Finally, after much trekking, Conan finds a procession of pilgrims who want to become part of Thulsa Doom's snake religion. Conan has a bizarre somewhat gay scene with a priest of Doom, though you can never tell outright if the priest is all hot and bothered and hitting on Conan. Conan is hitting on him, though, but only with his massive fists.

Disguised as a priest, Conan quickly ruins his disguise by flashing one of the stolen artifacts from the snake tower. He is beaten up by James Earl Jones' main henchmen, who many of you will also recognize as members of the British metal group Spinal Tap. They then tie him to the tree of woe, which means I can only imagine The American Dream Dusty Rhodes going ape shit and yelling, "They done taaaahhhhd him to da twee ah woe!" Conan is left to bake in the desert and battle with vultures who just want a little taste.

But then the cool exotic music starts up. Who is it? Kevin Sullivan? No! It's Subotai, in one of the film's simplest but coolest moments. He, Valeria, and the wizard struggle to bring Conan back from the brink of death. They cover him with sacred symbols that make him look like the guy from one of the stories in Kwaidan, and the wizard does all sorts of spells. In the end, though, the magic is useless and Valeria and Subotai simply have to get in fist fights with the cool little orange Mr. Clean looking spirits that come to carry Conan away.

It's actually something of a theme in the movie, if movies such as Conan the Barbarian dare have themes. In the end, faith and magic are useless shields we use to insulate ourselves from real life and real action. When you want results, you have to come out from behind the aegis of religion and pose mightily in the desert with your broadsword.

Conan eventually recovers enough to strike cool barbarian poses against a sweeping backdrop of desert dunes before he, Subotai, and Valeria paint themselves up to look really cool and invade Thulsa Doom's Mountain of Power, which I believe is also the name of a ride at Six Flags. Once again their actions are set to really great music as they sneak around, witness an orgy, some cannibalism, and finally find the king's daughter and Thulsa Doom, who turns into a giant snake and escapes! Conan and company set to wreaking havoc on the party, including another showdown with the members of Spinal Tap. They get the king's daughter, but as they are fleeing, Thulsa turns a poisonous snake into an arrow and kills Valeria.

In the end, Conan, Subotai, and Mako must face off against Thulsa Doom's forces in a very cool, very gory final battle amid some desert ruins and burial mounds. Conan makes a priceless prayer to Crom, his god.

I like Conan the Barbarian a lot. It's lush and has an epic feel. It's full of gore and action. The music really helps make the film. It's what I like to call "barbarian brass," and would be the musical style adopted by the genre as a whole. Lots of heroic thunderous brass and kettle drums, with chimes and woodwinds for the more exotic parts. Really great stuff. I used to work at a movie theater with this weight lifter named Marcus. Very cool guy. Every day, he would arrive for work crammed into his tiny car like some Rat Fink character, blaring the Conan the Barbarian theme song on his stereo.

His two favorite songs were "Anvil of Crom," which is the theme song to Conan the Barbarian, and Color Me Badd's "I Wanna Sex You Up," which was the theme song for him and his very cute, very friendly girlfriend.

Conanis more than just a nostalgia trip for me to a time when I had to work for my cult films. I had to travel and evade parents and guardians, sneak into theaters, things like that. Now I can just go down to Mondo Kim's and rent Immoral Tales and Cannibal Holocaust. But back then, it was a challenge. It was a quest, a trek just like Conan's. I still get a huge kick out of Conan the Barbarian and think it's Schwarzenegger's best film, and as I said earlier, the best barbarian film of them all. The music makes me want to trek a little myself.

A sequel, Conan the Destroyer, was made, but it just doesn't do it for me. It abandons the dark and gory, more or less serious tone of the original (not to mention all of the cast except for Arnold and Mako)and plays itself out as an action comedy with none of the excitement or drama of the first film. It's not bad, it's just too different to be as satisfying. And it had no Subotai.

Conan the Barbarian may not have the most logical plot, but it's as logical as things get in the world of barbarians and James Earl Jones turning into a snake and members of Spinal Tap wielding giant stone hammers. It's good stuff full of everything we demand from barbarian films, if you are the type of person who demands things from barbarian films. I know I am, and Conan the Barbarian satisfies me every time.

Labels: Director: John Milius, Fantasy: Sword and Sorcery, Stars: Arnold Schwarzenegger, Stars: James Earl Jones, Stars: Max von Sydow, Stars: Sandahl Bergman, Year: 1982