"Thief. Warrior. Gladiator. King."	Year of Release: 1982 Directed by: John Milius Running Time: Approx. 129 minutes Rating: R Listing on the A.K.A. Page: Nope! A Second Opinion: Sci-Film Buy the Collector's Edition DVD at: Amazon.com or Movies Unlimited.com. My Rating:

Also be sure to check out my other roundtable review for The Invincible Barbarian

Conan- Arnold Schwarzenegger! When Conan was a child, he watched helplessly as his parents and entire tribe were massacred by Thulsa Doom and his marauders (well except for all the children, they were sold into slavery). Once he gains his freedom, Conan strives for and achieves vengeance against Thulsa Doom.

Subotai- A Mongol (I thought he said he was an Acadian?) that Conan saves from starvation. They quickly become good friends and join forces to take down Thulsa Doom. (On a side note, Subotai apparently does all the crying for Conan.)

Valeria- Sandhal Bergman! Sexy thief that joins forces with Subotai and Conan against Thulsa Doom. She quickly falls in love with Conan however, and ends up paying the ultimate price for it (I'll explain that in more detail later on). She dies when hit with a snake-arrow, courtesy of Thulsa Doom.

Akiro the Wizard- Mako! Quirky Asian wizard that Conan befriends. He helps bring the nearly dead Conan back from the great beyond, and even joins in the final battle.

Thulsa Doom- James Earl Jones! A powerful sorceror who can change into a snake and use his somewhat hypnotic gaze to overpower women and... does it work on men? I have no idea... maybe it's just his charisma that draws people to follow and die for him. He is beheaded by Conan during the final scene.

Rexor and Thorgrim- Ben Davidson and Sven Ole-Thorson! Thulsa's main warriors and bodyguards (the latter of which uses a huge hammer in battle... hence THORgrim). Both are killed by Conan in the final climactic battle. Rexor is blinded by Valeria (she did say she would stand beside her lover in battle, even after death. Now that's commitment!) and slashed up by Conan. Thorgrim gets a pointy stick to the chest after falling for an ingenious booby trap.

King Osric and his daughter- Max Von Sydow and... some girl! He gives Conan and friends a ton of jewels. In return, the heroic trio must rescue Osric's daughter from Thulsa Doom's evil clutches. Osric's daughter is saved and returned to her father (as stated in the Epilogue).

The Cimmerians- A proud tribe of people who were pretty damn good at making swords. With the exception of Conan, all of them are wiped out.

The Giant Snake- Now remember, this movie was made in 1982! Long before the dawning of CGI there were scale models and puppetry. (And for the record, I hate CGI with a passion. Give me latex and foam rubber over computer effects anyday!) The snake doesn't look too bad, but it doesn't look very life-like either. Conan and Subotai dispose of this large serpent.

Crom- Conan's God. He's mentioned by Conan several times in the movie, but never makes an appearance.

Thulsa Dooms Soldiers, Honor Guard, and Followers- Fodder for our heroic trio!

To start this review off, I have one thing I want to make clear to you. I love this movie! As you can see, I gave it my highest rating and you know I don't just toss out five Radioactive symbols! Conan the Barbarian is simply one of the best films of all time (and not just in its genre). The movie opens with a quote from Friedrich Nietzsche - "That which does not kill us makes us stronger." And that pretty much sums up the tale of Conan. His entire existence revolved around survival; it was kill or be killed. To survive, he was forced to become as smart, fast, and strong as possible. But you may be wondering, how does this epic start? Well in the beginning, Conan was a young child living in the mountains of Cimmeria.
The Cimmerians are a proud people who are skilled in the art of sword making, and they're pretty much oblivious to the outside world. However, one peaceful day (not long after Conan's father told him about the "Riddle of Steel"), the Cimmerians are besieged by Thulsa Doom and his motley crew of marauders (which consist of a lot of men on horseback, a few on foot, some attack dogs, and one redheaded Pictish scout). Conan watches as Doom's soldiers burn down the village and mercilessly kill those who dare to run or fight back. After the initial battle has ended, Conan's mother with a sword in hand, holds her son close by her side. Thulsa rides up and takes off his helmet. He uses his hypnotic gaze on her, causing her to lower her defenses. As she stands there in a daze, Doom beheads her with one clean swipe of... Conan's father's sword! (and remember that sword. It's a crucial element in this film.)
Conan and the other children are then taken far to the North to the "Wheel of Pain," a gigantic grinding wheel. Years pass and eventually Conan is the last person there, pushing the "Wheel of Pain" by himself. (And the transition from child to man in this scene was excellent by the way. There was some top notch editing done here!) Conan is purchased by some red-haired guy and is literally pushed into becoming a pit fighter. In his first battle, Conan is as confused as a young child and has no idea as to what's going on. Despite his childish innocence and lack of fighting ability, Conan uses his brute strength to kill his opponent. Soon Conan begins racking up victory after victory, bringing his red-haired owner great wealth.
After a while, they both travel to the East where Conan is taught to read and write, to use a sword effectively, and to breed with the finest females available (lucky bastard). So after all of this, Conan is set loose on the world by his master one dark night. Sure it seems like a nice gesture, but Conan's first morning of freedom consisted of running like hell from ravenous wild dogs (which is made worse by the fact that Conan is lugging along a chain). Luckily he finds safety on top of a cluster of boulders, where he literally stumbles upon a secret tomb. He spends the night in there and finds a sword as well (a gift from Crom perhaps?!). Once morning comes, our hero cuts the chain from his ankle and escapes the stony tomb (and makes food and fur coats from those pesky wild dogs offscreen).
Conan then begins his journey to find those responsible for making him an orphan. He comes across the hut of a witch who tells him where he can find Doom. But that information doesn't come cheap, so to pay for it, Conan puts his sword in her scabbard. As she moans she tells him to go to the city of Zamora, then continues to enjoy the sexual relations. While Conan's doing his thing, the woman suddenly grows fangs and claws and begins clawing at the sweaty Cimmerian! After a quick match of coed naked wrestling, Conan tosses the witch into the nearby fireplace. She turns into a fireball and zooms out the doorway (again, Crom's doing). Conan then continues on his way and comes across Subotai who was chained up and left to die as a punishment for theft. Conan frees him and they soon become good friends.
After a religious debate, (Subotai wins out by saying that his God, The Four Winds, is mightier than Crom. Why? Because Crom lives beneath the Four Winds. Conan realizes that Subotai is correct and the conversation ends.) Conan and Subotai head to Zamora and decide to raid the snake tower there. Once night falls and the Black Lotus they had used has worn off (black lotus apparently has the same properties of marijuana), they go the the tower. Outside, they meet Valeria who is also up for some thievery. The three of them join forces, scale the tower (how did they get that rope up there?!), and sneak inside. Apparently there's a ceremony going on inside where a cute little virgin will jump into a pit with a giant snake (you can fill in the rest). Valeria steals the robes from one of the priestesses and keeps an eye on things upstairs while Conan and Subotai go down below to rob the place. Things are going as planned and Conan and Subotai grab a king's ransom in jewels. Unfortunately, a few drops of sweat fall from Conan's face and onto the eye of the giant sleeping serpent (which I believe is where that one scene from Mission Impossible came from)!
Subotai leaves the "snakepit" first and turns around to see the snake moving. Conan turns around just in time to drive a blade through the serpent's head. Subotai then fires about six arrows into the slithery reptile and Conan gives it the coup de gras by hacking it's head off with his sword. They both begin climbing back to the top of the tower unnoticed by anyone, until the virgin sacrifice leaps into the pit and lies there screaming next to the wriggling corpse of the giant snake. The three thieves escape the tower and go celebrate with their newly acquired wealth. This is where Conan and Valeria hit it off. He gives her the biggest jewel he stole (the eye of the serpent to be exact) and she gives him a night of pleasure (Conan is the MAN!). After some sex, they get really drunk and end up getting arrested by King Osric's soldiers. The King has heard of their raid and ... he congratulates them?!
He then offers them tons of jewels and gold if they snatch his daughter back from the villainous clutches of Thulsa Doom. Afterwards, as Conan and Valeria are together, she tells him that she thinks they should just forget about going after Osric's daughter. It's too dangerous and they have so much to lose! But her pleas fall on deaf ears and when she awakens the next morning, Conan is gone. Conan, in the meantime, is traveling toward Thulsa Doom's Mountain of Power (hahahaha!) and befriends Akiro the Wizard along the way (we don't learn Akiro's name until Conan the Destroyer. For now, he's just a minor character in the Conan saga.). Conan eventually makes it to his intended destination and steals the robes from a priest (whom I believe was a bit of a homosexual. Just watch their conversation, there were plenty of homosexual undertones there! I kid you not!) Though Conan is on the Mountain of Power in disguise, he is discovered and captured by Thorgrim and Rexor.
The Cimmerian is then taken and beaten until Thulsa decides to speak with him. The sorcerer is a major megalomaniac and taunts the vengeful Conan (Thulsa pretty much shrugs off the fact that he wiped out an tribe for no apparent reason in his "younger" days). Then Doom decrees that Conan will be crucified on the Tree of Woe. (HAHAHAHA! I love the names in this movie!) Later we see that Conan has been crucified on the aforementioned Tree of Woe (hahahahaha... I'm sorry... hahahaha!) and is getting nibbled on by some vultures. One (puppet) vulture gets too close and CHOMP, Conan's got the damn bird in his mouth (and yes he killed it)! Hahahahaha! God I love this movie! After that incident, Conan looks to the horizon and sees a figure running towards him. The figure disappears over a sand dune and Conan starts laughing and passes out. So was it just an illusion or hallucination from the heat?
Nope! It's Subotai to the rescue! Conan is taken back to Akiro's hut on the beach where he is dressed in black and some sort of language is written on all his exposed body parts. This is part of some ceremony, in which the gods (well remember folks, all of these characters are pagans) will try and take Conan. If they succeed he's dead and buried, if not, he'll be his lively self the next day. Well time passes, and suddenly the sky turns red. This hails the coming of bald, red, demonic apparitions that begin tugging at Conan's body (good thing he's tethered to some stakes in the sand). Once again the effects aren't believable due to the animated nature of said demons, but the choreography of the scene is beautiful to behold. You'd almost believe those cartoonish demons are tugging on Valeria's hair as she struggles to save her lover.
The danger finally passes (but I must add that Valeria has to repay the gods) and the next day Conan awakens with only one thing on his mind... REVENGE! After he fully recovers, Conan plots with Subotai and Valeria to steal Osric's daughter back from Doom. They sneak in the back door of Doom's Mountain of Power (how could there be such a huge glitch in the fortification of this place? At least have a few guards at the cave entrance at all times!) and paint themselves up with a variety of zebra stripe designs (pretty damn cool looking if you ask me). They sneak inside and skillfully start total chaos within Thulsa Doom's orgy chamber! That's right, there's a spot in the middle of the chamber full of cannibalistic, half naked women (dare I say it's quite... ahm... tasteful) with some guards tossed into the sexual fray.
Not far away is Doom, who for no reason at all, turns into a large snake and slithers off (something tells me that he sensed the impending attack). This leaves the princess free for the taking and soon the bloodshed starts. The three thieves easily kill all the guards (why are so many of these guys fat? Couldn't Thulsa afford fit mercenaries who had some fighting ability?) and grab the princess. Moments later though, Conan goes toe to toe with Thorgrim and Rexor. Conan's job is made easy since Thorgrim is quite stupid. With his mighty hammer, Thorgrim knocks over a huge stone pillar (one piece of it falls and knocks out Rexor), then gets a priceless... DID I DO THAT? look on his face. So Thorgrim's idiocy allows our heroes to escape, but not in one piece. Thulsa Doom uses a live snake as an arrow (he is a sorcerer you know) and hits Valeria from a long distance (see what I mean about paying the gods now?)
The warriors stop for a bit to tend to Valeria's wound but their efforts are fruitless. With her last breaths she kisses Conan and declares her love for him (she did that before, but it's even more crucial to do that now. And if I may say so, she's quite lucky. Most people die before they can share their true feelings with the ones they love!). She dies and Conan, Subotai, and Osric's misguided daughter go to a graveyard/shrine (many great kings are buried there so it's kind of like holy ground) near Akiro's hut, where they build a funeral pyre. Although Akiro says the pyre will not light, it does (with a vengeance)! Clearly Valeria must've had kerosene in her veins and a couple of mortar shells in her stomach (which would explain why she's so tough). In any case the next day, the mourning warriors prepare for the coming of Doom.
They prepare a variety of weapons (many of which are borrowed from the skeletons residing in the area) and Conan goes the extra mile to build a booby trap. And if I may take a quick break here, I just want to talk about one scene during the battle preparations. It was an added scene that really stuck out like a sore thumb. Conan and Subotai are making spears and pointy sticks and Conan starts reminiscing about his lost childhood. Yes it adds a new dimension to his character and makes him even more sympathetic, but it's way out of place. This scene should've occurred possibly after Conan met Subotai, which would've further cemented their relationship. In any case, getting back to the action, Thulsa Doom and his men arrive at the graveyard/shrine/holy ground/tomb/Stonehenge thingie, riding hard with swords drawn and spears ready. In about seven minutes or so, they are all wiped out by Conan and Subotai (and even Akiro gets into the action and kills one of Doom's men).
Conan then squares off against both Thorgrim and Rexor again. Thorgrim being the mindless brute he is, smashes a helmet that is sticking up over a boulder and sets off Conan's booby trap. For his stupidity, he gets a wooden spike through the chest. This was a really great scene too, because Conan walks up and looks coldly into Thorgrim's face as he dies. But lookout Conan, Rexor's coming and he's armed with your father's sword! (GASP! The DRAMA!) Rexor comes on strong and knocks Conan down, and just as he's about to deliver some pain and death to our muscled hero, Valeria (decked out as a Valkyrie) suddenly appears! She blocks Rexor's attack and blinds him, giving Conan time to get back on his feet (and I'm still trying to decide which guy was more shocked by Valeria's visit).
Conan and Rexor begin fighting again, resulting in one dead bad guy and one broken sword! (By CROM!) Thulsa Doom realized that he has lost and decides to kill Osric's daughter. Doom pulls a snake out of his pants (ewww... not that sicko) and fires it at Princess Osric with his trusty bow. (This is yet another great scene. Up to this point, Osric's daughter was preaching her devotion to Doom. But once he fires that snake-arrow, she screams out "Father!" It's just as if she woke up from a horrible nightmare!) Luckily Subotai arrives in the nick of time, and blocks the snake-arrow with a shield. Thwarted completely, Thulsa rides off to his Mountain of Power to address his flock of sheep... err.. I mean followers. In the following scene, it's nighttime now and Thulsa is spouting out pseudo-religious mumbo jumbo. Conan sneaks in through the back way (AGAIN?! Don't these guys ever learn? Cripes!) with the aid of Princess Osric and confronts Thulsa Doom. Doom uses some hypnotic suggestion on Conan ("Conan I am your father!") which might have worked if Conan wasn't holding his late father's broken sword.
Conan quickly snaps out of his trance and gives Thulsa a chop to the neck. Then he beheads Doom in front of thousands of followers and... they all just walk away probably wondering what they will do with all their newfound free time (see?! I told you they were sheep!). Later, everyone is gone and Conan is sitting on the steps of the Mountain of Power, \ contemplating many things (like the meaning of life, the riddle of steel and... umm... what he's gonna eat for dinner tomorrow? Hell I don't know!). He eventually gets up and walks to the base of the mountain fortress and sets it aflame. With his family and people now avenged, Conan walks away toward the sunrise with Osric's daughter in his arms. Then we get an Epilogue with Conan sitting on a throne with a crown resting on his troubled brow (because as we all know, Conan became king by his own hand). So what happens next? That my friends is another story (of high adventure)!
Wow... what a spectacular movie! After all these years, it still hasn't lost any of it's greatness. What makes it so great? Well first off, the casting! Every damn actor and actress in this film did a great job with their role. Not a single person was miscast (typecasted sure, but not miscast). Then there's the music! By God, it's one of the best musical scores to a film ever, all thanks to Basil Poledouris (who incidentally did the score for Robocop, yet another favorite of mine)! And the music is all appropriate too, meaning that it never seems out of place. The fight choreography was spectacular (no rubber weapons for these guys!) and you can tell everyone practiced with their weapons a lot. Also the gore effects and the costumes were superb. The only thing that brings this movie down at all (very minuscule things really) are some of the special effects. But I won't get into that because this flick was made in 1982 before special effects overtook plot. In closing, Conan the Barbarian was the film that set the standards for all barbarian films (a.k.a. knock offs) that followed. But to this day, not a single director has gotten the recipe right for a good barbarian film. So if you haven't yet seen Conan, I suggest you go pick up a copy of it now and watch it. (Note: Conan is best viewed in it's Collector's Edition DVD format.)

Mongol Leader: "Conan! What is best in life?!"
Conan: "To crush your enemies, see them driven before you, and to hear the lamentation of the women!"
Mongol Leader: "That is good."

Valeria: "Do you want to live forever!"

King Osric: "There comes a time, thief, when the jewels cease to sparkle, the gold loses it's luster, and the throne room becomes a prison. And all that is left is a father's love for his child."

Thulsa Doom: "What is steel, compared to the hand that wields it?"

Thulsa Doom: "Infidel defilers. They shall all drown in lakes of blood. Now they will know why they are afraid of the dark. Now they will learn why they fear the night."

Akiro: "Why do you cry?"
Subotai: "He is Conan... Cimmerian... he won't cry. So I cry for him."

Conan: "Crom! I have never prayed to you before. I have no tongue for it. No one, not even you will remember if we were good men or bad. Why we fought or how we died. No... all that matters is that two stood against many. That's what's important. Valor pleases you Crom, so grant me one request... grant me revenge! And if you do not listen, then the HELL with you!"