The Red Sonja movie has long been considered the “third Conan film”. Directed by Richard Fleischer of Conan the Destroyer, with a character created by a writer of the Conan the Barbarian comic book series, and taking place in the same Hyborian era as Conan; it is easy to see why. There is one glaring omission, however… not even a mention of Conan in the entire movie. Arnold Schwarzenegger does play a rather Conanesque role, as Lord Kalidor, a warrior of noble blood. An interesting sidenote, Arnold has top billing in every Red Sonja movie advertisement or publication I have seen, including the one above, but is the love interest of the title character. Red Sonja also stars Brigitte Nielson( making her film debut as the title character), Ernie Reyes Jr.(the martial arts prodigy and star of such movie gems as Surf Ninjas, The Last Dragon, and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles 2), and Sandahl Bergman(Valeria from Conan the Barbarian and the director’s first choice to play Sonja) as the evil Queen Gedren.
Red Sonja starts off with a woman, laying in tattered clothing next to a burning cottage in a dirt field. A voice calls to her, “Sonja, Sooooonja”. The spirit of womanly vengeance wakes her up and brings her up to speed with the events that preceded her little dirt-nap with a flashback. Her vision goes as such, Queen Gedren was riding through town with her soldiers when a fiery red-head caught her eye. The queen tried to put the moves on Sonja, but Sonja don’t swing that way. How does she evade the queens advances? Why, Sonja grabs a mace from the queens saddle and proceeds to bitch-slap her with it! That’s gonna leave a mark! The queen does not take this lightly and commands her soldiers to murder Sonja’s family and burn her house down. Afterwards, all of the queen’s soldiers take turns ravaging poor Sonja. The spirit informs Sonja that she will need “great strength with an unequaled sword-arm”.Thus begins our tale of revenge in a world of sorcery and barbarism; thus begins the story of Red Sonja.
Cue some wide shots of Cona….I mean Lord Kalidor, riding horseback through the countryside. Some really, really wide shots. This trend of super-wide shots comes back again and again throughout Red Sonja. I totally agree that the backdrops and set-pieces are truly beautiful, and they are trying to show off as much of them as possible, but most of these shots are so wide you can’t even see the actors or what they are doing. There are very few of these shots that actually work. One well-made, widely shot scene in particular displays a beautiful one-on-one sword-fight in the forest. Sonja evades Kalidor’s advances, divulging her vow to only take a lover that can defeat her in battle, so Kalidor takes her up on her offer. The static camera gives the impression that you are there, leaning against a tree, taking in a swordfight that you came across while wandering through the forest one day. The set pieces and costumes are ridiculously over-the-top, which may or may not be a good thing depending on the audience. My philosophy is the more outrageous the better, so I loved the ornately dressed warriors and horses fighting and traveling throughout the movie. The effects were pretty cheesy overall, from the thunder clouds in the distance, to the decapitations and dismemberment during battle. There is an intelligently thought-up monster in one scene; it is actually a literal killing machine, so its unnatural, mechanical movements and features are forgiven.
The plot is as camp as possible. A group af priestesses are about to banish a talisman to darkness, when a masked queen attacks with her regimen of ninjas and soldiers. The priestesses draw their swords and fight furiously, but to no avail. The queen’s forces are too strong and she takes the talisman as her own. This talisman has the power to destroy worlds, only women may touch it, and it’s power grows in the light, which is why the priestesses were sending it to eternal darkness. A red haired priestess escapes but is injured by the time Lord Kalidor arrives. Kal finds the priestesses sister in a training camp, having just been given the honorary title of master of the master. She reaches her sister, who has barely eno
ugh time to explain that there are 13 days until the talisman destroys the world. Red Sonja refuses Arnie’s offer for help and heads off on her own to battle. On her way to the talisman she meets an annoying child-prince Tarn(Ernie Reyes jr.) with his humble man-servant Falkan, pays a toll with steel, and gets saved by Lord Kalidor a bunch of times. A rather large plot-hole sees the young prince and trusty manservant get ahead of Sonja, even though she got a head start AND took the shortcut through the tollway. They even had enough time to get attacked by ruffians who can tell by
the prince’s fancy clothing that he has something of value. She saves the prince and he joins her to avenge their fallen kingdom. Kalidor saves them one more time and joins the party just in time for the climax in the land of perpetual night. When they get to the palace, all hell breaks loose. The talisman is causing thunderstorms and earthquakes exposing a lava pit under the castle. Epic swordfights break out throughout the castle. Kalidor even gives out a free, 1 second arm amputation out of the kindness of his heart. The climactic chick-fight is average, at best. I won’t give away too much, but they could have made it a bit more impressive.
This is a sword website, so I’m going to give this movie a B based on general swordy-ness. I thought Kalidor’s sword was the more stylish of the two main character’s swords. Sonja’s was definitely unique, but a bit too much. I wanted to put a link to buy a Kalidor replica sword, but the character is so obscure I couldn’t even find one. I will keep looking, so check up periodically for an update on that. Now for stats!
DECAPITATIONS 2
COMPLIMENTARY ONE-SECOND ARM AMPUTATIONS 1
SCREAMING FALLS INTO FRESH LAVA PIT 1
PROS |
CONS |
Costumes |
Wide shots |
Swordfighting |
Plot holes |
Arnold |
No Conan |