I attempted to avoid his sword but in the end I fell.
I mentioned that Conan The Barbarian was sitting there on the to-be-removed list from Netflix. I was tempted but I did not watch; I had other priorities. After leaving Netflix, it appeared on the Amazon streaming service only to quickly wind up on their short list. Oddly enough, it then showed up back on Netflix along with Arnold’s sequel Conan The Destroyer. This time it was flipped; Conan The Destroyer was the one about to go and Conan The Barbarian is slated to stay for the foreseeable future. Meanwhile, back on Amazon, the 2011 remake of Conan The Barbarian (with Jason Momoa in the title role) made it onto the list – at least until the end of July. It is now, too, gone.
I thought I’d speculated in these pages before but I don’t see it. I wonder how much of this Conan revival has to do with Netflix selling their miniseries documentary Arnold. It got me to thinking that maybe I should just give in a watch the whole lot. Maybe I will, if the sequels and remakes come back to me. And just maybe I will watch Arnold, independent of the larger experience.
Even if I don’t get there, I’m glad the vagaries of the streaming business did prompt me to re-watch the original Conan. As I said, I think this was my third time through. While I remembered much of it, in bits in pieces, taking it in as a whole filled in quite a few blanks. There story is a little more coherent (if simple, in an 80s action film sort of way), than my memory allowed. One thing I’ll say that I don’t remember is all the sexy-time that Arnie enjoyed. I’m thinking maybe I was, back in the day, watching this one on network TV, rather than at the theater.
The movie had an outsized influence upon me at the time it came out. I was into Dungeons and Dragons, fantasy novels, and other such nerdy pursuits. This adaptation of Conan came out at just the right time to ease me into the old serial writing from the 1930s with a well-constructed visual to go with the books and cover art*. Plenty of elements from both the movie and its sequel made it into my fantasy worlds**.
One thing I had not remembered, or perhaps registered, at all was that the original Conan the Barbarian was written by John Milius and Oliver Stone. The first, the movie’s director, brought on Stone as a screen writer to help secure backing. It’s an interesting tale of greenlighting, funding, and lack thereof that I’ll not dwell on at this time. It might, someday, make a good story of politics, drugs, and unlikely success in a very different Hollywood than that of today.
The film was also my introduction to Schwarzenegger (as it was for most). As a result of my enjoyment of his portrayal, I followed his subsequent rise through Hollywood with more than a bit of sympathy. He was Conan! Projecting, this film is probably most of the reason I’d be interested in watching something like Arnold.
I’ll leave you with a question. Does the ending of this movie feel an awful lot Apocalypse Now? It did to me. Given the background and players in this production, such a link wouldn’t surprise me at all.
*Shouldn’t Frazetta’s art have been enough for me? Perhaps so.
**The D&D one – not the sexy-time one, ya pervert.
et tu, Bluto? 