Comic Book Movie has noted that the UK division of Amazon has uploaded a possible first look at the DVD design for Conan the Barbarian 2011:

The legendary Conan The Barbarian stars ‘Game of Thrones’s Jason Momoa and Avatar’s Stephen Lang. From the producers of The Expendables comes a visual spectacular that brings the fabled action hero Conan to life like never before!Based on the character created by Robert E. Howard, Conan was born on the battlefield.  From those bloodsoaked beginnings, Conan is destined to venture into an unforgiving world after his father is brutally murdered and his village destroyed.  As Conan battles his way through a treacherous world of monsters, sorceresses’ and bloodthirsty enemies, he chances upon Khalar Zym – the warlord responsible for his tribe’s destruction.  And so Conan’s quest for true revenge begins… Also starring Ron Perlman and Rose McGowan.

The massively oversaturated red and orange is reminiscent of the similarly garish cover for Solomon Kane’s UK release, lending weight to the DVD’s prospective legitimacy. Bizarrely, even though the release date for the film on DVD and Blu-Ray hasn’t been announced on Amazon, there are 13 reader reviews as of this writing, no doubt for the film itself: it would be nice if they’d waited until we found out the extra features and picture/sound quality. Some are quite fun – Davywavy2 seems to think Conan was taken into slavery, that Conan knew Khalar Zym’s name, and seemed oblivious to Robert E. Howard, but the review is quite entertainingly snarky – and others are just a few lines. Expect the number of reviews to rocket in time: I might add my own if I get it on DVD.

UPDATE: The US Amazon page has a release date – 22nd November. It also has 22 customer reviews, so have a gander at them if you please.

Sean Hood has a very frank discussion on his Quora page in regards to the underwhelming weekend takings for Conan:

You make light of it, of course. You joke and shrug. But the blow to your ego and reputation can’t be brushed off. Reviewers, even when they were positive, mocked Conan The Barbarian for its lack of story, lack of characterization, and lack of wit. This doesn’t speak well of the screenwriting – and any filmmaker who tells you s/he “doesn’t read reviews” just doesn’t want to admit how much they sting.

Unfortunately, the work I do as a script doctor is hard to defend if the movie flops. I know that those who have read my Conan shooting script agree that much of the work I did on story and character never made it to screen. I myself know that given the difficulties of rewriting a script in the middle of production, I made vast improvements on the draft that came before me. But its still much like doing great work on a losing campaign. All anyone in the general public knows, all anyone in the industry remembers, is the flop. A loss is a loss.

This ended up on Deadline Hollywood, and led to some interpreting his mention of “making vast improvementsas throwing Donnelly & Oppenheimer under the bus, so to speak. Still others felt he was trying to blame everyone but himself, much like I’d been of Avi Lerner and Joe Drake. However, Sean himself commented at the site, and wanted to assure readers that this was not his intention:

Actually my words “I made vast improvements on the draft that came before me” weren’t very classy because it does sound like I’m throwing the previous writers under the bus, and I need to publicly apologize to Thomas Dean Donnelly, Joshua Oppenheimer, and Andrew Lobel. All I can say is that I didn’t mean it that way and I should have chosen my words more carefully.

What I meant to say that I was proud of the work I did solving problems that that had emerged in the development process, over many years and dozens of drafts. To suggest that I did better work than the writers before me would be both un-classy and flat out incorrect.

Many people have read Thomas Dean Donnelly and Joshua Oppenheimer’s early drafts of Conan when it showed up on the internet, and a great, great number of them think theirs was the best draft of any, including the shooting script. Andrew Lobel’s draft was filled with great humor, which some critics thought the movie lacked.

I didn’t write this to point fingers. As the last writer on the project, the criticism of the story, dialogue, and characterization should fall primarily on me… not my peers, not producers, not studio executives, not the director.

The offending line has been taken from the Quora page, but I’m going to address it all the same.

Editorial

Given that I’ve been following this project for two years, and that I’ve read nearly every iteration of the script, I feel I’m fairly qualified to speak upon the evolution of the film’s story over the past two years.

From this point, I can say that, yes, Sean Hood did improve upon the earlier scripts by a substantial margin, and even though not nearly enough of the script made it to the screen, he did make a clear improvement over the previous drafts, from my point of view. I may have been incredibly harsh on the film, but compared to what could have been if Hood wasn’t brought on board to filter out the dross, it could’ve been worse. I’m talking Uwe Boll-level, and it truly isn’t quite at that echelon. For all my disdain for the film’s direction, editing, story and acting, I stand by my praise of the digital sets, the locations, and Jason Momoa. If this film was anything like the earlier drafts, I don’t think I would be able to do that.

I’m also going to take this opportunity to offer my sincere apologies to Thomas Dean Donnelly and Joshua Oppenheimer. I read their scripts and hated them back in 2009, and still do, but I blamed them personally for the decisions that were made. I accused them of having no understanding of Howard’s character, writing or depth, and felt that all the problems of the project came down to them. After all, it was in their draft that we saw the Cimmerians wiped out by their own dogs turning against them, Corin’s ghost haunting the tormented Conan, and Khalar Singh using the Ceti Eels to get information. Yet as I started to learn more about the production process, I started to understand just how many factors were involved in making this story, how many different cooks were tossing their seasons in the broth, budgetary and logistical concerns overriding creative and logical ones. In effect, I came to the conclusion that Donnelly & Oppenheimer were as hamstrung as Sean Hood was: they were given the locations, props and settings available courtesy of Nu Boyana, given tons of ideas from Nispel (and no doubt also Rattner when he was still in talks) and the producers, and told to write a story from there. Not exactly the best way to write a great story.

However, it’s one thing to just say a script is better or worse than the end result, and another to explain why it is so. Thus, I’m going to get started on a series of posts where I discuss the evolution of the Conan screenplay: from the early days where Khalar Zym was Khalar Singh, Marique was Farique, Ukafa had gold teeth and Alina was still in the story, to the saga of the wounded elephant and Stygian Siege Beetles, on to the shooting script with the villains’ internal scheming and Conan actually showing some vulnerability. Hopefully then you will understand why as bad as I found the film, it’s still, by far, the one I’m happiest to see in the end product – and that even if the scripts I relate do sound better to you, you’ll understand why I came to that conclusion.

EDIT: Some have mentioned concern that this may become be another 20,000 word monster like my critique of the film. Believe me, spending anything more than the bare minimum on the Conan film is the furthest thing from my mind at this point! This will be nothing more than bullet points arranged into a few synopses. I’d be surprised if the word count for each script went into four figures. All my energy of late has been going back into all the projects I neglected: the book, the other blog, and other things not directly related to the film. So don’t worry, I won’t be subjecting you to another dissertation!

I just had to comment on this breathtaking link, where producers Avi Lerner and Joe Drake state why they believed Conan failed at the box office:

The concensus among Avi Lerner and Joe Drake, who had successfully released The Expendables together, is that Conan The Barbarian didn’t have the “brand equity” they hoped it would. The pair had convinced themselves that the brand was ripe for a reboot and that the fans were ready for it, so they rescued the film from the major development purgatory it had been caught in for so long.

Oh, of course, this film proves Conan just doesn’t have the “brand equity” they want.  Conan may be successful in just about every other field of media it’s branched out to, but when the film fails, it isn’t because of – say – atrocious marketing, or a mediocre product, or executives who don’t know what in blazes they’re doing.  It’s “brand equity.”

Compare Conan to Rise of the Planet of the Apes.  There is no way Planet of the Apes‘ “brand equity” was stronger than Conan’s at this point in time: the last time it made so much as a blip on the popular radar was 2001, with a poorly-received Tim Burton reimagining.  It didn’t have a long-running popular comic series, nor multiple video games, nor a resurgence in publication of the source material in the lead up to the film.  Yet Rise of the Planet of the Apes did gangbusters, even though the Planet of the Apes franchise hasn’t been on the cultural landscape for a decade. Why?  It had a good story, strong characters and quality product created by some of the best people in the industry, and advertising highlighted those strong points.

In this ecomonic climate, people can’t afford to just go to multiple films at the cinema the way they could back in the ’80s. They couldn’t just go to see a film on the off-chance it might be a laugh: they have to know they’re going to get their money’s worth. People don’t care about loyalty to brands, they just want something that’ll promise them a good night at the cinema. Judging by the success of Rise of the Planet of the Apes and The Help, it’s evident that people are more willing to go to a film for the story and characters than they are for scene upon scene of mindless action. So who’s fault is it, if not Conan?  It can’t be because it’s R-rated, because 300 and Predators have done very well in the past five years.  It can’t be the August release, because Rise of the Planet of the Apes is doing well too.

No, Lerner & Drake, it’s clear to see that whatever caused Conan to sink at the box office, it can’t be the “brand equity” being substandard.  You just squandered the potential.  Dark Horse took the Conan brand and made it one of the most celebrated indy comic titles in the last decade.  Funcom took the Conan brand and made it one of the few MMORPGs that’s still standing tall against the juggernaut of World of Warcraft where others have succombed.  Mongoose Publishing took the Conan brand and made an RPG series that spawned dozens of supplements.  Del Rey and Gollancz took the Conan brand and made multiple volumes of 80-year-old stories that are still strong sellers. All in the second half of the last decade. Seems to me that Conan was, in fact, ripe for treatment on the big screen – but Lionsgate & Millennium dropped the ball.

That said, not all non-film Conan excursions have been as successful: the 2007 videogame was something of a disappointment. Why? Because it was a mindless, fun hack-and-slash with no higher aspirations than letting people go nuts as Conan – and more importantly, that’s how it sold itself. Dark Horse, Funcom and Del Rey took a different tact: they sold Conan as an icon from one of the founding fathers of the modern fantasy genre, highlighted the majesty and complexity of the Hyborian Age as a setting, and most importantly, made it look like a compelling world with strong characters and a story to tell. I’m no marketing expert, but when I see a correlation between products that take REH seriously and promote Conan as a worthwhile, exciting adventure story doing well, and products that barely mention REH and promote Conan as little more than hack-and-slash doing poorly… I start to think maybe you should do more of that first thing and less of that second thing. Promoting REH, selling Conan as an enthralling story with fascinating characters has obviously paid dividends. Promoting Conan as nothing more than mindless killing and sexist exploitation has not.

Those companies succeeded because they took the source material seriously and delivered quality products without insulting people’s intelligence.  Lionsgate & Millennium failed because they didn’t: they were obsessed with aiming for the Spike TV crowd with advertisements that give no inkling of story and just throw a constant barrage of images. I place the blame squarely on the shoulders of marketing and the product itself.  But Avi Lerner and Joe Drake are never going to admit that – it’s brand equity, it’s Jason Momoa, it’s the disloyal fans who dare to vote with their wallet.

In other words, it’s everyone’s fault but their own.

Nonetheless, perhaps we should let Lerner & Drake think that the reason it failed was because the brand didn’t have “equity.”  Maybe that’ll mean they drop Conan, and the license can get into the hands of someone who knows what to do with the property. Just keep telling yourselves that, guys – then if someone comes along and delivers the Conan movie everyone’s been waiting for, you can just blame it on the “timing,” or “market analysis,” or whatever. As ever, blame it on everything except yourselves.

Sorry I haven’t been keeping up to date on the blog, Cromrades: various factors have conspired, which shall be addressed after the jump.

First up, let’s look at the news I haven’t already reported on:

• Art Andrews has a massive collection of photographs of props and costumes from the film at his Flickr;
• David Pomerico talks to Suvudu.com about Conan the Barbarian: The Stories That Inspired The Movie;
• Michael A. Stackpole’s novelization of Conan the Barbarian is reviewed at CSI: Librarian;
• SummerGlauWiki (of all places) has scans from SyFyNow’s four page article on the film;
• Rose McGowan has interviews with Montreal Gazette and Comic Book Resources;
• Film School Rejects speaks with Marcus Nispel (and it explains a lot about how the film turned out, IMO);
• Jason Momoa has interviews with USAToday, Miami News Times, The Huffington Post, ;
• Collider has a neat interview with Ron Perlman and Leo Howard;
• Gotcha Movies has a report on the Alamo Drafthouse Premiere (you can see a couple of familiar Howardian faces in the front row);
• The Sofia Echo reports a 24th August gala premiere for Conan the Barbarian (and with the way box office has been going stateside, I bet the producers are praying for the highest grossing film in Bulgarian history)
• Hollywood Outbreak chats with Rachel Nichols in a podcast;
• Honolulu Pulse brought the disappointing news that Jason Momoa couldn’t make it home for Hawaii’s premiere;
• The Daily Billboard has some nice images of the Conan billboards;
• at least seven new images from the film are up at filmering.at; 
• Conan: The Mask of Acheron has sold out;
• Bakersfield Now has photographs of the US Premiere;

The final report on Conan the Barbarian’s takings this weekend are up at Box Office Mojo, and… well, I’ll let the report speak for itself:

Conan the Barbarian went the way of past August fantasy/ancient action movies and flopped hard. Joining the ranks of Kull the Conqueror and The Last Legion and grabbing less interest than even The 13th Warrior, Conan reaped an estimated $10 million on around 4,500 screens at 3,015 locations. It was a far cry from the 1982 Conan, which had over three times the attendance on its opening weekend, though it had a similar gross ($9.6 million).

The Conan remake’s marketing relied on the brand name and generic fantasy action instead of presenting a compelling story and strong characters. The movie’s director, Marcus Nispel, was also responsible for the similar dud Pathfinder. With roughly 2,100 locations, 3D was 61 percent of Conan‘s take. Distributor Lionsgate’s exit polling showed that 65 percent of Conan‘s was male and 69 percent was over 25 years old.

Until we know how the film did on the international market, though, we can’t put the “flop” stamp on it just yet. In terms of opening weekends, however, it does appear to be something of a disaster.

State of the Blog

Alright Cromrades, I feel it’s my duty to inform you about what’s happening with the blog now that the film’s out.

In short, it’ll still be running, but not at nearly the same level of regularity as it has been. There are a number of factors: the first being burnout. I and others have been working hard on the site, and I’d rather slow to an easy pace than crash into a wall at high-speed. Another is more insidious: my general opinion of the film itself. As I said in my review, I, uh, had problems with it. The fact that I had such problems with it led to a sort of crisis, as I felt I had spent so much time and energy on a film that I feel didn’t deserve the effort. I felt angry, insulted and ultimately depressed. Now that I’ve learned the film hasn’t exactly been doing gangbusters over the weekend, I feel a great draining of energy.

Nonetheless, I’m not beaten: I just need to pick my battles, as it were. Future posts on the CMB will either be short links posted on a regular basis, as seen above, or longer ones posted irregularly. I don’t want to use a schedule, as there can be no telling when news will come and at what saturation, but I hope the community which has emerged in the past few years will mean there’s always something for new visitors each day, be it in the comments or forums.

It might interest you all to know that we recently reached a significant milestone, passing 1,000,000 individual views yesterday. The film might not be doing great, but the blog’s chugging along for now. I couldn’t have done it without you all, and although the film wasn’t what I was hoping it to be, I couldn’t be more overwhelmed at the community that’s flocked around it. You are the vital spark which kept me galvanized, even through the disappointments, trials and tribulations. For that, I thank you all from the bottom of my heart.

Well, let’s not get all maudlin: coming up, I’m putting together a pool of the best reviews – not in terms of how well/poorly they rate the film, but in terms of insight, perspective and eloquence, that they might help us look at the film from a different perspective. Until then, keep on clicking: maybe we’ll get another 2 million before we’re done!

There is still quite a bit of confusion about the upcoming Conan the Barbarian film. Some think it’s a remake of the 1982 film; others think it’s a sequel or re-imagining of it; still others have wildly different expectations and myriad misunderstandings of the character, his creation, and the film itself.

Well, I figured it’s time to put everything of importance into a short as possible, easy-to-read, plain English document for those who don’t know Conan. Think of this as a primer for anyone not closely versed in Conan, the Hyborian Age, or Robert E. Howard, whose only experience of Conan may be a late night talk-show host or a plucky little detective anime.

But they can’t remake Conan the Barbarian! Arnold was Conan! Milius was a Genius! This is an outrage!

A great man once said “Everybody has opinions: I have them, you have them. And we are all told from the moment we open our eyes, that everyone is entitled to his or her opinion. Well, that’s horsepuckey, of course. We are not entitled to our opinions; we are entitled to our informed opinions. Without research, without background, without understanding, it’s nothing.”

With that in mind, let me be perfectly blunt: if your only experience of Conan is previous adaptations, then you are not entitled to an opinion on the 2011 film’s fidelity to the Conan character. You can judge it on its own cinematic merits, as a moviegoing experience, or whatever. But without research, without background, without understanding, your opinion is nothing. If something in the 2011 film is different from something in the 1982 film, that does not make it unfaithful to the Conan character. Full stop. End of. Fin.

I’m not saying you have to read all of Robert E. Howard’s stories before going to see the film (though that would be awesome), I’m just saying you really should know that Conan existed for 50 years before 1982. I have spent too much time trying to explain to people that Conan existed for 20 years before Arnold Schwarzenegger was even born to have much patience left, and in this age of the internet, there is no excuse for ignorance. And this particular sort of ignorance is annoying, because it is so easily remedied with a simple, 5-second Google or Wikipedia search.

With that out of the way, onward.

This is not a remake.

Conan the Barbarian was created in 1932 by Robert E. Howard, a visionary Texan author who wrote over 300 short stories and 800 poems, most of which were written over the span of a mere 10 years. Howard wrote 20 short stories and one novel featuring Conan, and along with J.R.R. Tolkien and others, was vital in the creation of the modern fantasy genre.

“Conan the Barbarian” as a phrase started long before the 1982 film, and was used for a number of Conan titles. Though Howard never used the phrase, it has been in popular use since the 1930s by Farnsworth Wright, editor of Weird Tales, where the Conan stories were first published. “Conan the Barbarian” was also the title of a collection of stories published by Gnome Press in 1954, and the title of the phenomenally popular Marvel comic series, which ran uninterrupted in 275 issues for 23 years, from 1970 to 1993. A more mature black-and-white title, “The Savage Sword of Conan the Barbarian,” followed in 1974: it too was a runaway success, running for 235 issues over 21 years. So, even though the 1982 film had the title “Conan the Barbarian,” it was far from the first, and far from the only use of that phrase as the title.

The upcoming film has very little to do with the 1982 film. Here are a list of similarities:

• A young Cimmerian named Conan is our protagonist
• His father is a blacksmith
• His village is attacked by a band of raiders
• His father is killed
• The raider’s leader takes his father’s sword
• Conan eventually resolves to avenge his father’s death and village’s slaughter
• Conan grows strong and muscular as an adult, and becomes a deadly thief and dangerous warrior

So far, that sounds pretty similar to the film… for the first 15 minutes. After that, there’s practically nothing in common: young Conan is not enslaved and taken north; he is not set to work on a wheel for 20 years; he is not sold and forced into pit fighting for his life; he does not train in the far east in the arts of war; absolutely none of the story following Conan’s early life ever occurs. Thulsa Doom, Subotai, Valeria, King Osric, the Princess, the Wizard, Rexor, Thorgrim – in fact, every character apart from Conan’s parents – are absent in the upcoming film, just as they were absent from the original stories. The Wheel of Pain, the Atlantean crypt, the Tower of the Serpent, the Mountain of Power, the Mounds of the Dead – all nowhere to be seen.

Considering none of the above happens in any of Robert E. Howard’s stories in the first place, it’s plausible that a new Conan story featuring his origins could have practically nothing in common with the 1982 film.What little that does come from the stories tends to be mere names: Cimmeria, Zamora, Ophir, Khitai, Aquilonia, Nemedia, Koth, Stygia, and Hyrkania are locations from Howard’s works, and some episodes are loosely inspired by similar events on the stories. It is most assuredly not a few Conan tales “stitched together,” as those scenes account for little more than 10 minutes of the entire film.

For more information on the differences between Howard’s work and the 1982 film, see the following links:

• Conan and the Issue of the Origin Story
• The Filmgoer’s Guide to Conan the Barbarian (1982)
• Conan the Barbarian (2011): Remake, Reboot, or Reimagining?

This is not an adaptation of a Robert E. Howard story.

Although the filmmakers stress their goal to create a film as faithful to Howard’s work as possible, the story is not based on any of Robert E. Howard’s tales, and is completely original to the film. The opening act set during Conan’s childhood, centred around a plot for revenge, is completely absent from any of Howard’s stories. Every character in the film apart from Conan – Khalar Zym, Tamara, Marique, Artus, Ela-Shan, Ukafa, Akhoun, Lucius – is an invention of the filmmakers. Similarly, none of the events in the film following Conan’s youth are related in any story by Howard, or any later author for that matter. As such, you won’t find a Robert E. Howard story that mentions the Mask of Acheron, the Monastery, Khor Khala, Skull Rock, the Hornet, or the vast majority of the characters, settings and events in this film.

As with the 1982 film, what little that does come from the stories tends to be mere names: Cimmeria, Acheron, Asgalun, Shahpur, Zingara, and Hyrkania are locations from Howard’s works, though Howard doesn’t set any stories in those places. Conan obviously had a father, but aside from the fact that he was a blacksmith, nothing is known of him or his fate; similarly, we know Conan was born on a battlefield during a skirmish between his tribe and a band of invading Vanir, but nothing else is known of Conan’s mother.

Although Jason Momoa and Leo Howard may act more like Conan and his younger self respectively than their 1982 predecessors, the events that happen to them in the film don’t give any more insight into the personal history of Howard’s Conan than the previous film save in the most general ways. Certainly none of the stories are “spoiled” in the film, so you can enjoy them without having plot twists revealed ahead of time. In short, none of the events you see in this film will spoil any of Howard’s stories, for none of the events in those stories are in the film.

A full “Filmgoer’s Guide to Conan the Barbarian (2011)” looking at the divergences and allusions to Howard’s work will be published in due course.

Conan is not Arnold Schwarzenegger.

Many of the elements people only familiar with the 1982 film associate with Conan are, in fact, not related to Conan at all. For instance, the idea of Conan being pseudo-Germanic or Austrian has nothing to do with the original character, and entirely due to the fact that Arnold Schwarzenegger had the thickest Austrian accent in cinematic history. While the visual image of Conan being preposterously muscular was popularised by the illustrations and comics, the actual descriptions of Conan do not necessarily mean someone with a Mr Olympia physique: just someone suitably large and muscular enough to be an intimidating, imposing warrior, but without being so bulky as to reduce his movement to a crawl.

While some criticize Jason Momoa for not resembling Conan as closely as Schwarzenegger, in fact, he has far more of the visual cues Howard described. Jason Momoa may not have the blue eyes of Howard’s Conan, but he certainly has the scars, dark hair, hairy chest, sinister countenance, and bronze skin – all missing in Arnold’s Conan.

Some may have the idea that Arnold Schwarzenegger is the only person who can play Conan, which is like saying no-one but Johnny Weissmuller can play Tarzan, or no-one but Basil Rathbone can play Sherlock Holmes, or no-one but Bela Lugosi can play Dracula. Conan, like those other iconic characters, is bigger than any one actor: he’s a legend with many different visual interpretations, and so there’s more than enough room for many actors. The difference is that no-one else has played Conan on the big screen in 27 years, until Jason Momoa came along, giving rise to a popular belief that only Arnold can play him. Yet how can anyone truly tell if Arnold is “the only one” who could play Conan, when there’s no one else to with whom to compare?

Conan is not a dimwitted, clumsy brute.

Far from the popular cultural stereotype of the brawn-over-brain, monosyllabic thug, Howard’s Conan is intelligent, perceptive, insightful and surprisingly complex. Howard’s Conan listened in to philosophical debates among Zamorian scholars, spent weeks among the wise men of the Pelishti, and learned much of Hyborian Age religion, philosophy, history and folklore in his travels; he approached and solved problems with his mind as often as with his muscles; his personality and attitudes are more complex than the brooding, vengeance-obsessed former slave.

It should be noted that the 1982 film’s Conan is not unintelligent either, having read philosophy and poetry, and learning battle strategy and tactics: he was a man of few words who let his actions speak for themselves. Unfortunately, the depiction of the character in Conan the Destroyer utterly, well, destroyed that aspect in the public eye for decades, as the man who managed to wipe out a force of over twenty armed horsemen with only his wits and two allies was reduced to an idiot who could not count to six. This was exacerbated in the cartoon and live-action series, where he was portrayed as a gentle giant of very little brain.

Conan was not stupid: in a savage world like the Hyborian Age, you could not afford to be stupid. If you had no wits, you’d be at best a slave, and at worst dead.

Conan is not “talking too much”

A barbarian is not the same as a caveman.

Schwarzenegger’s Conan didn’t talk much not because Conan was a near-mute, monosyllabic stoic, but because his accent was near-impenetrable in the early 1980s. Originally, it was Schwarzenegger who was going to narrate the film, not Mako’s Wizard: this was changed when concerns arose about the clarity of Schwarzenegger’s diction, which had already been addressed in Hercules in New York through dubbing.

While no chatterbox, Robert E. Howard’s Conan was a lot more verbose and eloquent. Here’s an example of one of his more lengthy monologues:

“Compensation! The price of infamy and treachery! I am a barbarian, so I shall sell my kingdom and its people for life and your filthy gold? Ha! How did you come to your crown, you and that black-faced pig beside you? Your fathers did the fighting and the suffering, and handed their crowns to you on golden platters. What you inherited without lifting a finger – except to poison a few brothers – I fought for.

“You sit on satin and guzzle wine the people sweat for, and talk of divine rights of sovereignty – bah! I climbed out of the abyss of naked barbarism to the throne and in that climb I spilt my blood as freely as I spilt that of others. If either of us has the right to rule men, by Crom, it is I! How have you proved yourselves my superiors?

“I found Aquilonia in the grip of a pig like you – one who traced his genealogy for a thousand years. The land was torn with the wars of the barons, and the people cried out under oppression and taxation. Today no Aquilonian noble dares maltreat the humblest of my subjects, and the taxes of the people are lighter than anywhere else in the world.

“What of you? Your brother, Amalrus, holds the eastern half of your kingdom, and defies you. And you, Strabonus, your soldiers are even now besieging castles of a dozen or more rebellious barons. The people of both your kingdoms are crushed into the earth by tyrannous taxes and levies. And you would loot mine – ha! Free my hands and I’ll varnish this floor with your brains!”

Try to imagine 1982 Arnie saying all that. Even so, Conan spoke around 390 words in Conan the Barbarian, so people may be viewing the film with hazy memories.

Conan is being pronounced correctly.

Robert E. Howard’s pronunciation of Conan, according to his girlfriend Novalyne Price, was confirmed through Howard scholar Rusty Burke:

I pronounce it KOn’n (imagining that the apostrophe represents the neutral vowel sound, and the O is long) — much the way Conan O’Brien pronounces his name, or that Brits pronounce Arthur Conan Doyle’s middle name. I interviewed Novalyne Ellis, Howard’s old girlfriend, and she was very insistent upon the point that this was how Bob had pronounced the name. She said Bob’s old buddy Clyde Smith had complained to her about people pronouncing the name “Ko-Nan.”

In other words, Conan is pronounced the way anyone else pronounces the name. The 1982 film’s pronunciation being different is an anomaly, and the pronunciation in the upcoming film is most certainly not “incorrect.” Here’s a pronunciation guide for Arthur Conan Doyle for those still having trouble.

Jason Momoa is not puny.

At the time of filming, Jason Momoa stood at 6’5″, and weight 235lbs. Arnold Schwarzenegger was reported to be 6’2,” and around the same weight during filming. Jason Momoa is thus taller, and of comparable weight to Arnold Schwarzenegger. Crucially, Jason Momoa is far more agile and quick than Arnold, and is far more proficient in fight choreography.

Jason Momoa is not black.

Jason Momoa is of mixed ethnicity: his father is Native Hawaiian, his mother Native American-Irish-German. That makes him around a third white. However, his actual ethnicity for the role of Conan is irrelevant, as long as he looks sufficiently close to the description of Howard’s Conan. According to Howard, the Cimmerians were the direct ancestors of the Irish and Scottish Gaels, and his descriptions match those of the “Black Irish” phenotype: so, Jason Momoa has to look sufficiently “Irish” or “Scottish.” When compared to actors like Sean Connery, Gabriel Byrne or Daniel Day Lewis, Momoa isn’t really that far off.

To avoid disappointment, do not expect any of the following:

• Basil Poledouris’ themes
• Thulsa Doom
• The Wheel of Pain
• Conan the Gladiator
• “To crush your enemies, see them driven before you, and hear the lamentations of their women.”
• The witch
• The Atlantean crypt & sword
• Subotai
• Conan punching a camel, horse, or any such mounted animal
• Valeria
• The wizard
• Conan praying to Crom
• Conan saying “Crom” at all
• Rose McGowan as Red Sonja
• Red Sonja appearing at all
• Giant snakes
• Just about anything you remember from the 1982 film beyond Conan cutting dudes up

Yes, the world really could do with a new Conan movie.

Some would say that Conan the Barbarian was fine on its own. Others think Milius & Schwarzenegger should finish off their trilogy with Conan becoming King, and leave it at that. Some might then think “does the world really need another Conan movie”? To which I would respond: yes, yes it does.

Think of the countless Dracula, James Bond, Sherlock Holmes, Hercules Poirot, the Three Musketeers, Zorro, and Tarzan films which have come out over the years: think how those characters are just so iconic that they seem ideal for franchises. Nobody seems to be sick of them: the most recent Sherlock Holmes film was a big hit at the box office. Same for Zorro and Bond. Conan is one of those icons. There is no creative reason why there can’t be scores of films based around the character: the Howard stories alone would provide material for a dozen adaptations, be they full adaptations, expansions of shorter tales, or cobbled-together anthologies. And then, the sheer breadth of the Hyborian Age means that any number of milieus are opened up, and can rove around as audiences’ tastes change.

Say pirates are big one decade. Well, do some adventures where Conan’s a Black Corsair, Red Brother, or Freebooter: cash in on the buccaneer fad while still being a Conan movie. Or say fantastical adventures in mysterious jungle locales are in vogue; just send Conan to the Golden Kingdoms of the Himelians, or the Black Kingdoms of Kush. Maybe cynical, gritty, sombre war stories come back in fashion: go back to Conan’s period as a red-handed mercenary, or border-runner along the Pictish Wilderness. It could be full of complex byzantine politics and conspiracies playing against each other, or simple tales of humanity against monsters, evil, nature or death. There are just so many places one could take Conan – the exotic east, the colonial west, the icebound north, the steamy south, the high seas, the treacherous mountains, the burning deserts – that there really is very little one can’t do with a Conan film. That just makes it even more astounding that there have only been two Conan films in almost 80 years of the character’s existence.

I hope this post has been of help, and that people will go into Conan the Barbarian hopefully more informed.

In somewhat surprising news, we’ve found someone else has thrown their sweet hat into the arena to come up with a sequel for the upcoming Conan – Jason Momoa himself. In an interview with CraveOnline.com, Jason revealed that he’s come up with his own script for the sequel:

Conan himself has big plans for the next Conan movie, and he’s writing the script to prove it.

We’ve got some great interviews with the cast and crew of Conan the Barbarian coming up for you in the next week or so, but we couldn’t wait to drop this little bit of news from Conan himself, Jason Momoa, who says he’s writing a script for the sequel, provided of course that audiences come out for the first one. Time will tell if Momoa’s story or script are actually utilized for Conan 2 - whatever it may be called – but until then he dropped some hints of what’s coming next if he has his way.

Believe me, I have a lot to say about this, which I’ll add later. For the interview, the show must click on.

CRAVE Online: Are you signed on to do another [Conan]?

Jason Momoa: I am, as long as people go out and watch [the first one], you know what I mean?

CRAVE Online: Yeah. Is there a story you’d like to do for the next movie?

Jason Momoa: I wrote it.

CRAVE Online: Did you really?

Jason Momoa: Yeah, so we’re waiting to see if they’ll accept it.

CRAVE Online: Is it original or did you adapt it from something?

Jason Momoa: It will mostly be… It’s character-adapted, because I really want to get into more of the mythical creatures, you know?

CRAVE Online: Oh yeah.

Jason Momoa: We wanted to go there [in the first one], but having Clash of the Titans, and coming out against that, we wanted to put the budget into some other things. We just couldn’t hit… We couldn’t get to that level with [...] the visual effects and stuff. [...] I don’t want to give anything away, but we already have our Conan, really it’s about the villain, what that villain is going to extract from Conan, and where as an actor I want to go with Conan. You know, no one’s going to know what I want to do better than me.

CRAVE Online: Touche!

Jason Momoa: Exactly. [...] We want to incorporate three different things, because obviously you don’t just want to do the [existing] story, because the fans already know it. You want to keep them on their toes. So, I think we have a good lock on it. Also, I feel it’s beautiful… How many actors get to go in there and go, “I’m part of the writing process?” and care that much about the character, because he is a fan himself? It’s great. You know some people go like, “It’s great, I’m going to be in my trailer.” I want to @#$%ing make a great Conan movie.

Check back occasionally for my editorial, if you dare…

EDIT: I’m back.

Editorial

I should point out that as far as I know, there are at least two (possibly three) possibilities for the Conan sequel, should it be made. The first is Blackman/McCain’s, which is an adaptation of a Robert E. Howard story. The second is this. There is a possibility for a third – rumour has it, is another adaptation by another author (Sean Hood? Michael J. Bassett? Matthew Sand?) – and given what I’ve seen of Sean Hood’s work, I’d love to see his attempt at a straight adaptation of a Howard story.

I’ve already explained why I think Howard’s stories are not just good choices for film adaptation, but practically ideal for it. I’ve already talked about why there seems to be this insane blind spot when it comes to adapting Howard’s work, despite them being incredibly cinematic and visual tales. I’ve already ranted about why even superheroes have central tenets to their origins that nobody messes with – that aren’t present in Conan film and television adaptations.

The last thing I want to see happen to Conan is for it become an actor’s giant vanity project. Those things rarely turn out well. While I don’t want to judge Jason’s abilities without any prior evidence, I have to question how much of a fan he is if he thinks making up your own fan fiction is better than adapting the stories that have been printed and reprinted over the past 80 years, and are finally getting their long-overdue appreciation for their literary merits by academic and scholarly sources. I mean, if someone gave me the opportunity to write a Conan screenplay, I sure wouldn’t write a new story, I’d want to share one of those fantastic stories that electrified Weird Tales readers 80 years ago in a new medium. Why would I want a new story when there’s so much that can be done with Howard’s?

We want to incorporate three different things, because obviously you don’t just want to do the [existing] story, because the fans already know it.

Obviously you don’t just want to do the existing story, because the fans already know it? I – this – what? In what universe does that make sense? Did the Game of Thrones writers decide to jettison Martin’s intricate plotting and byzantine character relationships because “the fans already know it”? Did Peter Jackson & company decide making a Lord of the Rings film charting the journey of the Fellowship across Middle-earth was “obviously” something you “don’t just want to do”? Did the Harry Potter filmmakers realise that “doing the existing story” of the books wasn’t what you’re supposed to do? Hell, did Marvel & Dark Horse just do their own thing instead of adapting the original stories and pastiches?

Jason, if you’re truly a fan of the character, then you’ll understand that while pastiches and new stories can be enjoyed, they’re transient. They don’t last. Each generation is supplanted and deleted by a new range. The further adventures of Conan as chronicled by de Camp, Carter and others have been left in the 20th Century, excepting the last trailing Tor books of the early 2000s. Marvel’s Conan the Barbarian and Savage Sword of Conan has been reprinted, sure, but as historical relics, not an ongoing series. The 1980s film series ended with Conan the Destroyer, and unless John Milius & Arnold Schwarzenegger manage to wrangle permission from CPI to do Crown of Iron, it’ll stay that way. I haven’t seen any possibility of resurrecting Conan the Adventurer or the live-action series. Why should we assume that this generation of Conan pastichery will last any longer than the previous one? Yet the one constant throughout all those tales which have come and gone is a character created in 1932, to which all roads inevitably lead, and of all the stories, it is Howard’s which continue to be adapted and re-adapted. Hence how the likes of “The Witch of the Mists” and “The Thing in the Crypt” have only been adapted in the Marvel series, but haven’t turned up in Dark Horse – those stories are from the Old Days, the Before-Time, the Past. Yet “The Tower of the Elephant” and other early Conan tales have been adapted. All roads lead to Howard.

Some might think “well, if the Howard stories have been adapted so many times, perhaps people would get sick of it eventually.” And yet, look at the number of film adaptations of the works of Stoker, Dickens, Fleming, Poe, Dumas, Christie, Wilde, Conan Doyle, Burroughs, Austen, and other authors. In the near future we’ll be seeing a 7th adaptation of The Great Gatsby, and a 21st adaptation of The Three Musketeers. If a story’s good enough, then it could justify multiple adaptations – and the best Conan stories are easily worth an adaptation every generation or so.

I’m still willing to give this upcoming film the benefit of the doubt. I haven’t been expecting anything remotely resembling Howard since 2009, but I was hoping it would at least be a fun little film on its own – with the understanding that this origin story was strictly to appeal to studios who wanted to know “where Conan came from.” Except this film won’t tell you where Conan came from, because aside from Conan being a Cimmerian born on the battlefield as the son of a blacksmith, everything is completely made up by the filmmakers. Forget straight adaptations for a minute: if this film doesn’t have anything that Howard said happened in Conan’s youth, then how could you possibly say you’re introducing a new audience to Howard’s Conan? If you miss out the little we DO know from Conan’s early life – Conan breaking a bull’s neck, hunting mountain-beasts, Venarium, the Aesir, the Hyperboreans and so on – and replace it with a bunch of things invented from whole cloth that can’t be found in any of the stories, then how could this work as any sort of introduction to Howard’s Conan?

People are going to go to this film thinking “Oh, so Conan’s village was wiped out not by Thulsa Doom searching for steel, but Khalar Zym searching for the Mask of Acheron; ah, so Valeria wasn’t Conan’s great love, it was Tamara; right, so the Riddle of Steel wasn’t about flesh & steel, but fire & ice – this must be what Robert E. Howard was talking about.” And they’re going to be mistaken. Again. And if the sequel is yet another story that isn’t an adaptation of the as-yet-untouched mine of Howard stories, then they will continue to be mistaken.

I’m getting mighty sick of this, and I’m sure you’re mighty sick of hearing it. I dearly hope either Jason can be convinced to go with an adaptation, or that at least Fredrik will be able to put his foot down, because I’m tired of all these pastiches. We’ve already had 64 episodes of a cartoon, 22 episodes of a live-action series, and three movies that decided not to bother with adapting Howard. It’s been 80 years. You’d think it would just be easier to adapt stories that have been collected in Penguin Classics by an author whose work is collected in the Library of America, and cited as an influence and inspiration by scores of authors, artists and filmmakers. I would’ve thought coming up with new characters, ideas, stories and monsters would be more difficult than taking characters, ideas, stories and monsters that have been printed, reprinted and adapted over 80 years.

But apparently it’s obvious you don’t just want to do the existing story, because the fans already know it.

You thought you were rid of that beardy Scotsman? Well, he was sighted at Glasgow Central Station, where he managed to persuade his assistant to take a quick snap with her camera phone. Now we can really tell the advertising’s in full swing.

Onwards for more news!

In 1982 film news, it appears that the masters for the Poledouris score for Conan the Barbarian, long believed lost, have in fact been rediscovered – and that Intrada are planning on releasing a new soundtrack set! As reported by Roger Feigelson:

Okay, I know rumors started on this. Not sure where it started (AICN perhaps?), but given the number of requests we get for clarity, I thought I would do one posting for my own sanity. Yes, we are restoring and releasing both CONAN THE BARBARIAN and CONAN THE DESTROYER. Yes, the rumors that the masters were missing were false. They were there…24-track and 4-track units in pristine condition and complete, sitting right where we expected them to be at Universal. We transferred everything…the sound is stunning. Simply stunning. Going back to the 24-track is going to reveal a detail and ferocity on both scores you just haven’t heard before. Basil often went for a muscular, powerhouse over the top performance to match unrivaled visuals and got it in a way no big orchestral score had quite achieved up to that point. Remember the feeling when you heard these scores for the first time? You’ll feel it again! Fans of these scores should be ready to have their socks knocked off.

In another post:

On BARBARIAN, I have no issues with the performance. It’s performed by the same orchestra that did BEN HUR and a huge number of Morricone scores, such as GOOD, THE BAD and THE UGLY. Basil was a perfectionist and listening to the number of takes he really gave the orchestra a workout to get the final performances he wanted. But he did get them.

On DESTROYER I know he was unhappy with the main title (although with multiple takes and new digital technology, we’ll see if we can do in editing what he couldn’t do on the podium). I’ve lived with the LP program for decades and the performance never bothered me. But here’s something to think about when considering performance. Between high school and college I spent the summer working in the classical music room at Tower Records. We had a huge collection of LPs to play in the room, and I played this particular recording of Holst’s THE PLANETS quite a bit. My co-workers kept giving me a hard time about it. “Why do you keep playing THIS performance? It’s played by a college orchestra and they keep making mistakes.” I responded, “Yes, but listen to their enthusiasm. They make be making mistakes, but there is such passion in their performance, how can you not get caught up in the emotion? Sure there are recordings by professional orchestras who have performed this so many times that they can give a flawless rendition…but they’re very clean and just can’t compete with the obvious joy this orchestra has.”

It also reminds me of when we were in London recording JASON AND THE ARGONAUTS. When the orchestra first ran through “Scherzo Macabre” it was a thundering, exciting event, if not with a few clunky moments. Then Bruce worked through the complex piece and got all the kinks worked out. When he was done he turned around from the podium and said, “You know, they played this perfectly through, but nothing will beat the raw power of their first read through, even though it has mistakes.” Guess which version we choose? And no one ever complained.

So don’t get too wrapped around the axle of performance. It’s not everything. Basil was an obvious perfectionist.

BARBARIAN will probably be an MAF release. The verdict is still out on DESTROYER. I wish I could give you a date but the UMG machine is wildly unpredictable.

And Douglass Fake comments:

I’m working on both scores at the same time but CONAN THE BARBARIAN will hit before DESTROYER. Big surprise. If there’s any one thing that stands out it’s just the sheer power and energy captured in these originals that just raises the few hairs I have left on the back of my neck!

I recall talking at length to Basil about the first score while we were mastering our very first release, which was RED DAWN. One of the things he stated was how disappointed he was that the film ended up being mixed just for mono presentations. He said one reel had been mixed in Dolby surround for testing and the producers decided not to incur the extra costs. Basil was really frustrated because he said he’d managed to capture such ferocious “over the top” performances on the multi-channel session masters and couldn’t understand why the film makers would reduce it all down into a mono film soundtrack.

The two-track mixes were used for the record versions (and the later Varese CDs) and everyone, including Basil, pointed out those actual original 24-track session masters were lost for ever. So it was a goosebump moment to find virtually everything alive and well in those Universal vaults.

Since these are the unedited masters being heard for the first time, we’re having a blast finding out all sorts of cool stuff: Basil’s very first take of the famous CONAN THE BARBARIAN main title (“Anvil Of Crom”) has those familiar French horns starting out not low as they always have done BUT way up an octave, screaming in the upper register! He obviously didn’t like the high melody line and asked them to drop it an octave. And there’s a complete bridge section recorded for the sequence after the “Funeral Pyre” scenes that has never been heard before, not even in the re-recording.

Some of the neatest things are finding out how much power Basil got out of his percussion by frequently having the tympani and bass drums try several different strokes and volume levels, making adjustments right there on the podium to get just the sound he wanted. Much of the energy comes from working right there and literally ad-libbing specific passages, then adding other percussion sounds and getting that unique Conan sound.

I honestly can’t think of many film scores where the raw power and intensity comes from players who just “go for it”. THE WIND AND THE LION, recorded in Germany, comes to mind. Anyway, as Roger pointed out, when we were doing JASON AND THE ARGONAUTS, Bruce Broughton and engineer Mike Ross pointed out just how raw energy and vitality would trump clinically accurate playing on epic scores like this. I know in my heart that’s what Basil was looking for during his Conan sessions. Captured on 24-tracks spread out over two inch wide tape, I can hear those players giving Basil just what he wanted. And we’re really excited about bringing it all to you.
–Doug

I must admit the multi-channel CD around our parts is pretty much a dead animal. I realize my view comes from just our narrow little corner of the movie music world but – at least for Intrada – the complaints about the audio quality of Varese’s THE GREAT TRAIN ROBBERY far outweighed any compliments it received. I don’t recall any major feedback on TIMELINE but during that era we sure got a lot of comments from customers saying they preferred to listen to music in a two-channel stereo format rather than anything multi-channeled. We recorded JASON AND THE ARGONAUTS in the Genex 5.1 format (as well as a live two-track format) with the plans to do a multi-channel release and found very limited interest at the time. The economics vs. the potentially dismal sales prospects made our decision process simple. I’m just not convinced there’s an audience willing to support the extreme finances of mixing, mastering and manufacturing a multi-channel disc for either of the two CONAN scores. I’m guessing people would prefer the efforts be made to produce the best possible stereo CD, then if the expenses warrant it, include alternate takes, perhaps a rehearsal of the main title or some of the battle music, maybe some mixes without the chorus and so forth instead. But keep in mind… I don’t know. I just work here.
–Doug

I still think the City of Prague’s re-recording really shows off the true potential of the Conan score, but it’s undeniably fantastic news all the same. This is one of those scores which justifies multiple collections.

In addition, JainkhulTamhair of the Robert E. Howard Forums gave us a sneak peek:

- the alternate version of “Atlantean Sword” from CTB becomes “Sanctuary of the Horn” in CTD
(officially unreleased, even by Intrada)
http://www.megaupload.com/?d=HESH66SR

-the underwater part in the so called “Thoth amon” castle is called
“underwater passage + hall of crystals”
http://www.megaupload.com/?d=DBR8YQP5

-here’s an unreleased alternate version of “recovery” in CTD , left untitled.
It sounds as if it were an alternate outro to the Wizard’s death scene (mirror shards)
http://www.megaupload.com/?d=OABD4FPW

Back to 2011 movie news, a video interview with Jason Momoa. I can’t embed the video, but I can post the transcript (and you can watch the video on the site):

Finally a video interview I can embed, an extended interview with IGN’s Rythmic Roze:

Our first is an interview with Jason Momoa, both in video and text form. I’ll provide the video below, and the text in the rest of the article after the click.

SAN DIEGO – I really tried to get Jason Momoa to talk about his new role as the iconic fantasy hero “Conan the Barbarian.” I really did. However, after the euphoric reaction Momoa and his former cast members of “Game of Thrones” had received the day before our interview at the series Comic-Con 2011 panel, it was clear his breakout role as Khal Drogo was still on his mind.

Continued!

Momoa is no stranger to television or acting. The 32-year-old actor has a long television career of roles on “Baywatch,” “North Shore” and “Stargate: Atlantis.” But, it’s his work on “GoT” and now “Conan” which are opening major new doors.

During our sitdown in a nondescript room (which could have doubled for an interrogation room in “Inception”) Momoa was keen to discuss Marcus Nispel’s cinematic reboot of the Robert E. Howard warrior, but just couldn’t let go of his passion for playing Drogo. And while that former tribal leader is presumed perished, he also thinks there is no reason Drogo can’t come back at some point in “GoT.” Perhaps re-incarnated as a dragon? Are you listening George R. Martin? Momoa appears ready to put on that motion-capture suit at anytime to return to the Seven Kingdoms of Westeros.

As to comparisons between Drogo and Conan, Momoa says Drogo is “a silverback. Conan is a lion.” No, I’m not sure who wins that fight either, but it sounds like it would be a lot of fun to watch.

Being the leading man in a feature film is also a bit more intense than being part of a huge series ensemble.

“Conan was a lot harder,” Momoa says. “It was every day. Non-stop. Having to go to the gym. And to do the whole ab thing? It was like being a robot.”

Moreover, it was the confidence he earned on “GoT” that really lead Momoa to a possible new feature career that should kick off with the Cimmerian Warrior.

Momoa notes, “I took ‘Conan’ because I had done ‘Game of Thrones.’ I had ‘Game of Thrones’ in my pocket. It was the greatest thing I’d ever done. I knew it was going to be amazing and that’s why I did ‘Conan.’ ‘Conan’ is easy compared to doing ‘Game of Thrones.’ I’m a physical guy. ‘Conan’ is not a very challenging role for me. Drogo was extremely challenging. To have to go learn a language like that. To go toe-to-toe with 50 English actors? Amazing directors? Everything. ‘Conan’ is not Shakespeare.”

He adds, “Having that I knew would help ‘Conan.’”

Jason’s a bit all over the place there: one minute he’s saying Conan’s harder, the next that Drogo was harder, though this makes more sense in the video, where he explains Conan is harder than Drogo in some ways (much more physical, carrying the lead role) while Drogo is harder in others (being one of the few Americans in the cast, having to do a lot of talking in a fictional language). I’m not a fan of saying “Conan is not Shakespeare” while implicating Game of Thrones is, but obviously from context it’s shorthand for saying “Game of Thrones is lots of talking and Machievallian politics, Conan is action and fighting,” which at least describes the differences between the series and films quite well.

Next is an interview with Rose McGowan at Fandango.com, where she discusses the usual things, though mentions that there’s an extra part in the film which, apparently, pushed the boundaries of good taste a little too far. Removing any subtletey to Marique’s Elektra complex in the film is something I’m really not happy about, so to hear that there was apparently going to be some really heavy incestuous overtones… Yikes. As for that whole dismissal of the hardcore fans thing – yeah, fidelity to the source material counts for nothing, that must be why the adaptations of The Lord of the Rings and A Game of Thrones were so popular, amirite? Anyway, enough griping:

Not movie news, but I feel it’s worth pointing out that popular website Cracked.com has an article which includes discussion of the Cthulhu Mythos links in the Conan stories. In an article about “Movie & TV universes that overlap in mind-blowing ways…” but since they justify its inclusion with the 1980s films and the cartoon, I figure they could get away with it.

As ever, humour is the name of the game with Cracked, but I would be a pretty bad Cromrade if I didn’t point out some quibbles:

• The character from Cimmeria in “The Shadow Out of Time,” Crom-Ya, is not named after Conan’s nemesis – Conan didn’t really have a nemesis in the Howard stories – but after his god, Crom. This isn’t really pedantry, as even people who only vaguely know Conan are aware of Crom in some manner.
• The Serpent Men of Valusia never appeared in the Conan stories. However, they did appear in the Kull stories, which are ancient history by Conan’s time. Incidentally, another Mythos writer, Clark Ashton Smith, makes reference to Howard’s Serpent Men in “The Seven Geases,” showing it wasn’t just Lovecraft who borrowed from REH.
• Actually, Howard’s non-Conan horror “Dig Me No Grave” makes it fairly implicit that Set is not another name for Yig, but for a being Howard called “The One Black Master.” In that tale, it’s said that all the evil gods and demiurges of mythology – Malik Tous, Ahriman, Apolleon, Sathanus, and “The Old Serpent,” a synonym of Set in the Conan stories – are all different guises of “the One Black Master.” Howard then makes the connection of Set to Satan clear in “The Valley of the Worm,” where Set was demonized in later Egyptian mythology, and equated with Satan and Leviathan by the Semites. Interestingly, some scholars believe that if any of Lovecraft’s Great Old Ones are a guise, it would by Nyarlathotep. It’s only later authors who decided that Yig was Set, which is a somewhat problematic correlation.
• Howard’s Serpent Men, surprisingly enough, didn’t worship Set, but another deity called the Great Serpent. Later authors decided to conflate the two deities into one, though frankly, it’s equally likely this was just another guise of the One Black Master anyway.
• The monster in the new Conan trailer is pretty clearly not a snake, but a giant squid of some sort. In addition, the Dark Horse comics and Age of Conan haven’t really been shirking from the mythos links, with plenty of Cthulhoid nasties to be found.

Still, isn’t it awesome to see Howard mentioned on Cracked?

There’s another interesting little interview with Jason Momoa by the parentally-minded folk of CelebrityBabies.People.com, where they ask Jason about his children and Conan:

Jason Momoa‘s son Nakoa-Wolf is only 2½, but the toddler is already taking after his action star dad.

“My son loves swords and shields and dragons,” the Conan the Barbarian star told reporters at a press event for the film at San Diego Comic-Con. “So he loves the Conan stuff … he just grabs sticks and [makes swords].”

Nakoa-Wolf is Momoa’s second child with actress Lisa Bonet. Their daughter, Lola Iolani, turned 4 last month.

“They love the action figures,” Momoa, who is also on HBO’s Game of Thrones, says of his kids.

Unfortunately for the duo, the plastic dolls may be as close as they get to experiencing Dad’s version of Conan for quite some time.

While Momoa allowed his children to view the trailer for his upcoming film – “not the [restricted] one,” he clarifies – the actor is adamant his offspring keep away from the full product.

“They’ll never see it till they’re 19,” he says. “They don’t need to see those parts of Daddy!”

The Momoa kids will have to settle for their memories of helping their dad get into character.

“My image of him was this lion or this panther,” Momoa says of playing Conan. “He was just this big cat, so I’d go to the zoo with my kids and I’d just watch and study lions.”

– Jessica Wedemeyer

I have to admit, he has a point. Not everyone needs to see their father naked. Especially in a sex scene. Especially especially not in 3D.

… Wait a minute, run that by me again:

“They love the action figures,” Momoa, who is also on HBO’s Game of Thrones, says of his kids.

Unfortunately for the duo, the plastic dolls may be as close as they get to experiencing Dad’s version of Conan for quite some time.

Action figures? Back in June, it was stated that there weren’t going to be any for the upcoming film. What’s going on here, then? Has Jason commissioned customs for the film, or is there something we don’t know? Hmm…

Finally, a whole bunch of images from Comic-Con are up on Facebook, where visitors had the opportunity to get their picture taken in the midst of a battle. I’ve taken some of the ones I quite liked, either because they’re in costume (I’m not supremely well-versed in wider comic/gaming culture, but I’m pretty sure I saw Lara Croft, Axe-Cop and someone from an Austen or Bronte novel in there), or because they’re delightful:

This gives me so many ideas for crossovers. Lara Croft discovering Hyborian Age ruins and bringing the spirit of Conan forward a la “Kings in the Night” is an obvious one, but frankly, I have a morbid curiosity in seeing Conan transported to turn-of-the-19th-Century Hertefordshire. Pride & Prejudice, Sense & Sensibility, Northanger Abby… Bride & Barbarism? Sense & Sorcery? Northerner Axeblade?

You give ‘em hell, Granny and little dude!

Now, the final part of the puzzle. In the past number of days, some leaked scripts for the upcoming Conan film have appeared on the internet. While suspecting them to be mislabelled copies of the Donnelly/Oppenheimer scripts, or even just some old unproduced ones, I figured I may as well have a look. After checking with a few sources, it turned out they were indeed genuine. I now had, in my figurative hands, the shooting script for Conan the Barbarian. And, as I’ll discuss after the break, the final script for Conan the Barbarian was by far the best iteration of the screenplay.

However, something else happened at the same time: I received reviews of the films by anonymous sources which corresponded with plot elements in the scripts – but with several differences. So, it seems that alterations, additions and subtractions were made to the film after this script was printed, and it is my understanding that there are some documents with reshoot instructions (thus far not on the ‘net). The more worrisome aspect is that one review was decidedly critical of the new film, and that many of their complaints in regards to story, characterisation and plot development were actually addressed in the shooting script. By the same token, the more positive review seemed to coincide with the better aspects of the script. So, just how much of the shooting script ended up on the film?

Well, we won’t truly know until the film sees a general release. So until then, I’ll offer my thoughts on the script – and I truly hope the film is closer to it than to previous versions.

The outline of  the script is not much different from the synopsis that’s been floating around the internet. Nonetheless, I’ll give my impression of a brief outline. SPOILERS abound, of course:

Amidst a raging battle Cimmeria, a child is born, cut out of his mother’s womb by his father, CORIN. With her last breath, she names him CONAN. The young boy quickly proves himself an innate if impulsive warrior, killing three Picts in a savage ambush.

KHALAR ZYM, a powerful warlord, arrives with his band of mercenaries, demanding not gold or steel, but a fragment of the Mask of Acheron. The Cimmerians refuse and a massive battle ensues, Khalar Zym winning the day through the use of overwhelming numbers. Corin, knowing the battle is lost, hides Conan, at the cost of his own life. Conan, wracked by the guilt of a survivor, vows his revenge on Khalar and his warriors. When we meet Conan again, many years later, he’s grown into a powerful and experienced warrior, currently sailing with his pirate friend ARTUS on his ship, the Hornet. Our first meeting with adult Conan takes place as he attacks a group of slavers, freeing the slaves in the process.

Fatefully, Conan recognizes one of the few of Khalar’s former warriors still left alive, LUCIUS. He allies with a thief, ELA-SHAN, in order to get close enough to Lucius to interrogate him. Before killing him, Conan discovers Khalar’s location in the distant Khor Khala. In a hidden monastery in the desert, Khalar finds TAMARA, the last of an ancient royal line, the one person he’s been searching for the past twenty years. Tamara, unknowing of her own identity, is told to flee by her mentor, FASSIR, even as Khalar’s forces enslave or massacre the oasis’ people. Tamara escapes, and a furious Khalar sends his men scouring the countryside for her. But her path crosses Conan’s first, and instead of setting her free he decides to use her as bait to draw Khalar out. But the plan fails and Conan and Tamara must work together to escape.

Conan joins up with Artus and aim to take her far from Khalar’s clutches. Conan learns of Khalar’s plan: to revive the ancient and evil empire of Acheron by sacrificing the only living heir to its throne, Tamara, who will be possessed by the soul of his dead wife, Maliva. Khalar sends Ukafa and Cherin to attack the Hornet, but the pirates are victorious, with Conan slaying Ukafa, and Tamara killing Cherin in the fight.

Conan tries parting ways with Tamara, intent on his own revenge, but she follows him.After they make love, Tamara sneaks away – only to be captured by Marique. Conan calls in a favour with Ela-Shan, and they make for Khor Khala. Once inside the fortress, Conan kills the massive AKHOUN, and escaped the terrible DWELLER. As Khalar prepares to sacrifice Tamara and resurrect his wife, Conan attacks – but Khalar has already unlocked the power of the Mask.

Conan finds Khalar to be a tough opponent. As Tamara is about to fall into a precipice, she grabs a chain, which Conan also snatches – as Khalar approaches him. Conan is at a crossroads: does he choose revenge, or does he drop his free hand to pull up Tamara? As he hesitates, Tamara’s eyes tum black and she starts to assume the form of Maliva. However, Conan remembers his warrior’s training, and kills Khalar without losing grip of Tamara. Khalar tumbles into the abyss, and Conan raises Tamara up: the two escape as the ruins collapse around them.

Outside the cave, Conan and Tamara watch the sunrise, alive, and ride into the distance. Conan’s final words are taken straight from Howard, and are a fantastic note to end on.

Obviously, it isn’t perfect, there are certainly parts that bothered me, but crucially, most of them were present in early versions of the script, so there were likely unseen forces at work, and any alterations by Lobel or Hood hands were likely tied into them. Speaking of which, I think it’s relevant to discuss the immediate predecessor to this script: the Lobel draft.

February 2010 Script

I’m sorry to say that the Lobel draft, in my opinion, is nothing short of a mess. Countless segues, vignettes and set pieces come and go, character motivations are all over the map, and things just tend to happen, rather than progress naturally. Some absolutely insane, non-Howardian things come up. For instance, remember the elephants that pull Khalar Zym’s warship? In the Lobel draft, they are – and I quote – “Stygian Siege Beetles,” enormous tick-like monsters which feed off the blood and sweat of slaves. They don’t play a role beyond the siege of the monastery: after they’ve served their purpose, they’re never spoken of again. Just gigantic bugs that wandered off the set of Starship Troopers 4: Heinlein’s Revenge.

Tons of things like that appear and disappear. Donal, a childhood bully of Conan’s who is just a shade less stupid than the guys who taunted Elisha, appears for a fair portion of Conan’s childhood and… disappears.  We don’t even see him die at the village. The last we see of him is trading blows with a raider: no closure. Even important supporting characters like Ela-Shan just drop off the face of the earth.

That’s not to say there weren’t parts I actually liked in the Lobel draft, though most of those were more a sense of amusement than actual appreciation.  I’m mostly speaking about the elephant subplot: there is a part of the script where Conan comes across an elephant in the desert. It has an arrow in its leg. Androcles Conan takes pity on this poor creature, and plucks the arrow from its leg. The elephant is grateful, and he uses it as a mount to cross the desert with Tamara, and later uses it as a means of interrogation: somehow, Conan has successfully communicated to the elephant to press down a some bad guy’s head with just enough pressure to freak him out, but not so much that it pops open like a grape. Sadly, after the elephant fulfills his role, he just disappears from the script, leading us to wonder what marvellous adventures that curious pachyderm embarked upon. It was a very strange, silly sequence more reminiscent of George of the Jungle or – heavens above – Conan the Adventurer than Howard, but damn, I just found it so endearing it actually kind of warmed me to the script.

Probably the best part is the opening scene with Conan’s mother – renamed Fialla in this and the subsequent script, matching Dark Horse’s name for Conan’s mother – giving birth on the battlefield: the groan-worthy dialogue of the first drafts was cut down, and she comes across as a completely badass warrior for the minute or so we see her. Just a shame Khalar Zym (then Singh) is shoehorned into the background for – again – no bloody reason. No explanation for why Khalar Zym is riding with a band of Vanir, no references to the episode later in the script, nothing. Just “Oh hey, look, Khalar Zym! Foreshadowing!”

Indeed, I found a lot of the isolated things by themselves in the Lobel draft were pretty good, but as a whole, it was a mess.  Lots of cool little ideas – few of them were particularly Howardian, but they would’ve made for a fun action adventure – and I really did enjoy the elephant thing, much as I felt it to be un-Conan. Some of the jokes and lines were genuinely quite funny to me.  The best analogy I can think of for it is this: scripts are like three-course meals, with an appetizer, main course, and desert.  The Lobel draft threw everything together in a big bowl, so you had bits of roast in the ice cream and gravy over the salad.

I don’t really think Lobel himself is entirely to blame over this: it seems much more likely to me that he was simply trying to please too many people. Remember, there are no less than eleven(!) executive producers on this project, and Donnelly & Oppenheimer’s original scripts, and a director who’s notorious for his idiosyncrasies, and the ideas put forward by cast and crew, and budgetary concerns, and who knows how many other cooks working on a single pot of broth. I get the distinct impression that Lobel was endeavouring to simply do a good job and include everyone’s ideas, only to end up with a bloated melange of half-baked concepts, good ideas, weird tangents and cancelled plot lines.

Maybe I just have a soft spot for friendly elephants, who knows.  However, the only parts of the entire draft I felt were better than the final was page 3, where Corin’s explaining to the Cimmerians about driving back the Vanir on the day of Conan’s birth, which was replaced with the “thirst for blood/cold edge of steel” thing; I also preferred the idea that the Cimmerian boys weren’t fleeing, so much as they were going back to alert the village.  It seems like a small difference, but I consider it a profound one, especially with so little dialogue.

06/18/2010 – Final Draft

So you’d think nobody could do anything with the script. This is where Sean Hood stepped in. The script is far more cohesive, you have a sense of what’s going on and where everyone is/where they’re going, and there’s a far more convincing character dynamic going on between all the major players. I’ll break it down a bit.

Conan

The most pressing matter is the titular Cimmerian.  Well, he doesn’t act massively out of character except for the whole revenge plot, and the angst over his lost village is commendably subtle. There’s one part in particular which I particularly appreciated: Tamara and Conan are lying together. Tamara is stroking Conan’s scars, drawing her fingers along them, like she was following a map of his life. When she comes to his face, there’s a scar which was inflicted on the day his father was killed. Conan grunts slightly, and gently takes Tamara’s hand away. It’s far more subtle than the excruciating “but until my people are avenged, I cannot be content” angsting of earlier scripts, and it allows for a window into Conan’s psyche in a way that’s compatible with the generally quite impersonal Cimmerian. Conan doesn’t share much of his early life with anyone beyond a few details, so this worked wonders to show that he is affected and human, without beating you over the head with it. Conan even undergoes a subtle character arc in a degree comparable to “The People of the Black Circle”: it’s no pedestrian Bildungsroman, it’s a barely tangible shifting of priorities and newfound understanding.

I should mention a part of the trailer that’s caused a bit of controversy: Conan saying “no man should live in chains.” Now, this line was in earlier iterations, but NOT in the final one, leading me to think that some elements from earlier scripts have been restored. That’s obviously not something I’m happy about, but as long as those restorations are few and far between, I can tolerate it. That part really irked me, as it felt completely artificial: in early scripts, Conan’s primary motivation for attacking the slavers is specifically to free the slaves. In Hood’s draft, this has been altered: now, Conan is attacking the slavers to get at their loot and wine. Conan freeing the slaves only afterwards is thus entirely in keeping with Conan’s character: he didn’t go out of his way to be a good guy, but because it required little effort on his part with no negative consequences, he decided these people deserved a better lot in life. I much prefer this version, naturally, and I hope the film hasn’t just gone back to the Lobel draft. There’s also lovely little tease in this scene before Conan’s introduction which features a counterpart to the Wheel of Pain, but with a twist that would delight Howard fans fearing the worst.

The climax of the script follows Conan: The Mask of Acheron almost exactly: Conan has to choose between saving Tamara, or finally taking revenge. Much as I hate Conan hesitating (in “The Servants of Bit-Yakin,” he didn’t hesitate for even a second between saving an annoying dancing girl who was driving him nuts, and a priceless treasure which would have him set for life), given what’s happened to *this* Conan, I can understand it more readily, and it ties into an earlier event in the film, where Corin’s warrior training comes handy.

About the only other thing which really strikes me as decidedly un-Conan is the confrontation with Lucius – and this element has been part of the script since the beginning, so obviously there’s someone in the project who’s seriously high on this idea of Conan betraying his word on a technicality. It depends how it plays out in cinema, but I’m pretty sure I’m going to have to be prepared to grit my teeth at this part.

Khalar & Marique

I applaud Hood on the characterisation of Khalar and Marique.  I was truly dreading reading about them, but I was pleasantly surprised by how subtle and unusual their relationship is. Although there are the merest hints of an Electra complex in Marique, it wasn’t overt.  The relationship is one of co-dependency and mutual distrust, and tied into the narrative: it matters in the grand scheme of things.  I wish there was more time to develop it further, since I felt one could have really fleshed out Marique’s background beyond being Khalar’s primary henchman.  It reminded me of some of Babylon 5′s exploration of mundane vices and turmoil in a fantastical context.  I would’ve liked to see the other villains fleshed out more, too, but I suspect time constraints/whatever may have thwarted that.  Best of all, while Khalar & Marique’s motivations are sympathetic and believable (rather than doing it For The Evulz), the script didn’t fall into the trap of making them too sympathetic.  They’re still twisted, sadistic and brutal villains, so I don’t see much chance of people mistakenly latching onto them than Conan. I do recall that the scene where Marique holds the mask over the ocean was in the novelization, and it was really good in the script.  The in-fighting and power struggle among villains is one of my favourite things about Howard’s Conan stories, so it was good to see it with an extra twist.

Having read Conan: The Mask of Acheron, I have to say that parts of it are almost verbatim from the shooting script. Entire paragraphs of dialogue are replicated. What bothers me is Sean Hood isn’t credited anywhere, even though so much of the comic script is right out of the draft. He deserved at least “based on the script by Donnelly/Oppenheimer/Hood” in the credits splash. Now, I’m not sure just how much of that ended up in the final film, but I really hope the important stuff gets in there – in particular, Khalar’s motivation for seeking the mask to revive his wife, which adds a sorely needed human dimension. Howard’s villains often had delineated motivations, but they were often subtle and easily missed: Khalar’s is more obvious, so cinemagoers wouldn’t miss them.

There’s a particular part of the script which puts a scene in the trailer in an entirely new light. Remember Khalar smashing Fassir’s head in on the steps of the Monastery, the scene where Fassir seems to say “You have sought to enslave all of Hyboria?” Well, according to the script, the actual words are different: “Your “innocent” wife sought to enslave all of Hyboria with her sorcery, and so she deserved to burn. You will never rule, and Maliva will never rise again.” The line is also spoken just after Khalar told Fassir & the audience about the death of his wife, blaming the supposedly life-valuing Hyborians. When Fassir taunts Khalar, he is enraged, and kills Fassir in a fit of anger. So while murder’s never the answer, you can see Khalar was somewhat provoked.

Similarly, we got to see a glimpse into Marique’s past. Being raised in the shadow of her mother’s memory, ostracised as a witch’s daughter, and idolizing her father results in a very different sort of villain than what we’re used to. The pathos of Marique sometimes seeps through when we least expect it: there’s a particular moment where Marique finally gains her father’s love, and a smile fills her face. Hopefully Rose McGowan’s up to the task of presenting this side of Marique, and that Nispel allows for that side to be seen.

Tamara

Tamara was also a lot better than in previous drafts: I particularly appreciate how resourceful, crafty and intelligent she is, outsmarting and outmanoeuvring Conan in a way that makes her look smart without making Conan look stupid.  Her dialogue’s also a lot better (some of the things in the Lobel draft had me wincing).  The relationship she has with Conan is also paced well: I got the impression this was something of a fire-forged relationship, but it didn’t go too fast.  There were definite stages of distrust, betrayal, reassessment of each other, cautious alliance, all the way to determined friendship: they only enter a romantic relationship comparatively close to the end.  Considering it takes place over the course of the film, it has a flow and dynamic that fits the extraordinary circumstances the two find themselves in.  Very Howard-esque: I can definitely see the influence of “Red Nails.”  I was very concerned about Tamara’s characterisation: make her too “meek” and you might risk making her typical pulp cheesecake, while making her too strong might undermine the impact of Belit or Valeria in a future adaptation.  Tamara seems very much cut from the Yasmina/Zenobia cloth, with the determination of the former and resourcefulness of the latter, though she’s a bit more capable with a sword.

As a fun aside, I was delighted to find that this script might barely pass the Bechdel Test:

MARIQUE: My mother wore this gown on her wedding day. It flatters you.
TAMARA: I am NOT your mother.
MARIQUE: No – but you will be. Imagine your body is a vessel and your soul is the water that fills it. When your blood seeds the mask, my father will empty you. And my mother’s soul will rise to fill up your toes, your legs, up into your breasts, neck and lips… until my mother turns your pretty blue eyes pitch black.
TAMARA: I would rather die.

The brief mention of Khalar and the fact that it starts with a mention of a wedding might make it disputable, but hey, at least it passes 2 of the 3 criteria – more than the 1982 film did.

Corin & the Cimmerians

Corin’s much more believable as a Cimmerian patriarch, too: less of the pointless riddles, and more exposition (even if it’s for that damned Mask of Acheron subplot) & rough kindness make him more a character than a cardboard cut-out. The Cimmerians are better as well: taking out the Cimmerians being horrified by Conan’s savagery and replacing it with a sort of shocked awe does a lot to show why the Cimmerians are feared, while also showing how they can be impressed by a small child’s ability.  As an aside, I just wish there were some Cimmerian girls among the boys looking to graduate to warrior status, to really push Cimmerian egalitarianism: according to one of my sources, Sean actually pushed for exactly that same thing. A man after my own heart, if it’s true!

Others

Artus presents an interesting character, as being neither civilized nor truly a barbarian offers something of a middle ground between Conan and Tamara – and, by extension, Conan and the audience. There’s one part where Artus explicates quite effectively Conan’s disdain for civilization to Tamara: “Barbarians may be warriors, but they do not sacrifice their children or enslave their allies like the priests and princes of the “civilized” world.” It’s a nice little distillation of the barbarism/civilization conflict so central to the Conan stories, and I hope it made the cut. Ukafa doesn’t have much to do, but even with the few lines he has, there’s a definite undercurrent of dissent with Marique & Zym (“To what cursed land have you led us now?”), adding another subtle level of intrigue within Khalar’s ranks. Aside from that, most of the other characters are little changed from previous iterations.

Compare & Contrast

Having read the scripts, I think I understand more clearly what my source was disappointed in: I can practically take a marker and cross out the things that he didn’t mention, because I’m sure that my source would have commented on them, good or ill.  In particular, I was shocked to learn that not only are Cherin, Akhun and Ukafa not named in the film – they have no lines at all.  Apparently, the only conversation between Khalar and Marique is when they’re on the Man of War, and it amounts to a few sentences, culminating in a very abrupt and unsubtle hint at an incestuous relationship (not present in the script: either he misremembered, or it’s a reshoot).  Conan and Tamara apparently barely talk to each other – very different from the conversations I read in the script.  Overall, his biggest complaint seemed to be that nothing was explained: practically no names of countries or locations, only a flash of a map at the beginning, barely any context for what the heroes or villains are doing, why they’re going somewhere, what they’re doing.  Also, apparently it’s rewritten so that Conan is basically an unstoppable killing machine: he doesn’t have problems against Khalar, he kills just about every enemy (including Cherin, whom he steals from Tamara by stabbing her with a harpoon), and there’s no sense of drama or urgency with him.  The Man of War doesn’t get used in the sea battle, resulting in Khalar’s army hauling this massive thing all over land for absolutely no reason. I know Fredrik Malmberg did say there was “enough footage for an extended edition” at the presentation at Cross Plains, leading me to wonder how much of that extra footage is in fact vital characterization and exposition.

It’s important, of course, to remember that films are a subjective medium, and what one person finds confusing, stupid, poor-quality or whatnot may not match the tastes of another. I certainly can’t compare and contrast the final film with the script, since I haven’t seen that. However, I can compare and contrast one scene in the film with its respective scene in the script. Thus far, all we have to go on at this point is “When Blood is Spilled,” the 3-minute scene depicting lil’ Conan busting some Pictish heads. Unfortunately, I feel that the account of the fight with the Picts is a lot more believable, compelling and interesting in the script than what I saw in the clip.

Now, in the script, Conan is attacked by not four, but three Picts. The other Cimmerian boys retreat not out of fear, but to alert the rest of the tribe (they are unarmed after all). Conan is taken down by the bola, but manages to untie himself without the Picts seeing, letting them to believe he was immobilized, lulling them into a false sense of security. When one bends down, ready to scalp the boy, he catches them by surprise, killing two in seconds and crippling the third. In fact, he kills one by breaking his neck, showing that he’s obviously far stronger than the average child, as well as evoking the much missed “break the neck of a wild Cimmerian bull” anecdote. The crippled Pict manages to escape, but he turns up later – leading Khalar to the Cimmerian village. Conan brings back two heads, and the Cimmerians are not appalled, but awestruck. Again, big difference.

To jog our memories, here’s the clip:

I can believe Conan catching three Picts by surprise and killing them in seconds, and displaying his strength in breaking one’s neck makes it clear to the audience that he’s not your average 12-year-old.  However, the way it played out on film made the *four* Picts look like bumbling idiots: they circle Conan, attacking one at a time (as is the law of Conservation of Ninjitsu), and the fight is more drawn out, exacerbating the issue.  I especially dislike the part where little Conan leaps on one’s back and swats at him ineffectually with his hands, making him look even more like a child, and making the Picts even more pathetic.  I sure don’t recall Conan doing roundhouse kicks either. More infuriating is the number of times he cries out and opens his mouth: how in blazes did his egg not fall out, or get cracked open in the scuffle?  Most infuriating of all is the fact that he beats 4 Picts, but only brings back 3 Pictish heads, with no explanation of what happened to the crippled Pict – and particularly confusing, since the end of the clip gives the impression that he kills the fourth one.  And, again, I notice the Cimmerians are shocked (the women covering their mouths in fright had me spluttering blasphemously), which is from the Lobel draft and before.

Still, even those three minutes were better than anything* in Kull the Conqueror, Red Sonja and Conan the Destroyer.  Combined.  And throw the live-action show in there for good measure. Though we never had to worry about Nispel skimping on the brutality and violence, the bloodshed here is commendably gruesome and painful, and the scene is shot and framed nicely too. While I might have quibbles about Cimmerian topknots, chickens and water wheels, the Cimmerians and their village look impressively authentic. I still think Corin looks more like a king of the Æsir or Vanir than a Cimmerian, but he’s a great bear-like mix of patriarchal and savage. I also think Nispel took the idea of Picts howling like wolves a little too literally, and I’m a dissenter when it comes to Gregory Manchess-style Picts, but they look sufficiently distinct from the Cimmerians. Best of all, the world is rich and textured: while being in Cimmeria means the colours won’t be particularly vibrant, there’s still enough visual interest to keep your eyes on screen. What’s more, this feels serious. There’s none of the self-conscious camp of Conan the Destroyer, and the tongue-in-cheek tone of Kull the Conqueror is utterly nonexistent. While I’m sure some viewers will take the violence and bleak world in an ironic manner, it seems clear that, whatever my grievances with the scene, Nispel shot it with a sense of conviction, sobriety and intensity that is preciously rare in the genre. This isn’t evocative of the post-modern semi-comedies like Xena or Hercules, nor is it a throwback to the 1980s Sword-and-Sorcery clones: if anything, it evokes the grim, stark horror of Apocalypto. That’s a victory in itself.

Conclusion

Now, some might think that I’m being inordinately easy on Mr Hood due to his open and extensive communication with the fanbase, be it at his blog, Quora, or even the Robert E. Howard Forums themselves. However, I would like to contrast this with the case of Dirk Blackman. Like Sean, Dirk actually reached out to the Robert E. Howard fanbase, and even offered a theoretical adaptation of “The Frost-Giant’s Daughter” to form a prologue as an example. The reaction was, shall we say, lively, but a few Howard fans took immense issue with Dirk’s choices and alterations , and this became a most heated discussion which delved into the mythological and symbolic significance of this 9-page story. Look also to the case of Charles Edward Pogue, who also talked with the fans about his version of Kull the Conqueror. It’s undeniable that the film Pogue wrote was infinitely superior to the schlocky excursion in mediocrity we ended up with… but that doesn’t mean it didn’t have problems of its own, which go all the way back to his treatment of Conan the Conqueror.

In my experience, Hood has a much better grasp of Howard than Blackman and Pogue did, even though this script isn’t an adaptation, where Blackman & Pogues’ were direct adaptations of Howard stories. Sure, I don’t agree with everything, but I find myself agreeing more often than disagreeing. He hit all the right notes, got the big things, and delivered a Conan script that’s pretty darned solid. The references to Howard stories are fairly subtle, and direct quotes are well-chosen, in that they don’t poison the well for future adaptations too much. Finally, the big themes of barbarism/civilization, Lovecraftian horror, and strength of will in an uncaring cosmos are present, albeit simplified and streamlined for a general audience.

There are still things I, and I suspect a lot of Howard fans, are going to hate like nobody’s business. The revenge plot – Conan’s father being murdered by Khalar Zym, and his village being destroyed – is almost universally condemned by the Howard fans on various forums and in personal correspondence. The much-talked about torture scene, where Conan betrays his word in a most contemptuously civilized display of duplicity, is also thoroughly panned. The idea that Khalar Zym could effectively rampage across the Hyborian lands unchallenged is viewed dimly. The use of Acheron in a story preceding its first mention in  The Hour of the Dragon is not well received, and the inconsistencies with Howard’s history are intensely disliked. Unfortunately, these elements have been in the script since the beginning, and it seems they have backers within the production which ensured they remained.

But compared to what we could’ve had… Sure, in an ideal world, we would have a Howard adaptation, directed by someone with a love of the source material as well as artistic vision and competence. If we had to have an origin story, it would be one that’s compatible with the clues Howard left. But I’ll say this much: this film is in the best shape it’s been since the project started. Remember those horrible rumours about the Cimmerians – as in, the entire race – being wiped out by werewolves, Ukafa the Gangsta tribesman, and Corin’s ghost literally haunting Conan throughout the film? Remember when it looked terrifyingly possible that Brett Rattner was going to direct? Remember the bile rising in the back of your throat when you learned that Kellan Lutz was in the running for the role of Conan?

Perhaps I have something of a skewed perspective on the whole thing, knowing just how horrendous it could’ve been, and yet lamenting the unseen possibilities. But going by the latest script, and comparing it to earlier ones, I can’t help but feel that it could’ve been so much worse. The work Sean Hood’s done on the script is nothing short of miraculous, transforming the story from a meandering, mixed-up muddle into something that makes sense, with villains with a little more dimension than “we’re evil because the script says so,” and heroes with more complexity than the average rags-to-riches peplum. That’s something, surely?

EDIT: A couple of questions have been raised in the comments section, so I’ve decided to address them.

•  Venarium is mentioned in the script during the transition between young and adult Conan, where it’s said that Conan “stormed the high walls of Venarium.” We don’t see it, unfortunately.
•  ”The Tower of the Elephant” is alluded to by Artus, regaling a gaggle of slave girls with the legend of Conan: “When I first met him, he was no bigger than you. Just a scrawny little rat picking pockets in Zamora. But even so, it was he who stole The Elephant’s Heart and slew the sorcerer Yara.” One slave girl squeals with delight “that was you!?” Obviously Artus was embellishing Conan’s size and frame for the purposes of the story – either that, or they’re subtly laying the seeds for Leo Howard in a “Tower of the Elephant” adaptation down the line!
• No mention of Amra.
• No “Frost-Giant’s Daughter” quote.
• There is a line where Tamara says that the mask, not Khalar, “raises the souls of the unspeakably evil,” leading me to think it’s another cut/paste job to turn it into “Khalar raises the souls of the unspeakably evil.”
• The “I do not want your kingdom,” “No? Then what?” “I want your head!” exchange is slightly different: “I don’t want your gold,” “What, then, do you want?” “Your head.”
• UPDATE: The opening scene is indeed the Nemedian Chronicles, but depressingly, it’s more or less the same as in the 1982 film – “Between the years when the oceans drank Atlantis, and the rise of the sons of Aryas, there was an age undreamed of…” It’s followed up with this segue to Conan’s birth: “It was an age of war. And of all Hyboria, none knew war like the Cimmerians…”

*Oh, and yes, Mr Foom, the soundtrack of Destroyer, Sonja and – yes, even parts of Kull – were better than the generally bland and unintrusive score in “When Blood Is Spilled.” But then, that was always going to be a given, since Bates – all power to him – is no Poledouris, Morricone, or Goldsmith. Even Joel Goldsmith.

(Note: this post has been a source of much turmoil and torment to me. At one point I wasn’t going to do it at all. However, my intense desire to let my Cromrades know – you can thank Dave the Rage for that fantastic portmanteau- overrode my sense of self-preservation. Perhaps my recent discussion about “knowing too much” will be made a bit clearer today, though there is still more than meets the eye.)

A while ago, I received a review for Conan the Barbarian. I was never sure exactly what I would do in this situation, but I figure coming clean about it is all I can say. I felt that it would be irresponsible of me to release a review of the film that was, well, this vicious, without a counterpoint. Whatever my personal opinion on the film, I feel it necessary to provide context. The last thing I want is to herald bad news when unwarranted – or overly-optimistic news, for that matter. So, I decided against releasing the review, at least until something came along to make me reassess that situation.

Happily, something did: a user on the Internet Movie Database offered their thoughts on the film, and they were positive! Now, they didn’t say this was the second coming of Eisenstein or Kurosawa, but they said it hit all the notes that really matter to the average movie-goer. Howard fans would undoubtedly be disappointed (no kidding), Conan fans might have issues, but the vast majority of cinema patrons would probably enjoy it.

What’s important is that I ran this by some of my sources, and they match up. In addition, the details in both reviews appear to correspond – characterisation, set pieces, whatnot – with each other, with few differences. This may be a result of regional differences (the two reviews may come from different countries, and thus possibly slightly different cuts), or misremembering elements, or any number of things. Thus, with two reviews offering different points of view, I felt comfortable in releasing them.

I should remind that the following post will have spoilers: nothing too drastic, no major plot elements are spoiled, and those parts that might spoil have been rendered in text roughly matching the page background. Highlight those areas to reveal their secrets, as it were. I think the site software has some form of spoiler tag, but I can’t figure it out.

You may click when ready.

Since I prefer to start with the bad news and let the good news make up for it, I’ll go with the negative review first.

The Bad Review

This first review was sent to me by a source who wishes to remain anonymous. This is from someone who’s read and enjoyed the Howard stories, is a big fan of Sword-and-Sorcery cinema, and is open to the idea of Conan films not directly adapting one of the original tales. This reviewer absolutely savages the film from a storytelling, film-making and adaptation standpoint. The direction, editing, acting, effects, set design, music – nothing comes out alive. My impression of this review is that the film fails not only as a Howardian adaptation, or a decent Conan pastiche… but as a piece of narrative fiction in itself. This is quite a profound disaster, at least from this particular reviewer’s perspective.

I have seen the new “Conan the Barbarian”. And it is an awful mess of a movie.

There is no explanation for anything that happens. Things just come with no rhyme or reason. There is no sense of pacing or emotional depth. The videoclip style made it impossible to get a handle on what’s going on. The inconsistencies range from contradicting Howard, to contradicting their own damn tale. Plot holes threaten to engulf the entire film – characters just disappear, Chekhov’s guns are left on the mantelpiece, dialogue is disjointed with no logical flow.

I blame Marcus Nispel for the whole debacle. I am pretty sure he destroyed this movie with bad ideas, no direction for the actors, and a poor choice of shots. I blame the producers too, of course, because they don’t put enough money, time or effort into this flick.

I am not a great fan of Arnold or John Millius, but I must admit that the 1982 movie was really good. It doesn’t have much dialogue, but some of the lines are truly poetic, and the characters say more with the eyes than many others with a thousand of words.

I am not a Howard purist either. I have read the original stories once and I enjoyed them, that’s all. I would prefer a straight adaptation, but I have no problem if they invent a good new story.

I love sword & sorcery movies. It is my favorite genre. Before the screening I had no prejudices towards anyone involved, and I really wanted to enjoy the experience. But this film is worse than “Conan the Destroyer”, worse than “Kull the Conqueror” and even worse than “Red Sonja”. Worse, far worse than “The Scorpion King”.

The fight scenes are embarrassing. Tedious and confusing. This is not an insignificant flaw in an action movie! Everything happens too fast, with too many close ups. And the editing is a real disaster. There are a lot of continuity errors, crossing the sight lines, and no sense of place.

Rachel Nichols’ character, Tamara, never caught my interest. She is pretty, but with no outstanding characteristics. She gets in some action scenes, but it is simply ridiculous. Nichols looks fragile all the time, and she is supposed to be a nun, so there is no explanation about her fighting skills.

Stephen Lang is a cheesy over-the top-villain without much charisma. Rose Mcgowan is not sexy or menacing enough. Most of the other bad guys have no presence, no background, no lines of dialogue, no character arc… they even have no names!

I think Jason Momoa is a good actor. I have enjoyed him in Game of Thrones and Stargate. He was a good choice. But, unfortunately, you never see him as Conan the Cimmerian…

First, because he doesn’t look like Conan. His hair is not black enough, he has no square cut mane, he is not big enough and, most important of all, he has no volcanic blue eyes.

Second, because he doesn’t speak like Conan. Forget the long philosophical monologues or the subtle irony. This character talks like a self-confident bully. He doesn’t even say “Crom” in the entire movie!

Third, because he doesn’t act like Conan. The original character is a free man that enjoys the fruits of adventure and has learned to fight for survival. The protagonist of this movie is a cruel sociopath that enjoys torturing people, and doesn’t hesitate in killing women.

The film’s modest budget means the special effects are unpolished. In a summer blockbuster this is plainly unacceptable. The giant squid looks terrible, and the great Hyborian cities are like a bad matte painting from the fifties. The swords looks like plastic, the clothes are like halloween costumes, and the built sets are too little.

The story has a lot of absurd moments too. For example, there is a giant battleship that Khalar’s army moves along the Hyborian world… and in the sea battle, the bad guys use little boats. How stupid is that? In another scene, Conan’s swashbuckling friends save a village from slavers. Not only do the pirates have no reason to act in such a heroic way, but even the methods they use are highly questionable. They throw giant rocks, so the village they are trying to save is destroyed in the process. Then, they have a bloody hand-to-hand combat with the enemy. It is unbelievable that no slaves get harmed!

Again, I don’t want to blame the screenwriters for all that stuff. It seems that a lot of dialogue and key scenes have been cut in order to make the movie shorter and more action packed. We know how Hollywood works, and how bad directors can ruin a good script.

The final battle is truly disappointing. The averange viewer can accept a silly adventure movie if, at least, it has a good climax. This one does not. If you expect some giant monsters, incredible nightmarish sets, emotional depth, or the resolution of intriguing conflicts… forget it. There is no excitement, no drama, no spectacle, no real danger. Only bland characters fighting each other (without much conviction) in an ugly cave.

Finally, the soundtrack is mediocre at best. I cant recall a single theme from it. Coming from Basil Poledouris’ magnum opus, this is a clear problem.

Movies like Transformers 2 are bad because have no plot, but they are made by professionals that know how to tie two scenes together. This nasty experiment has been made with very little money by untalented people. It really needs a full recut with 30 minutes more, better pacing and coherent action scenes in order to start to be a movie.

I cant understand how these people decided to kill the franchise from its very inception. If this is the motion picture that Paradox put off the ground with so much effort… it would be better to have no Conan movie at all.

I discussed certain elements of the film with this anonymous source, and unfortunately, there was extremely little good to be said. Now the favourable review, which was released as a series of posts on the Internet Movie Database, which I’ve compiled into a review of sorts.

The Good Review

This review comes from an anonymous user who, again, managed to see the film. This one, however, had a very different response. They had little knowledge of Robert E. Howard and the 1982 film beyond a very vague grasp, and they went in with incredibly low expectations… and they were pleasantly surprised. Jason Momoa managed to carry the film, the story was simple and straightforward, plenty of action, they were never bored, there was an emphasis on practical effects over CGI. My impression of the review is that, from this individual’s perspective, Conan the Barbarian is an entertaining, fun, unchallenging popcorn movie – which is, frankly, all I could’ve hoped for with this project ever since it was confirmed to be an origin story, given the reality of Hollywood.

On Conan:

Can’t give out any details as to how I’ve seen it, but regarding the film I can say this: I was very sceptical at first, but the movie managed to really win me over – mostly because of Jason Momoa, who’s incredibly charismatic. In this one, Conan isn’t as serious a character as he was in the original film – he makes a lot of wisecracks and has a very cool kind of attitude. The film itself is definitely no Oscar winner, but it has a ton of action and it’s actually quite a lot of fun. I can’t tell you what a die hard Conan fan would think of the film though.

If Howard’s Conan fans expect Momoa to play a dead-serious, cold and ruthless type character, then they’ll probably be disappointed, Conan in this one is the more wisecracking, comedian type guy, though – of course – he’s hella badass.

I’d love to see Momoa play Conan again.

Both ‘young Conan’ and Momoa had dark brown eyes.

He’s definitely very cocky and arrogant, and hardly serious about situations he gets into. For example he treats Tamara like a piece of trash for the most part, and when he gets into fights with individuals he’s always kind of joking around. Most of the time he’s rather smiling than being dead serious like a brick. But I thought Momoa pulled it off very nicely and he really has a lot of charm. And, of course, when it’s time to kick ass, he kicks ass.

No melancholy to speak of. Conan seems very happy with his life in this one. Arm wrestles with guys in Messantia, drinks mead and doesn’t have a worry in the world.

I should also say that the film doesn’t show Conan as a drifter, pickpocket, thief and just a murderer who roams aimlessly in Hyboria. They establish at the beginning that he’s been doing all that since his father’s death. As the film starts Conan has found his friends, he rescues slaves with them, etc. So they start him off as a good guy. I don’t know if that’s a plus or not.

Character development:
You can’t expect him to evolve given there’s maybe all-together a 25-30 minute portion of the film that isn’t action. But he definitely doesn’t become more humane as the movie progresses which I suppose is a plus. Though in this movie he’s certainly more a ruthless action hero type character than a dark, mysterious wanderer/warrior. Very generic writing of Conan, probably, but Momoa kind of spices it up.

Whether Conan softens when he falls for Tamara:
Interestingly enough he really doesn’t. Their relationship mostly reminds just official but friendly. There may be a sex scene in it but no real romance develops between them. At least not the cheesy kind.

On the story:

It might interest you that at the beginning of the film the narration explains that Conan had “stormed the high walls of Venarium and prowled the dark seas among pirates” while growing up. And there’s a huge ‘victorious’ moment on the ship with heavy music in the background so I suppose you will get a sense of Conan being a true warrior of the seas!

Relation to Howard
What I was surprised though was how many names, such as places or characters, from the Conan books they used: Yara (they reference how Conan once killed the evil Yara), Shaipur, Shahpur, Cimmeria & Hyboria (obviously), Acheron, Khor Kalba, Argalon, master Fassir, Zingarian slave colony.

Relation to the 1982 film
It’s pretty dark and dirty. And they weren’t exactly going for camp either, you could tell this was a serious project for them, which perhaps wasn’t the best approach. I’d say the 1982 CONAN is a LOT more colorful and cheery-looking than this one. The pirate friends don’t have a very big role. There is a character named Ela Shan though who’s kind of a comedic sidekick…

Relation to the novelization
I took a quick peek at this novelization and this portion:

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During this tale telling, several men approach the pirates camp. They are Aquilonians, and their master is a man Conan has met before. A Man missing the nose that Conan took.

The men have come to hire Conan. They think he is a Vanir-man and will make an excellent addition to their master’s forces. Conan knowing this to be a chance to find out more about the “Klarzin” who destroyed his village plays along. Allowing them to put him in chains as a “Show of good faith”, He’s put with a few other captives including one who claims to be a great thief. Ela Shaun.

---

is different in the film. And actually the story version fits better. But I suppose that means the movie is different from the novelization.

Okay, a few more looks at the novelization and it’s COMPLETELY different from what occurs in the movie.

I didn’t read the entire thing, but what caught my attention in the novelization was (spoiler tags include an excerpt from the novelization):

Tamara is preparing to leave the monastery on her quest to find Conan. None too soon it seems as Fassir is brought word of an army approaching. He beseeches Tamara to go, and not to look back. Only finding Conan can she right the evils that are being committed. Only Conan can save the world. So reluctantly the girl departs on her long and lonely quest.

There is none of that in the film. I guess they scrapped most of that to make room for action. Let’s just say that in the movie, Conan and Tamara meet a lot more circumstantially, and there is no ‘Only Conan can save the world’ and ‘lonely quest’ stuff. At that point in the film, Tamara doesn’t know who Conan is.

And (excerpt from novelization):

Instead of simply dispatching the Cimmerians, Khaler plans to take Conan with him, as it will cause Corin the most pain. And Khaler likes to cause pain to those who attempt to thwart him. But Corin with his last act makes it possible for Conan to escape. The boy kills another of Khalers men on his way out of the village, and then begins the journey to find his Grandfather.

That isn’t in the film.

Narrative Complexity
It’s a very simple film. Around 80% of it is just action so they don’t devote almost any time to developing characters or actual storylines, and the main plot with Khalar Zym’s plan is pretty clichéd, on the other hand it’s one of the better paced films of recent memories. Not a single boring moment in it. If you switch off your brain and just enjoy it for what it is, it’s rather fun.

Settings
I should add the movie has a very episodic feel. It keeps moving on into new scenery and action set pieces. Which I thought was quite nice.

They move from place to place rather quickly and I think all major ones have been shown in the trailer. The major locations are (in the correct order): Cimmeria (young Conan), Zingarian slave colony, Messantia, Shaipur, Shahpur, Shahpur Outpost, Argalon (city of thieves), Khor Kalba

Revenge
The revenge plotline doesn’t really ‘kick off’. This is acknowledged during the first 15 minutes or so: Conan has always wanted to avenge the death of his father but he has never exactly known who slaughtered his village. When he learns it was Khalar Zym who is now quite powerful, he’s surprised because he’d always thought it was just a bandit. And then he gets info where to find him, and he’s just like: “oh, awesome, I’ll go and kill him.” But there’s never a “now I will get revenge” moment in the movie, which I really didn’t think of before until you brought it up. He’s always wanted to pay back for his father, and when he learns he has a chance, he just goes for it like it’s a walk in the park. He doesn’t think of it as a mission. It’s hard to explain. His behavior or attitude doesn’t change when he learns he can get closer to avenge his father’s death, that’s for sure.

Climax
Honestly… it should have been better. A lot better. It’s very rushed. But the build-up is very good.

On violence:

Oh, it’s very violent! There’s more violence than nudity, anyway. Let’s say Conan has no problem killing or torturing people in pretty nasty ways.

The battle scenes, which there are many, aren’t very bloody (not a lot of dismemberment and such). However, there are several specific scenes that really made me cringe. This would be the second time for director Marcus Nispel to have an extremely disgusting birth scene in his film.

Yes, I saw both trailers and all of that is obviously in the film. But it’s more nasty than bloody. It’s certainly a lot less bloody than 300, but has some specific torture scenes that can be quite brutal.

Fight choreography: well shot?
I would say yes. My only grievance is that the last 15 minutes or so are way too dark. This will probably really show in 3D as well.

On nudity:

Tamara being topless:
Yes, but the scene is brief and quite dark.

Other than Tamara, some slave girls are nude.

On the special effects:

Surprisingly enough it doesn’t have a lot of CGI at all, it all looks very authentic and natural. They do use special effects in the dweller scene and when Conan is battling these sandman type figures you see in the trailers, but – believe it or not – they had seemingly built a mechanical dweller that they used in some of the shots (at least that’s how it seemed) and those sand-men were definitely actual actors that had been polished with CGI in post-production (to make them look like they do).

It all feels natural, there’s a very limited amount of cheesy special effects and it gives off the vibe of an expensive production. None of it felt like a simple set.

On the score:

I didn’t pay attention to the music all that much and I don’t know whether the music from the original film was used, BUT it’s quite orchestral and they also use a lot of vocals.

So I guess it’s average. When I saw X-MEN: FIRST CLASS I instantly knew I had to get the music separately because it was just so good. In CONAN you have the usual, typical orchestral BS.

On the film in general:

Rated R for strong bloody violence, some sexuality and nudity. I should also mention it’s 108-109 minutes long.

Most of the runtime is devoted to action. But frankly I expected a lot worse. Like I said I thought Momoa was just very charismatic and I kind of just enjoyed watching him (not to sound gay… I also took notice of Tamara) It’s very well paced, not one boring moment in it. I know critics are going to tear it a new one but I enjoyed it for what it was. True Conan fans will almost certainly hate it.

It has excellent pacing and there isn’t a single boring moment in it.

Miscellaneous:

Conan saying “Crom!”
Not that I recall, but “In Crom’s name” is used as an expression, especially by Conan’s dad. I believe Artus also says “In Mitra’s name”.

References to the REH stories
Unfortunately I’m not familiar with Howard’s stories, but I would say there aren’t many.

Marique & Khalar Zym’s Characterization
Not very extensive, but they sort of have this incestuous thing going on where Marique wants to be the heir of her mother and rule alongside Khalar Zym as his bride in case they won’t be able to resurrect Maliva.

I friggin’ loved McGowan, dude. Marique is a far more interesting character than Khalar Zym who’s basically a faceless, underdeveloped bloke, while Marique is a very brutal and ruthless type character and who feels she’s the truthful heir of Maliva’s, Khalar Zym’s wife. Cast members other than McGowan and Momoa definitely are underused.

Ukafa, Akhun and Cheren’s screen time and lines
Not that I recall. Quite frankly I’m not even sure who you’re referring to. Conan’s main friend in the film is Artus who’s known him for ages.

The main one-on-one fight occurs between Conan and Akhoun who feeds slaves to the dweller.

I also know for a fact that Ukafa nor Cherin have no lines in the movie.

Yes, he (Ukafa) appears in the ship scene and Conan combats him. He doesn’t have any lines though, I think.Torture
Conan himself does not get tortured, but a few people are tortured by him. There’s a noseless fella who Conan needs to get info from and he sticks his finger through the hole in the guy’s nose… I thought that was quite nasty.

Conan’s birth
Perhaps like… a minute. It’s VERY brief. And quite disgusting too.

Khalar Zym’s ship
The ship is used by Khalar Zym’s men to strike through the walls that surround Shaipur Monastery.

Barbarism vs Civilization dynamic:
Hardly. Khalar Zym taunts Conan by calling him ‘Barbarian’ though.

Favourite Part:
Hmm. I would say (this happens 30 minutes into the film): Conan surrendering himself to get to people who may know about the bandit that killed his father, and then torturing Lucius to get info on him. Just because I thought it was wonderful how playful Momoa was there.

Editorial

I think we all knew that this year’s Conan the Barbarian was going to be a hugely divisive film. It already has a massively fragmented audience – Robert E. Howard fans, Lancer book fans, Marvel comic fans, 1982 film fans, Arnold fans, Milius fans, Dark Horse comic fans, Age of Conan fans, probably even some Conan the Adventurer fans – all of whom have different expectations for the film. So it’s probably natural that we’re going to get some extremely polarized reviews. I see little reason to doubt these reviews are genuine, due to information which I’ll reveal in due course.

How to process this information? Let’s go with scenarios. Say the popular consensus agrees with the first review, that this is a disaster of profound proportions, neither enjoyable as a brainless action film, or even as a guilty pleasure. The cinemagoing public is amazingly forgiving when it comes to rewarding terrible films with great profits – see Clash of the Titans and the Transformers trilogy – but they have their limits, as seen in the cases of Gigli and The Adventures of Pluto Nash. If this film truly is not only as bad as those films, but ends up a box office failure, then that would be nothing short of soul-destroying. All that effort so many people put into making a film, only for it to end up under-performing at the box office, possibly to a catastrophic degree, even killing the Conan film franchise for another quarter decade? Heck, even all the effort Waldgeist, Gatekeeper and myself have put into this blog, trying to be as fair as possible, and promoting the film and Howard along with it? Forget soul-destroyed, I’d be furious.

Or, let’s say only a comparative minority feel the undiluted hatred of that first review, and that the average fan will have a good time at the cinema. It isn’t a somewhat Avant-garde attempt to infuse Nietzchean philosophy and classic auteur homages into a Peplum flick like the 1982 Conan the Barbarian, nor is it an intelligent blockbuster like Inception – but it’s a bloody good time. This may translate into box-office success: it’s a given that it isn’t going to topple Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides, Transformers: Dark of the Moon or Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2, it might not even end up breaking the top ten, but it could possibly recoup its budget and a little extra left over, maybe doing well in DVD sales. Perhaps we’ll get a sequel or two. If even a percentage of those filmgoers then decide to pick up some Conan books, then that’ll be a success, and hopefully the blog will remain for anyone with questions, ideas or theories about the film & the source material as it’s released in the rest of the world.

Whatever happens with the upcoming film, be it a terrible flop, an excellent blockbuster, an excellent flop, or a terrible blockbuster, one thing is certain from my perspective: people are going to compare it to the 1982 film by virtue of it being a cinematic work, and people are going to compare it to the original stories due to the constant “faithful to the spirit” mantra. Regardless of the quality of the final film, I intend to use it as an educational tool regarding the original stories. If it’s good, I can point out the good parts, and hopefully they’ll coincide with the parts more faithful to Howard: if it’s bad, well, I don’t even need to set up a comparison, since the gap of quality is implicit.

Either way, a lot depends on the film. Only time will tell whether this will be among the greatest flops or hits of 2011, critically or financially. I’ll be attending Empire’s Big Screen event on 14th August for – what else? – the Conan the Barbarian in 3D European premiere. Then… well, we’ll see.

UPDATE: Fredrik Malmberg himself has commented on the situation:

I would also add that any “review” of an unreleased film without their own name standing behind their “review” is not really something I would pay attention to. While R-rated action movies rarely get rave reviews by professionals, let’s wait and see. I have a good feeling we will actually come out alright!

There have been haters who want us to fail from day one. Seen it for ten years. We (representing Paradox) want to inspire a new generation to explore and enjoy REH’s yarns and I believe we have a great film coming up that not only is enjoyable but nails Bob’s character and sets up the world in a believable fashion.

As ever, it’s best to keep an open mind for all possibilities. That’s the scientific way.