The first thing to keep in mind when watching either of the Conan movies, or Kull for that matter, is that they are not Howard's evocative characters. They are completely different, and only keep the name to sell the movie.
That said, Conan the Destroyer has nowhere near the impact or power of Conan the Barbarian. While that film opted for a dark, serious tone, this movie has a light, comedic feel to it, probably so it would sell to children. While the humor is pretty good at first in this movie, such as the scenes when Conan is first riding into the city and the merchant starts covering up his jewels, and the encounter with the camel, it gets boring and redundant after a bit. Also, what happened it Subotai? He was a fun, likeable character, who they disposed of for some reason and replaced with Malak, a completely unecessary, obnoxious and pointless character who somehow has inherited Subotai's memories of past events.
While the previous Conan film showed off Conan's graceful violence and taste for women, in this one most of the swordplay is choppy and not very well done, and he doesn't bed one wench. The special effects are terrible, because I guess the director was trying for cool effects and thrills and failed miserably.
Grace Jones is a colorful new addition as the savage Zula, but Wilt Chamberlain acts quite badly as Queen's Henchman Bombatta. I'm not quite sure who played the queen, but she also was quite horrible. The wizard from the first one is brought back and given a name, although he was also wimpified extremely and is now a stupid gibberish- sprouting powerless wizard. And the girl.
I still maintain the biggest mistake in this movie was making it a kids movie. Even with the bad acting and effects, this movie could have been good with an R rating, with decently real gory violence and women. Alas, the girl is played by Olivia d'Abo from the Wonder Years, who does a horrible acting job in this movie. She is around mainly to stand around looking scared and occasionally to show some skin on her leg or near her breasts, but that is as far as it goes.
The other downfall in this movie is the plot. While the plot is big and epic in the first one, here it's just "the quest for the magical this-and-that with the beautiful girl as bait."
One hopes that for Conan III, they will bring back the somber tone and have a more epic plot, like have Conan lead an army to take over a kingdom after a corrupt sorceror kills Jehnna or something like that, with Arnold Schwarzenneger finally becoming king by his own hand as alluded to in the first two conan films.
While this is worth seeing, or even buying if you're a fan of fantasy or sword and sworcery flicks, don't look for real deep material here.
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Production Year: 2002 - Action/Adventure - Director: Vincenzo Natali - Original Language: English - Classification: 15 years and over - Starring:Lucy Liu, David Hewlett, Anne Marie Scheffler, Joseph Scoren, Matthew Sharp, Jeremy Northam
Production Year: 1964 - Action/Adventure - Director: Cyril Endfield - Original Language: English - Classification: Parental Guidance - Starring:Stanley Baker, Jack Hawkins, Ulla Jacobsson, James Booth, Michael Caine, Nigel Green
Schwarzenegger wields his mighty sword once again as Robert E. Howard's epic warrior, ... more
Conan, in this impressive Collector's Edition DVD. Battling against sorcery, slaying vicious beasts and fighting to protect his companions.Taramis, witch queen of Sha...
Release Date: 2004-09-27, Rating Suitable for 15 years and over,
Postage & Packaging: Free! Availability: Temporarily out of stock. Order now and we'll deliver when available. We'll e-mail you with an estimated delivery date as soon...
![Conan The Destroyer (Collector's Edition) [DVD] [1984]](http://picnicb.ciao.com/uk/78518937.jpg "Conan The Destroyer (Collector's Edition) [DVD] [1984]")
![Conan The Destroyer [Special Edition]-DVD](http://picnicb.ciao.com/uk/100426163.jpg "Conan The Destroyer [Special Edition]-DVD")
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