Conan the Barbarian

Overall:  

You couldn’t really go downhill from the Arnold version, and this one didn’t it’s decently done for a story where the initial source material had as much intelligible dialog as a conversation between infants.

What I liked:

The matte paintings of the cities were pretty freaking gorgeous. I’m a sucker for beautifully done cityscapes, I won’t lie. These places are rough and tumble and I’d likely end up someone’s slave in a little over three minutes, but I still want to go there because they are gorgeous (granted, I’m sure they smell awful).

The sand men were a pretty cool take on a concept that could have come across as tired and worn. They were just unique enough to keep me from being bored with them. I think I would have liked for them to be a bit bigger of a plot device though, not just that one scene.

Rose McGowan’s character was a perfect mix of “I want to please daddy” and creep factor. I’m not sure why, but I have a feeling that might be all she’s going to be good at anymore. It worked for her in this film, and I think it would serve her well to seek out more of this type of roll.

The Problems:

Some of the dialog came across SUUUUUUUUUUUUPER stilted. I realize that they didn’t have contractions back in the day that this sort of thing is set in, and part of it was delivery on the actor’s parts. But it wasn’t awful, just caught me up occasionally.

I felt like it needed more time to tell the story in, as it was it felt rushed for as grand a tale as it is. I think that, had they had a little more time, this movie could have been immensely better.

Other, random thoughts:

Am I the only one who noticed an odd number of Game of Thrones parallels? Conan is Drogo, Artus is Xaro Xhoan Daxos, and Someone dies with molten metal poured over their head… and there are other things that I’m forgetting as I write this… I’ll come back and update once I remember them.

Runtime: 113 minutes

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The Expendables

A group of mercenaries are hired to take out the dictator-like authority on a small island, and find there’s more at stake than losing their paychecks.

  

The Problems:

OMG. Mickey Rourke "Tattoos" the "ables" part on the end of stallone's "Expendables” back piece.... With no stencil... in all of 10 seconds.... and then Stallone just puts a shirt on over it.... WTF?  Mr. Stallone. You directed, produce, wrote and starred in this film. YOU HAVE TATTOOS. You should know that what you just tried to sell me as an authentic tattoo session was so bogus I just can’t even talk about it. There was no attempt at making it feel real.

 I didn't think the Lacy storyline was necessary at all. Like. What the heck was she even there for? Just to get beat up? I know, it was to give Statham’s character depth or whatever but she felt like filler that they ran out of time to make relevant. There was no real resolution to her in the plot. She was just there as like... their token romance? Since the whole Sandra thing didn't have a chance of working out. And I know she's in the next one, but still.

What I liked:

 I was really happy that Stallone wasn’t some badass that took Steve Austin to school, because let’s face it, Sly’s not the ripest peach on the tree. So, when it comes down to their fight, I was very happy to see Stallone have his ass handed to him. Not because I want evil to prevail, but I’m glad to see he didn’t write himself a part that was unrealistic simply for vanity’s sake.

And that’s probably one of the things that makes this a good movie, the fact that it doesn’t try to be more than it is. It’s an action movie, with more action stars than you’re like to see in a long while (or, you know, until the sequel), and it doesn’t waste time trying to be more. It’s a simple plot, with a lot of shoot em up/blow shit up/save the day antics. And that works for this movie.

Run Time: 103 Minutes

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