If someone wants to learn how film franchise can be destroyed, few examples are as telling as the way Italian producer Dino De Laurentiis handled series which had begun with 1982 sword and sorcery epic Conan the Barbarian. While the vastly inferior and disappointing 1984 sequel Conan the Destroyer was decent in its own right, the last chapter of the original Conan film saga came a year later, in the form of spin-off Red Sonja.
The title character originally had nothing to do with Conan, introduced by Conan’s creator Robert E. Howard in his 1934 story The Shadow of the Vulture, set in 16th Century Europe, as fiery red-haired female swashbuckler. In 1973 comic book authors Roy Thomas and Barry Windsor decided to bring her to mythical Hyborian Age and use her as character in Marvel Comics adaptations of Howard’s works. Red Sonja appeared there either as Conan’s sidekick or protagonist of her own series. The film begins with title character (played by Brigitte Nielsen) as young village woman who paid a terrible price for rejecting lesbian advances of evil Queen Gedren of Berkubane (played by Sandahl Bergman) and scarring her face. Tyrannical queen orders her parents and siblings to be killed, while Sonja is brutally raped by her soldiers. Answering her call for revenge, goddess Scáthach gives her superior strength, agility and fighting skills under condition that she never lies with a man unless he defeats her in a fair fight. While she trains to become formidable swordswoman, her surviving sister Varna (played by Janet Agren) is a priestess in a temple that guards Talisman, an object so powerful that it could destroy the world. As the priestesses prepare the ritual to destroy Talisman, the temple is attacked by Gedren’s troops that take away the Talisman which is to be used by Gedren in her campaign to conquer the world. Varna is mortally wounded, but lives long enough to warn Lord Kalidor of Hyrcania (played by Arnold Schwarzenegger), and ask her sister to retreive and destroy the Talisman. Proud Sonja initially reject Kalidor’s offer of help and begins seeking Gedren and Talisman alone. Along the way she finds Prince Tarn (played by Ernie Reyes, Jr.), spoiled child ruler of Hablok, city destroyed by Gedren’s Talisman who would, together with loyal servant Falkon (played by Paul L. Smith) ultimately join her in her quest.
The idea behind this film was quite sound. There is hardly a better way to make a spin off of the saga featuring muscular half-naked swordsman than a saga featuring fierce half-naked swordswoman and the concept was proven a decade later on television with Hercules: Legendary Journeys spawning Xena: The Warrior Princess and one of the most iconic characters of its time. In case of Red Sonja, sadly, Dino De Laurentiis apparently exhausted all his creative reserves and the ultimate result is near complete failure on almost all levels. The most obvious mistake was casting Danish model Brigitte Nielsen who looks the part and handles swords sufficiently convincing in few action scenes, but whose acting abilities simply didn’t exist at that stage of her career. This is the problem that could be hardly solved even by directors more inspired than Richard Fleischer in what would become his penultimate film. Even bigger problem is the script by Clive Exton and George MacDonald Fraser that reduces fascinating quasi-historic world of Hyborian Age to setting of simple revenge story more suitable for low budget western. Another issue for scriptwriters is De Laurentiis’ apparent failure to secure rights for the character of Conan in this film, so he is simply replaced with character who is, for all practical purposes, Conan in all but a name. Schwarzenegger apparently agreed to play him thinking that Kalidor would be supporting character only to later find that his role was beefed up nearly equal to the protagonist (in Yugoslavia the film was actually distributed under title Kalidor and the Red-Headed Warrior). Schwarzenegger felt cheated and this, together with film’s failure at box office and displeasure with new family-friendly orientation of the franchise, led him to terminate contract and thus seal the fate of the original Conan series. Although Red Sonja had decent budget, De Laurentiis made it look cheap. This impression is created in the beginning, when the traumatic events of Sonja’s past are simply narrated through brief flashbacks instead of directly shown on the screen. Danilo Donati does good job with costumes and production design, but his work seems in vain when compared with poor special effects in the scene featuring mechanical fish. There are few other bright spots in the film – Ennio Morricone delivers powerful score that, to a degree, matches Basil Poledouris’ work from two previous Conan films and Paul L. Smith, actor specialised for menacing and despicable villains, is very effective in the role of kind-hearted and loyal servant who serves as something of comic relief. Red Sonja is nevertheless the film that, even after all this time, is more likely to make Conan fans angry than nostalgic.
RATING: 3/10 (+)
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