The Sword and the Sorcerer

Somewhat charming fantasy-adventure film that features some respectable special effects and the set designs were pretty good. Acting was so-so however the lead didn't have a whole lot of charisma and the fight scenes were fine but a few scenes were too dimly lit. Should be said, these kinds of movies (including Conan the Barbarian) aren't really my thing but at least this kept my attention. **3.0/5**

This actually benefits from having the germ of a decent story of dynastic skulduggery. The evil king "Cromwell" (Richard Lynch) has designs on the throne of the peaceable king "Richard" (Christopher Cary). To that end he awakens the lethal and demonic "Xusia" (Richard Moll) to destabilise "Eh-Dan" and make it ripe for the picking. Fortunately, young prince "Talon" (Lee Horsley) escapes this terror and flees leaving his elder sister "Alana" (Kathleen Beller) behind - a slave. He doesn't forget though, and trains hard, learning how to handle a triple-bladed sword that he plans to use as he returns to reclaim his inheritance and free his sibling. Needless to say, though, neither "Xusia" nor the usurper are going to be welcoming him with open arms! The visual effects are OK here and the drama keeps going fine at the beginning, but the quality of both acting and writing soon starts to drag the whole thing down into cheap and cheerful television movie-dom. The tousled Horsley is pretty amateur from the get-go and although Beller tries to inject a little feistiness into her character, the whole thing just lacks any sense of menace. Indeed, Moll is about as intimidating as yesterday's lettuce. It is little raunchier than many of the genre but in the end it's rather disappointing and eminently forgettable.

They made a sequel to this that was bucking for arthouse... and it was horrible. This movie was self aware enough to know that they weren't making Chinatown. The dialogue was pretty fun and understood that it wasn't anywhere near a good film, so it could still be light hearted enough to throw in gags here and there in the script, to over-act when it suited the scene, to be fun for the sake of being fun. It's a B sword and sorcery flick that knows how bad it is, and makes the best of it that sort of turned the film into a cult classic. It's a serious movie that has fun with itself, has fun with it's content, and because of that the viewer can sit back and be entertained. Not everything has to take itself seriously.