The Sword and The Sorcerer [VHS]

  

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Audience Rating: R (Restricted)
Binding: VHS Tape
EAN: 0013131136333
Format: Closed-captioned, Color, Original recording reissued, NTSC
Label: Starz / Anchor Bay
Manufacturer: Starz / Anchor Bay
Number Of Items: 1
Publisher: Starz / Anchor Bay
Release Date: April 24, 2001
Running Time: 99 minutes
Studio: Starz / Anchor Bay
Theatrical Release Date: 1982-04



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Editorial Review:

Amazon.com:
Lean, lanky Lee Horsley (TV's Matt Houston) is hardly the iconic image of a medieval warrior, but in this cheesy Conan the Barbarian knockoff he makes his swaggering, mercenary Talon a genial smart aleck of a barbarian hero. The plot is pure pulp cliché: evil Cromwell (Richard Lynch) raises a demon to conquer a peaceful kingdom, kill the rulers, and imprison the royal heirs, and the son of a murdered patriot returns to take his righteous vengeance with a projectile-loaded, three-bladed sword. First-time director Albert Pyun apprenticed under Akira Kurosawa and brings with him an eye for handsome images and a fluid sense of action that helps overcome B-movie dialogue ("Unlock this door, wench, and leave that to us!"), scenery-chewing performances, and bargain-basement budget. In one fight sequence a guard punches a rock wall--and dents it! Kathleen Beller (the dark-eyed beauty of The Betsy) is the rebel princess who enlists Talon to the cause, Route 66's charming wanderer George Maharis is a conniving traitor under an unflattering mop of greasy hair, and Richard Moll dons a latex monster mask to play the double-crossed demon. It's utterly silly and often awkward, but it does have energy to spare. The sequel promised at the end of the film was never produced and Pyun went on to direct some of the best straight-to-video action films of the 1990s, including Nemesis. --Sean Axmaker



Customer Reviews
Average Rating: out of 5 stars

Rating: 5 out of 5 stars - Good movie
I first saw this movie in a theater about twenty years ago, and I enjoyed it as much on VHS when I recently purchased it. It's basically a B-movie sword-and-sorcery flick, but aside from some trite dialogue and the fact that the demon raised in the movie was played by Richard Moll (a good actor, but after seeing him play Bull on "Night Court" kind of took the scare away), the movie has held up well. It's entertaining if you want to see an adventure movie.


Rating: 4 out of 5 stars - More than just a cheap Conan knock-off
If I were to say the name "Albert Pyun", chances are pretty good you'd draw a blank. CYBORG? Uhh, isn't that a Van Damme film or something? Yeah. RADIOACTIVE DREAMS? Cult movie from the 80s maybe? Sci-fi? Yup. Same guy as this Conan ripoff? Yup. And over 40 other films in less than 30 years. The man has certainly been prolific - if not particularly good.

Well, he started off on the right foot, even if this low-budget affair is cheesy, goofy, and most definitely made to cash in on the Schwarzenegger film's success; or presumptive success might be a better way to put it, as it was actually released a few weeks before John Milius' bigger-budgeted, better-marketed film. In fact (and this blew my mind) it had almost exactly the same box office gross, at least in the USA, as the film that made Arnie a star - 40 million dollars or so, a substantial amount for a low-budget indie in those days.

Why the film hasn't stayed in the public consciousness and why the promised sequel (mentioned in the end credits crawl) had to wait until this year, remains a mystery to me after re-watching the film recently. The plot is pretty basic and really rather inconsequential: evil Cromwell takes over the peaceful kingdom of Ehdan with the help of monstrous undead sorcerer Xusia, killing the king and his family but missing young Talon, he of the three-bladed sword, who will eventually grow into strapping he-man Lee Horsley and come back for revenge, along the way saving gorgeous Princess Alana (Kathleen Beller) and her brother Micah, who believes himself to be the rightful heir in the absence of Talon. There's lots of fairly mediocre and unconvincing swordplay, plenty of shots of the half-naked Horsley for the ladies and the scantily-clad Beller and other nubile vixens for the guys, rather dreamy overlit photography that helps camouflage the overall cheapness of the sets and costumes, and a musical score that's rousing if rather shameless in its ripping off of 40s swashbuckler stuff and even for a moment "Gone With the Wind".

But what makes the film work is the sense of humor it has about itself, and Horsley's charisma. How can anybody take the triple-sword (which fires two of its blades like crossbow bolts) seriously, or do anything but laugh when Talon is crucified on a big wooden X at a wedding celebration but pulls the spikes out of his hands (mostly in slow-mo of course) and then goes on to start chopping up the bad guys as if nothing happened? The film has an energy and verve that for me more than makes up for some really ludicrous lapses in plotting near the end, and I for one wish that a sequel starring Horsley had been made. This is Pyun's highest-rated film on the IMDb and judging from what else I've seen and the descriptions and comments on a few others, probably deserves to be. Too bad - it's far from a great film, but it's sad that the director has become such a joke ever since.


Rating: 4 out of 5 stars - Living sexy fairytale
Bad boy Cromwell deployed a demon resurrected to reign over something like ancient England, ousting "good right royals" from power. To complete a task, he needed a crown princes got married. Loyal peasants lead by mercenary Talon inspired with virgin princess's promise to be her first, got rid of illegal throne-users. Traditionally-friendly (hah) multinational affairs and multi-race cooperation (hah, hah) are on display in both camps of warriors.

If one abstained from fairytale propaganda, beautiful bodies, brilliant performing and clever mix of actions affect significantly a modern, spoiled with sci-fi tricks viewer with a natural strength and near realistic overcoming of mere terrestrial problems. It seems, too many events ispire future films (The Mummy, The Mummy (HD DVD) / The Mummy Returns , Queen of the Damned , for instance)

It is a really good work and a price reflects its market value of a rare DVD to date.



Rating: 5 out of 5 stars - Sword and the sorcerer
The movie was a good one, however even the lowest asking price is too expensive. The movie is almost 30 years old and is not worth more than 10.00 at the most. Would not buy it here.


Rating: 5 out of 5 stars - A good movie!
I bought this movie for two reasons:(1)I like sword & sorcerer movies and(2)to prepare myself for the upcoming movie,"Tales of An Ancient Empire". Granted,it didn't really help much with reason #2,since the only connection between this and Tales is Lee Horsley,whose appearance in the new movie amounts to nothing more than a cameo. However,I did enjoy this movie,despite all the killing that took place. To me,the most interesting thing about this movie was the tri-bladed sword,which I found to be a really cool piece. If you love sorcery-type movies,you might want to check this movie out!