Conan the Barbarian (2011)

Why do I watch all these stupid fucking remakes?  Is it because I am incapable of discussing actual substantive films (for example, just saw Pi and all I can really think of saying is "just watch this movie you dumb fuckheads")?  Was it a subconscious reaction to the free champion rotation in League of Legends this week having the BARBARIAN KING that literally nobody seems to know how to play?  Do I like ruining my friend's Netflix account tracking with garbage films?

First off, though, let's be clear.  Conan the Barbarian is not a remake of the 1980's Conan the Barbarian. Really, the two films have almost nothing in common aside from the fact that they both take place in a fantasy world and have a big strong amoral dude named Conan killing other weaker dudes.  But it's still a remake, in fact a remake of another Arnold Schwarzenegger film:

Commando.

I know this might sound a little kooky, but hear me out.  Both films feature the aspect of the hero chasing after an object important to them (John Matrix's daughter, Conan's sword).  The object of importance is held by a collection of bad guy archetypes for that time in place (in the 80s you have the Jew, Black Men, and Gay Person in a Chainmail Vest, in the Hyborian Age, you have the Fat Jew, the Larger Black Men, Gay Shirtless Person, and Seductive Woman).  The film is largely constructed around the hero going through predetermined stages and slaying all the bosses until finally coming up to the Prime Bad.

The ostinsible plot of the movie is Conan seeking revenge against the bad guy from Avatar, who with his band of ethnic misfits razed Conan's childhood village and now wants to rule the world with a magic skull helmet that a necromancer made in his eighth grade crafts class.  For some reason, to do this he needs the blood of the last descendant of the necromancer (who is a hot grrl), so he can lock her away in the Dark World and Conan needs to find the Master Sword.  Of course, like Commando, none of this actually matters.  It's also strangely complex, especially since the original Conan was just "arnold wants to beat up a snake cult."  It's as though the filmmakers decided that they really needed to lure the neckbeards that actually read the Conan stories and damn anyone that just wants to see some swordfightin'.

The biggest problem with this is that the person playing Conan, Jason Momoa, cannot sustain this narrative flow worth a fuck.  One of the hidden great things about the original Conan was that the director of that film was fully cognizant that Arnold was not at the point where he could successfully spout catchphrases, so his greatest duties in that film are looking intimidating, wielding a sword, and being around naked women.

Jason Momoa's prior roles to this were playing that crazy dude on a Stargate spinoff and being a barbarian king in Game of Thrones, boffing the lady that people draw an insane amount of porn of.  It's clear the director saw him as a perfect fit for the new Conan, and he does look appropriately intimidating.  The problem is that he has alot of dialogue in Conan, and every single time he talks it's like he's reading off a cue card.

For example, early in the film, Conan finds himself in a jail run by the fat one-eyed jew.  Conan breaks out and tries to menace him into giving information about the Avatar guy's plot, saying "tellmewatiwant won'tkillu."  Naturally he spills the beans, so Conan hauls him outside and sticks the prison key into his mouth and kicks him towards the angry prisoners.  Fifth-grade screenwriter Jimmy then has the jailer say BUT YOU SAID YOU WOULDN'T KILL ME, to which Conan states "mmmbutdintsay wuntkillu."  It's where I fully realized I was just watching Commando, and that this movie was a terrible mistake.

So I guess the biggest difference from Commando is that Conan gets a nordic lady friend as opposed to a platonic Negress buddy.  Conan rescues her from the magic smart people city that is attacked by evil but she runs away but is pursued by a group of baddies culminating in a clumsy chase sequence.  Naturally she's a super independent lady because 1) she doesn't dress like a slut unlike every other female character in this film and 2) she constantly refers to the fact that she's a super independent lady.  So naturally she spends the entire movie either kidnapped, getting seduced by Conan's omega-level PUA strats, or the classic "helping in a fight by killing a single monster."

Speaking of fights, there's alot of them in this movie, and all of them are pretty pointless.  There's Rose McGowan dressed as a slut witch (I don't know why you would try to make Rose McGowan ugly, but this movie certainly puts forth the effort) summoning sand monsters that somehow die after you stab them three times.  There's a pirate boarding party led by the giant black guy and archer lady from the beginning of the film, both of whom have zero lines and die almost instantly.  There's my three-second triumph over hypothetical guilt where I missed five minutes of the movie so I could watch my friend fight stuff in Guild Wars 2.

The final pointless fight, occurring when the tuff grrl gets kidnapped and Conan needs to rescue her, deserves more attention because it really symbolizes everything dumb and forgettable about this film.

So, near the start of the film, when Conan was captured by the aforementioned Jew Jailer, he met some thief guy who says COME MEET ME IN THE CITY OF THIEVES IF YOU NEED HELP BRO.  About 70 or so minutes later, for reasons I can't remember if they even exists, Conan goes to the literal City of Thieves where he meets the thief in the first bar he goes to.  They then proceed to the Avatar Guy's Doom Castle, because I guess that's where she is.  They sneak in via the sewers or something, and eventually come up through a pool in the center a giant multi-level prison area manned by Avatar Guy's final lieutenant, a shirtless cannibal guy whose lines are HA HA HA and ARRRRGH.  But then there's a twist because Conan and the thief have to also fight a GIANT OCTOPUS MONSTER.  And by that I mean Conan has to fight it, because the thief's entire contribution to this scene is running around and screaming COOOONAAAHAAAAN over and fucking over again and meanwhile the cgi is goddamned awful and nothing in the fight choreography makes sense.  After like five minutes of this the lieutenant is dead and fed to the octopus, so Conan and thief make their way to the throne room/balcony where it is revealed that the girl is not even in the castle, but in the nearby mountain cave which is shaped like a skull.  Jesus Christ.  And no, the thief guy isn't even seen again after this.

The final scenes of the film have naturally no surprises, except for the kind of annoying screenwriting trend where it is revealed that the Avatar Guy, who previously explained his origins via a sad story about his wife being unjustly murdered for being a witch, actually reveals that "no that was a lie she was evil and so am I, haw haw haw."  All bad is murdered, climatic kiss, whatever.

I don't really hate Conan the Barbarian, but it's just such a forgettable movie for the amount of money and talent thrown into it.  No attempt was broached to make something interesting or coherent, just endless pandering to fans with minimum breast shots and cgi just there because.

verdict: just watch Commando again