Conan (2011)

This is serious business. Let's talk about it.

This is not Conan the barbarian. This is something else, someone else. I think pretty much everyone was thinking this, so I just wanted to put that out there.

Also, in this household, we love Lionsgate. There is no doubt what kind of movie you're getting when that Lionsgate logo (in one of its many forms) appears on the screen. It's a very general statement, but we like the movies they put their name on, so I have a tough time outright disliking this movie.

But I have no problem criticizing its guts out. So let me start...

Jason Momoa. He was downright great as Khol Drago in Game of Thrones. Here, with what is a very similar character, he's dreadful. I don't place sole blame on him because there's a director hopefully trying to direct. There's no way he can be Arnold Schwarzenegger as Conan, so I can't blame him for that, but essentially I suppose I am. He's not Conan the barbarian. Sorry, Jason. There's charisma there, but it's out of place.

The script. I can't forgive the dialogue they gave to Conan. It's quite bad, just awful, and doesn't make me think of Conan at all. It's more like the writer wanted to evoke the spirit and charisma of Dwayne Johnson/The Rock in Scorpion King (which was no triumph either), and it falls utterly flat. Now, I think Jason Momoa can do this, take those roles Johnson did earlier, because there are flashes of it in the movie, but this is not the place for it.

The pacing. For being so action-oriented, this is a slow movie. In general, I found all the fights to be overly long, which causes them to be dull. Nothing really interesting happens in most of these fights. The swordplay is generally slow even though it's simultaneously furious. I don't know how that's possible, but they've done it here. In fact, there are so many fights in this movie, they blur together and I honestly can't recall them, or even care.

A lackluster ending. This is where it should have taken a bigger cue from Conan the Destroyer (a silly kids movie really) and had Conan rebuff the woman. How different they are, and really how he'd never respect her, is made apparent all through the movie. They do hook up, but it's little more than a booty call. I would have preferred them to be more... distant, take it more in the direction of the hero saving the girl and the world and getting his revenge, see ya later! But here is some shoehorned romance silliness.

The direction is just all over the place. Sometimes it's effective, and interesting, and other times it's just silly. Again, it wants to be one of those fun and silly action movies and still be a serious take on Conan the barbarian.

There are positives to the movie, which might be overlooked on a single watch (I wouldn't blame you). I only watched it again because I had missed some of the beginning, and I'm a completionist like that.

The kid. Kid Conan at the beginning (beginning, ha. First quarter of the movie) I thought was quite good. I could believe he'd grow up to be Jason Momoa. He looked good with a sword, and his fight scenes were impressive. While trying to hide the fact that no way could a kid fight these seasoned warriors and walk away, they managed to make it an interesting fight.

Stephen Lang and Rose McGowan make for a ridiculous over the top father/daughter villain duo. I'm all right with this. At this point, I don't think Stephen Lang bothers to do anything but over the top.

Most of the visual effects were very good, including what could have been really awful: the sand warriors. There was a little greenscreening that didn't look great, and the distracting smudging of Rose McGowan's forehead, but I thought the rest was quite nice (though it turns out the budget was much higher than I thought, so at least that made it on the screen). Along with the computer effects, I was very impressed by the practical makeup for the most part (the one guy's fake beard is pretty bad though, the stupid tentacle mask, and the dentures). 

Costumes are nice, except for Rose McGowan's battle garb. That red leather flapper panel is silly, though the rest of it looks good. I like what armor we see is big and overstated, but not utterly ridiculous and impractical. 

Bob Sapp!

The unceremonious ends of McGowan's and Stephen Lang's characters. Sure, they battle Conan, but they don't get killed by epic slow motion spinning sword slices or getting their heads lopped off. It sounds funny to describe it, but I do like that there was a choice to kill the main bad guy by dropping a wall on him and then just tossing him off a bridge.

Overall, I really see the bright spots in this movie, and they may not be enough to save it for some people. I actually find it kind of sad that it couldn't pull together to live up to the sum of its better parts. So I suggest this, when viewing the movie: don't think of this as a new Conan. Think of it as Jason Momoa playing a character named Conan who is the son of Schwarzenegger's Conan (Ron Perlman is his adoptive father). This is actually the Son of Conan movie. Makes it much easier to watch.