DEATHSTALKER (1983)

 

PHENOMENALITY: *marvelous*
MYTHICITY: *poor*
FRYEAN MYTHOS: *adventure*
CAMPBELLIAN FUNCTION: *metaphysical*

There's some minor irony that this eighties series of barbarian adventure logged in twice as many installments as the official CONAN series. Of course the original barbarian would have bombed if he'd come out with cut-rate budgets like those of the "Deathstalker" flicks, but there are a few other cut-rate barbarians of the period that had a little more personality than the guy with the peculiar cognomen.

It is fitting that the character of the blockhead barbarian is perfectly matched by the bad acting of the actor playing him. Early in the film, Deathstalker (Rick Hill) happens across some evil soldiers harassing refugees, and he defeats them not because he's a Good Samaritan, but because they threaten to steal his horse. After the warrior has shown his skills, the leader of the refugees tells him that he is the former king of some local feif, recently conquered by the sorcerer Munkar. The king offers Deathstalker riches if he'll use his talents to infiltrate the kingdom and kill Munkar, and when the warrior thinks about it, Hill tries to look calculating, and ends up seeming like he's got indigestion.

Deathstalker refuses the king's request of remuneration-- fair enough. But in the next scene, he comes across an apparent old acquaintance, the witch Toralva, also being menaced by Munkar's men. After the witch and the warrior eliminate the soldiers, Toralva instructs Deathstalker that he needs to go find a magic sword to defeat Munkar-- and Deathstalker's like, "Okay, fine." This moment of narrative incoherence was easily my favorite part of the film, even though as an eighties flick there was good T&A service throughout.

So Deathstalker rather easily finds the sword after some confusing business with an ogre who transforms into a human thief. With this thief in tow, Deathstalker rides toward Munkar's kingdom, intending to participate in a great tournament as a cover for his assassination plans. On the way Deathstalker picks up two other warrior-buddies, one of whom is buxom swordswoman Kaira (Lana Clarkson). Kaira and Deathstalker have sex one night but it doesn't seem to foster any special feelings between them.

Meanwhile Munkar heaps degradation upon Princess Codille (Barbi Benton), daughter of the exiled king, dumping her into his harem but not immediately taking advantage of her. During the tournament Munkar seems to know all about Deathstalker and the magic sword, but he only takes one minor measure to get rid of the barbarian. He transforms an assassin into a duplicate of Codille in order to beguile the hero and kill him, but Deathstalker senses danger. Kaira ends up fighting the assassin and being killed, which is the closest the movie comes to some drama. Various tournament-fights burn up some more time until a climactic battle between swordsman and sorcerer.

The only good thing to come out of this boring opus is that Lana Clarkson earned a minor cult-status that led to a somewhat better sword-and-sorcery film, BARBARIAN QUEEN-- that, and the fact that the spoofy sequel was much more fun than this turd.