Review of Conan the Barbarian (2011) by Canisrah — 19 Aug 2011

Ok. I'm a Conan fan, always have been. I read the terrible critic reviews for this film with a sense of dread as I had tried to keep an open mind and had hopes that the movie would defy expectations and be good. Undaunted, I went to the cinema (albeit with fairly low expectations), and donned my 3D glasses.

I have to say, for the first 20 minutes or so, this movie was magnificent. I was totally engrossed, emotionally involved, and thoroughly impressed. The intro scenes depicting Conan's birth and the following exposition around his early years as a young Cimmerian boy are fantastic. I turned to my friend who was watching the film with me and said 'I don't understand it, the critics are so wrong.'

But then, unfortunately, came the rest of the film. For some inexplicable reason, after a brilliant setup (outstanding performance by Ron Pearlman), and a captivating turn by the lad playing the young Conan, the film kind of lost itself, and the plot, the pacing and the action became increasingly pointless until finally one didn't really care what was happening and by the third act I was waiting for it to be over. It's a shame really, because I think the new Conan is perfect - for me he's totally believable, and embodies the barbarian really well. I also loved the art direction and the CGI which was really well implemented. The 3D was ok - but didn't really add anything overall.

Too much fighting without good story to back it up, too much noise and crashing rocks for no real purpose. Started really well, and last 5 minutes it finished strongly, but the second and third acts were quite painful to endure.

My take is that it's not a bad movie, but it's not real good either. If it weren't for the first 20 min's I would be rating it much lower. Here's hoping they nail it in the sequel.