Review of Zardoz (1974) by Kevin G — 04 May 2010

A laughably bad, but seriously entertaining (did I mention bad?) sci-fi "epic", directed by Deliverance helmer John Boorman, which to this very moment just shocks me. This is the kind of movie you watch with friends on a weeknight when you need some good laughs over cigarettes and wine, which is precisely how I watched it. Filled with every single stupid, pretentious science fiction cliche, Zardoz clumsily borrows from many of its classic predecessors and tries to stuff them all into one horrendously cheesy and somehow, real, film. Sean Connery, who at this point in his career was attempting to break away from the chains of his type cast Bond persona, dons an S&M style leather clad outfit and intoxicatingly parades around with nearly no dialogue and a confused sense of bewilderment. His predicaments including:

- a floating stone head who commands he slaughter...innocent people (for what reason is never really made clear).

- a sexually destabilized mass clan of zombie like inhabitants.

- a Fellini Satyricon like dream haze complete with a symbiotic and obviously constructed Roman like society (except they don't screw).

And.

- horrible, horrible writing.

For these reasons, along with a "stunning" end twist, Zardoz has to be grouped along those other classic side splitting "so bad they're good" films, and when you watch Sean Connery don a Village People outfit and stumble around aimlessly in a superfluously constructed futuristic society set to the music of Beethoven's 7th symphony, Allegretto, you'll know why this movie has to be watched. (I would suggest watching it with friends, high or both).