{"id":1478,"date":"2024-08-01T02:32:51","date_gmt":"2024-08-01T02:32:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/?p=1478"},"modified":"2024-10-14T11:27:30","modified_gmt":"2024-10-14T15:27:30","slug":"barbarian-queen","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/2024\/08\/01\/barbarian-queen\/","title":{"rendered":"Barbarian Queen"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"Barbarian Queen<\/strong> (1985)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Concorde Pictures\/Action-Fantasy\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 RT: 72 minutes\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Rated R (violence, rape and a whole lot of nudity)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Director: Hector Olivera\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Screenplay: Howard R. Cohen\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Music: Chris Young and James Horner\u00a0\u00a0 Cinematography: Rodolfo Denevi and Rudi Donovan\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Release date: April 26, 1985 (US)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cast: Lana Clarkson, Katt Shea, Frank Zagarino, Dawn Dunlap, Susana Traverso, Victor Bo, Arman Chapman, Andrea Barbieri, Tony Middleton, Andrea Scriven, Robert Carson, Matilde Mur, Eddie Little, Patrick Duggan.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Box Office: N\/A<\/p>\n

Rating<\/strong>: ***<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ll be no man\u2019s slave and no man\u2019s whore, and if I can\u2019t kill them all, by the gods they\u2019ll know I\u2019ve tried.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u00a0This brilliant line of dialogue is the work of Howard R. Cohen, the screenwriter behind such treasured trash classics as Vampire Hookers, Saturday the 14th<\/sup>, Space Raiders, Stryker and Deathstalker. It can heard coming from the lovely lips of Lana Clarkson in the sword-and-sorcery cheapie Barbarian Queen<\/strong>. Am I the only one who considers her the Marilyn Monroe of B-movies? I can\u2019t be. In the milieu of straight-to-video movies, the Deathstalker star was a hot goddess. Sadly, she was taken from us far too soon when that whack job record producer Phil Spector murdered her in 2003. She was a true beauty.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Directed by Hector Olivera (Cocaine Wars), Barbarian Queen<\/strong> is an American-Argentine production that was distributed by Concorde, the company founded by Roger Corman after he left New World in 1983. The \u201cKing of Schlock\u201d serves as executive producer on this cheesy fantasy flick featuring Clarkson as a female warrior named Amethea looking to free her people from the clutches of the evil tyrant Lord Arrakur (Chapman, Rage of Honor). Dirty bastard that he is, he attacks the village on the day of her wedding to Prince Argan (Zagarino, Where the Boys Are \u201984). That\u2019s right after a couple of his thugs gang rape Amethea\u2019s little sister Taramis (Dunlap, Forbidden World) while she\u2019s out picking flowers. When the dust finally settles, several of the villagers are dead while others (including Taramis and Argan) are taken prisoner.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Having managed to escape by outwitting the dim marauders, Amethea grabs her sword and swears vengeance. Thankfully, she\u2019s not alone in her quest. Riding by her side is her loyal lady-in-waiting Estrild (future Poison Ivy director Shea) and fellow female warrior Tiniara (Traverso, Happy Highschool). On the way, they raid an encampment where a now-traumatized Taramis is being used as a sex slave. The ladies make short work of the men before continuing their journey to Arrakur\u2019s city where they hook up with an underground band of rebels too afraid to take up arms against their common enemy. The leader, a wuss with an eyepatch and a missing arm, doesn\u2019t think they\u2019re ready to fight yet. What does it say about a man when his preteen daughter (Scriven in her only acting gig) has a bigger set of balls? She looks 12, but she\u2019s ready to help take down the awful autocrat.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Movies like Barbarian Queen<\/strong> were very popular with teen boys in the 80s and not because of the violence or fantasy aspect. The main reason can be summed up in a single word, BOOBIES! FACT, teen boys like boobs. It\u2019s a \u201cthe more, the better\u201d kind of deal. There are more naked boobs on display in Barbarian Queen<\/strong> than in some issues of Playboy. Also, the women tend to fight in skimpy costumes that leave nothing to the imagination. These movies are softcore sex fantasies for the D&D crowd. The only problem is that Barbarian Queen<\/strong> doesn\u2019t offer much in the way of fantasy. It has plenty of sword action, but no sorcery.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Barbarian Queen <\/strong>may not have dragons, but it does have a dungeon. And where there\u2019s a dungeon, there\u2019s torture. And where there\u2019s torture, there\u2019s nudity. Our heroine finds this out first-hand when she and her companions are captured and sent to the hellish place which could also serve as an underground S&M club. Amethea is tied spread eagle to a rack (sans top, of course) with a mechanized gauntlet of some kind aimed right at her bust. The creepy dungeonmaster (Middleton) makes the mistake of trying to rape his prisoner. Little does he know what grisly fate awaits him upon entry. She clamps down on his manhood with her vagina muscles and refuses to let go until he releases her from her bonds. When he does, she pushes him into a vat of acid conveniently located right in front of the rack. Don\u2019t you just love twisted s*** like this?<\/p>\n

\u00a0And what of Argan and the other men from the village? They\u2019re being trained to fight as gladiators for Arrakur\u2019s amusement. It\u2019s a job with perks like nightly orgies with the harem girls. This is how Estrild gets with Argan to plot an uprising against their oppressor. Naturally, there\u2019s always that one guy that shouldn\u2019t be trusted. You know, the SOB secretly in league with the main antagonist. Like all such SOBs, his treachery is only a temporary hitch. The fight against evil prevails in the exciting climax. Will good triumph over evil? I think you know the answer to that burning question already.<\/p>\n

\u00a0If you go by the standards of cinema as art, Barbarian Queen<\/strong> is a bad movie. And I mean BAD! From the clumsy sword fighting to the terrible acting to the dopey dialogue to same sets recycled from Deathstalker, it is definitely not in the same league as Casablanca or Conan the Barbarian. Speaking of recycled material, does some of the score sound familiar? It should. You heard it in Battle Beyond the Stars (by James Horner).<\/p>\n

\u00a0To me, Barbarian Queen<\/strong> is pure low budget exploitation gold. It\u2019s S&S junk like Sorceress and The Warrior and the Sorceress, two other Roger Corman flicks. If you go by those markedly lower standards, Barbarian Queen<\/strong> is still pretty bad, but a hell of a lot of fun. All of the things that qualify it as bad make it positively laughable. Once again, the makers cast a lead actor (i.e. Zagarino) that looks like he stepped right off a California beach. The guy can\u2019t act, something he proves every time he opens his mouth to speak. He has quite the physique though. His man-boobs are as prominent as any pair of female boobs that appear in the movie.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Clarkson wasn\u2019t the best actress in the world, but that fearless attitude of hers carried her a long way. She was up for pretty much anything. Although pleasing to the eye, she was definitely more than mere eye candy. Her performance in Barbarian Queen<\/strong> didn\u2019t win any awards nor was it meant to. A movie like this isn\u2019t about good or even passable acting. It\u2019s about hot babes with nice boobs and big swords in that exact order. The only player that even tries to deliver something close to a performance is Dunlap as a young girl suffering the after-effects of multiple rapes. Her character gets over it pretty fast judging by the way she seizes the opportunity to become Arrakur\u2019s newest concubine (it\u2019s all part of the plan).<\/p>\n

\u00a0Oddly enough, I didn\u2019t watch Barbarian Queen<\/strong> until I was in my 20s. I rented it one summer day from a local video store during a period of unemployment. I don\u2019t remember anything about it, so when I rewatched it this past New Year\u2019s Day, it was like seeing it for the first time all over again. It was an entertaining 72 minutes with a plot consisting of recycled bits and pieces of Conan, Deathstalker and other Conan knock-offs. It\u2019s filled with poorly choreographed sword fights, not enough blood and lots of boobs! I can see why it appealed to 15YO boys back in the day. I, however, would have been the lone voice clamoring for more bloodshed. Either way, Barbarian Queen<\/strong> is good goofball fun if you know how to take it. It is its own kind of trash art. Oooh, I can\u2019t help myself. I have to quote one more line from this glorious pile of S&S rubbish:<\/p>\n

Arrakur: \u201cYou are much too beautiful a girl to let yourself be broken into food for the royal dogs.\u201d<\/p>\n

Dialogue like that lives on forever, wouldn\u2019t you agree?<\/p>\n

\"\"
Copyright HAG \u00a92008<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Barbarian Queen (1985)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Concorde Pictures\/Action-Fantasy\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 RT: 72 minutes\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Rated R (violence, rape and a whole lot of nudity)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Director: Hector Olivera\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Screenplay: Howard R. Cohen\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Music: Chris Young and James Horner\u00a0\u00a0 Cinematography: Rodolfo Denevi and Rudi Donovan\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Release date: April 26, 1985 (US)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cast: Lana Clarkson, Katt Shea, Frank Zagarino, Dawn Dunlap, Susana Traverso, Victor […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1565,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[27,9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1478","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-b-movies","category-guilty-pleasures"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/08\/Barbarian-Queen-PIC.jpg?fit=620%2C348&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1478","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1478"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1478\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2032,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1478\/revisions\/2032"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1565"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1478"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1478"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1478"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}