...so in spite of my attempts to hide from my producers, I have been dragged out and patiently reminded of the fact that I have a contract to fulfill. I swear, when I started Sword and Sorcery 2020 with Krull, I was all "Oh, what a gas! Oh, this will be fun! I won't live to regret this!". I was correct, I almost didn't.
Also, yes. In spite of how much I'm about to tear this film a whole multiverse of new ones - Deathstalker is still the worst film I've reviewed for Sword and Sorcery 2020 and possibly for all of my Reel Thoughts segment in the years I've been doing it - and this is not a statement I make lightly in any sort of way. Regardless, here we are at the end - the last film of Sword and Sorcery 2020. It's been a heck of a road, hasn't it? Don't worry, by the way, that won't be the end of the genre in my reviews - there are plenty more films to be had (including two more Deathstalker films - cue deep and epic groan).
So, let's get this over with. And yes, I'm aware that Spoony already reviewed this and the original Beastmaster film. Like I said in the Yor, the Hunter from the Future review, I'm not really miffed. In any case, we begin with Dar being put on trial by the evil wizard Arklon for crimes against the kingdom. What's that? The first movie ended with Dar putting his half-brother on the throne? Yeah, forget about that. I don't even recall Tal being mentioned in this movie - in fact, at one point, Dar refers to his animals as the only family he has. Awkward.
No, instead, Dar (played by a returning Marc Singer) is now in the clutches of the evil wizard Arklon (Wings Hauser). If that name is familiar, it really shouldn't be...and I mean Wings Hauser, not Arklon, though he really shouldn't be familiar, either. Unless, of course, you realize that Wings Hauser was in the movie Tough Guys Don't Dance, which gave us this brilliant dialogue read:
...no, that isn't Wings Hauser, but that is about the level of goofy chipmunk bullshit we're dealing with in this movie.
Regardless, Arklon is having Dar executed for rebelling against his rule and Dar being...y'know...the Beastmaster...summons a bunch of his animal friends to fight his way out and escape. From the beginning, the combat comes off as more goofy than in the first one. 1980's S&S films (look at that, so many reviews and I finally found a way to shorten Sword and Sorcery) were never really big on "realistic" violence (with some exceptions), but like the shift between Conan the Barbarian and Conan the Destroyer, the second film has more of a slapstick comedic feel to the combat...which really doesn't help matters.
After a lengthy credits-covered chase scene, Arklon is met by the sorceress Lyranna (Sarah Douglas - who you might remember from Conan the Destroyer). Cleavage and all, she offers to give Arklon a power that will make him the most powerful being in the world...which he apparently already is? Between having a totalitarian grasp on the world as well as a magical rod of vaguely established magical powers that include things like blasting people with energy beams and making very obviously styrofoam boulders roll toward his opponents.
Arklon's even smart enough to point out that he already rules the world...and yet he goes along with Lyranna's idea. After some travel, she shows him a portal into another dimension - a place called "L.A.".
Yeah...yeah, we're doing this. A portal through time...only not really. LA, aka the "real world" is apparently a completely separate dimension from the world of the Beastmaster, making this not only a really bad movie...but a really bad movie with a title that is a complete lie. On the other side of the portal is a device called the neutron detonator, basically an atomic bomb.
Arklon and Lyranna prepare to go through to LA, but something instead comes through from LA - namely Jackie (Kari Wuhrer), a valley girl/daddy's girl stereotype...and yes, by the way, she's only slightly less annoying than her character in Sliders.
So we have what we think is a story about Jackie being an outsider in Dar's world. Not so, I'm afraid. No, Dar ends up crossing over into the "real world" for hijinks. This is Sean Connery running around in 2024's Scotland levels of upsettingly surreal. I want to try to give what little credit I can where I can give it - Marc Singer is still pretty good as Dar. The animals are definitely a big draw and the work with them is really well done, even if I'm a little confused as to where Dar now has a striped tiger instead of a black one (yes, I know about the black paint - but you're telling me they couldn't find a black tiger anywhere?) and how he only has two ferrets when he should have at least three.
Oh, and James Avery shows up as an LA cop. No doubt just before finishing up his law degree and buying that palatial estate in Bel Air.
And thus, that is the extent of my ability to praise this film. Sorry.
I really don't go into films looking to hate them, I really don't. I will say like I said before that this film is a lot better than several of the movies I've reviewed, though that isn't a particularly high bar to clear. The rest of the film is just...bad. It's just bad. I'm not even the biggest fan of the original Beastmaster (it's a cult classic and a very enjoyable movie, please don't hang me), but I can't imagine what it was like to be a fan of the original film and then see this shat out after nine years of waiting on a sequel or other continuation of the story.
The production of the film was apparently somewhat tumultuous from the jump - with five different people credited as screenwriter, including first (and only)- time director Sylvio Tabet. Tabet had been a producer on the original Beastmaster, but he helmed the director's chair for Beastmaster II - apparently rather suddenly and even threatened to remove the writing credits of Jim Wynorski and R.J. Robertson (both of whom were screenwriters for Deathstalker II - y'know, the one that was actually not a terrible piece of shit) when they protested.
Needless to say, Mr. Tabet was a bit of a dick who clearly had a very unrealistic appraisal of his own abilities and it shows. The actors really don't seem to have much to go on, several scenes that very clearly should have gotten another take either didn't or they didn't use the retakes, and other problems crop up. Wings Hauser is 150% pure ham throughout this movie, literally to his last line where he declares his victory while falling into the molten core of the Earth (after, as Spoony did point out in his review, calling the Beastmaster out to fight in a fucking zoo!).
Literally, the only one more campy than him is the EXTREMELY FLAMBOYANT clothing salesman that Jackie takes Arklon and Lyranna to see when they arrive in Los Angeles.
Seriously, Boy George would have told this guy to take it down a peg.
Or twelve.
In short, Beastmaster II: Through the Portal of Time is a hilariously bad pile of shit. Not a so bad it's good kind of film by any means, but a very good abject lesson in how not to do something. Like with Conan the Destroyer, it goes for a more comedic and child-friendly style that causes the film to suffer as compared to the first one. Like Highlander II, it changes the setting so drastically and almost ignores the previous film to the point where it might as well just go be its own, terrible film.
It's bad from taint to sphincter. Don't watch it if you can help it.
And like that, Sword and Sorcery 2020 is finally done. Thank you for reading along with my Reel Thoughts, everyone! By the time this comes out, it will already be after Christmas, but Happy Holidays and a Happy New Year to everyone out there! Let's get ready to watch 2020 die horribly. It deserves no less!
Beastmaster II: Through the Portal of Time was brought to us by Republic Pictures and New Line Cinema.
For the latest from the MadCapMunchkin, be sure to follow him on Twitter @MadCapMunchkin.
No comments:
Post a Comment