I can almost see Beavis sitting back on the couch, licking the yellow Cheeze Puff dust off his fingers and saying "Yep, nothing like sitting down to a nice bag of Cheeze Puffs and a good old Barbarian Women movie." It's sometimes a fascinating if disreputable genre, who's modern form is traceable at least back to 1972's ATTACK OF THE BARBARIAN WOMEN by Alfonso Brescia, or possibly even PREHISTORIC WOMEN from 1967 era Hammer. There is one reason to watch them, and that is to observe hawt, half-naked chicks chop each other & anyone handy up with broadswords before relaxing in the saunas together. Gotta love the Bronze Age some days.
As others have stated this one isn't bad, right up there with BARBARIAN QUEEN as probably the best examples of the mid 80's Americanized version of the genre, which probably seemed like a good marketing bet in the wake of the success of CALIGULA and Lucio Fulci's CONQUEST, which this is basically a combination of. They are usually a good bet on the entertainment factor because firstly, the cast members playing the Barbarian Women will all have to be in peak physical shape to look good in their designer fur & leather bikini costumes. People who take care of their bodies usually enjoy showing them off, so the ladies won't be adversed to ideas like being oiled up for frontal shots of their abs & thighs. Couple that with a desire to make an impact and we are talking about actresses who will be delighted to appear on screen naked, do sex scenes, and maybe even a snake dance.
This one is curiously plot heavy, and the one thing that kept tweaking my funny bone were all the absurd names given to people, places, events and objects. "We must cross the forest of Anjoo and climb the sacred Nak-Nak tree to find the Sword of Nibblenoon", all said with perfectly straight faces and ample feminine curves. Even the old soothsaying 300 year old witch-lady is hot, and those with a taste for discipline may be amused by the completely subservient & impotent nature of the men in the film. The one guy who is supposedly the hero spends the film locked up in a cage until it's time to feed him to a lioness, and the only male character in the film that makes any kind of an impression is Joseph Whipp's at-times hilarious meanie sorcerer villain, who not only gets to sleep with the lead actress but gets some genuine laughs playing his role in a totally blasé, non-mystical manner. He's just an evil rotten dude endowed with some kind of magical force, basically wants to destroy the world, enslave humanity and conquer Hell. You have to admire someone who knows what they want, and has a scheme to achieve it.
The only thing I didn't really like about the film was the one problem I have with the whole Barbarian Women genre, which is that the plots lend themselves to scenes that will inevitably feature sexual violence against the scantily clad heroines -- Fortunately this one aborts it's gang rape before the fireworks start but it's still kind of disturbing to watch a couple of big-haired 80's Valley Girl types get roughed up by a bunch of scummy, sweaty, degenerate male extras who look like roadies for Meatloaf. I guess the fact that they all get killed off after wards is supposed to make it all even out, but notice how you don't see a lot of films like this being made anymore.
So get a bag of Nachos or whatever, spark up and enjoy the show. Beats the Global Warming movie genre at least.
6/10 for being so relaxingly stupid, and over quickly.
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