'Conan the Barbarian' (2011)

The closer it gets to Christmas, the less likely I am to be reading all the books that I should be reading as I'm pretty much letting my brain go on permanent time out now. Look, it's been a long year and my brain deserves to just stop for a bit ;o) Just one more day of work and then I'm pretty confident that I can make it through the next week and a bit on auto-pilot. I'm pretty sure that no-one will notice. I'll try and get at least one book review up before Friday but yesterday saw me back at work, after a couple of weeks off sick, and there was no time left for reading after catching up with everything then heading out to see my kids. So what did I do instead? Watched Jason Momoa being Conan the Barbarian of course ;o)

After watching Arnie make for a much better Conan than I remembered, and then reading 'Queen of the Black Coast' the other day, it was inevitable that I'd find myself watching the 2011 'Conan' movie sooner rather than later. It's been a long time since I last watched it and I was interested to see if I felt any differently about now than I did back then. I wasn't a big fan of the movie back in the day and wondered if the passing of time had been kind to it. As it happened, yes... I think I can see a decent film in there that I hadn't seen before. Or maybe I've mellowed a bit and let my standards slip? Or maybe my brain turned to mush, without my realising, and I'll just happily watch anything... To be honest, it could be any of these reasons (after this year, my money has to go on 'Reason 3') but the bottom line, as ever, is that I had a great time watching 'Conan the Barbarian' and, these days, that counts for a lot and I'm prepared to be very forgiving of any film that cheers me up ;o)

I'm not going to go into the plot too much because you've probably already seen the film anyway and even if you haven't, it borrows a lot from the original 'Conan the Barbarian', just with a different villain for Conan to go after. There's a little nod to the 'Born on the Battlefield' comic though and we actually get to see more of Conan growing up in his Cimmerian village which lends a little depth to Conan's character as well as fleshing out his world, just a little bit. The inevitable 'village massacre' happens and then Conan is thrown out into the wide world to seek his revenge, but mostly stay alive. We don't see any of this, adult Conan strides onto the screen as fully formed as I suspect he was when he strode into Robert E. Howard's imagination. And then the film is up and running for real.

A lot of the problems that I had with 'Conan the Barbarian', on a first viewing, are issues that I still have. Mumbling dialogue can be cured with decent headphones, and subtitles, but it still grates that when faced with the world and stories that Howard created, the writers basically decided to retell Schwarzenegger's 'Conan' instead, just a little more so. I still wanted more than just a nod to the 'Tower of the Elephant', I wanted to see it happen! I mean, Conan is a pirate in the movie but there's no Belit? Come on... Having watched the original 'Conan the Barbarian' recently, I found the 'Defeat the End of Level Boss' approach, to the plot, a little easier to deal with this time round. If you're borrowing that plot then fighting an 'End of Level Boss' (and they all were) makes sense as that's what Arnie did.

What I did like was how the world unfolded this time. Instead of namedropping, it felt like a few mentions of cities etc really gave the setting a little context and that made a big difference. Once I'd got off my high horse a little (I needed to but still, why couldn't they use some of Howard's actual stories...?), what really made the difference to me was Jason Momoa's take on Conan and the supporting cast who add to this.

While Arnold Schwarzenegger has a 'noble barbarian, slightly confused by civilisation (but he will still kill you)' thing going on, it feels like Momoa takes things a little further by really emphasising how wild Conan can be. He's an animal that hasn't been tamed yet, might never be tamed, and you can't help but be on your guard for when he decides to cut loose in order to get what he needs. I couldn't take my eyes off the way he moves, all coiled aggression. Momoa also has the whole 'mirth and melancholy' thing absolutely nailed on. Him and Schwarzenegger are two totally different Conan's, I honestly can't call it between them but Momoa's 'Conan' is compelling.

I also liked the fact that the film makers aren't afraid to take the focus off Conan and let other characters have their moment. I'm looking at you in particular Artus, with your larger than life presence and ability to rein Conan in when needed as well as Tamara, who helps Conan get where he needs to be, and save the world at the same time. This isn't a cast that carries Conan, this is a cast of well drawn characters, each with their own quests but all coming together to help each other. You can't help but get behind that.

Add in some brilliantly choreographed fights and you've got a movie that I think captures the spirit of Conan far better than I gave it credit for last time round. It's not perfect but I can forgive a lot when it does the other stuff as well as it does.