Bad Movie Club: The Warrior and the Sorceress

1984

Bad Movie Rating: 3/5 (Johnny: 2.75/5; Mark: unable to finish due to technical difficulties; Josh: 4/5; Fred: 4/5; Libby: must have fallen asleep while counting breasts)

Rating: 7/20

Plot: See Yojimbo. Or A Fistful of Dollars. Same plot.

Right down to a scene where David Carradine walks back into the story through a wall of smoke. And Carradine squints a lot, but that might just because the guy was stoned out of his mind during this movie's production.

That poster up there probably looks familiar. It's the work of Boris Vallejo, an artist who specializes in scantily-clad fantasy characters on sword and sandal movie posters. And, of course, the National Lampoon's Vacation movies.

This is exactly what you'd expect from a mid-80's fantasy movie--too-big music, a sketch of a good v. evil plot, some weird-looking characters, guys comparing the length of their swords, people fighting over a well. There are four things that keep things interesting though:

1) David Carradine, a guy who always made great career choices. I said he was stoned out of his mind up there, and he very likely was. Still, he's got cool boots (Pocahontas boots, Johnny said) and is the personification of cool. Does he ever display anything higher than "barely competent" when it comes to action chops? No, not really. He's sluggish and clunky when swinging giant swords around or kicking people in the midsection. But there's just something about the guy--those eyes, the way he puts his lips together, that voice. Here, he has a great moment where he rubs his own nipple, ostensibly as a form of intimidation. Oh, and there's one great moment where the sound effects guy used a sword whoosh sound to go with a Carradine kick. If there's one action star who deserves that treatment, it's Carradine.

2) One of the bad guys has a pet lizard. He's the Jabba the Hutt of this movie, and his puppet friend is his Salacious Dumb. The puppetry with this minor character's scenes would likely make Jim Henson shit his pants.

The lizard puppet is the one on the right. 

3) In their efforts to make the "Sorceress" in the title of this movie a strong heroine, the screenwriters decided to have her run around topless the entire movie. She's Maria Socas, who was probably used to the objectification since she did a lot of these movies. (We saw her in Wizards of the Lost Kingdom.) But seriously, the amount of screen time her boobs got in this movie was a little ridiculous.

4) There's a four-breasted woman, about six years before we got to see 75% magic on the silver screen in Total Recall. I'd give you a picture, but this is a family-friendly blog. My inquiry ("Does anybody know if Cecilia Narova really has four breasts?") is that actress's only thread on her imdb message board.

Oh, I also liked two "idiot" characters full-mentally-challenged by Daniel March and John Overby. This was the only movie for both of those guys. Their names were Blather and Gabble, and if you have to credit this movie for anything--other than the lizard puppet character, David Carradine, or the gratuitous nudity including a scene with a tri-titted stripper--it's the names. Zeg, Bludge, Bal Caz, Burgo, Blather, Gabble, Scarface.