Conquest (1984)

Don't listen to the negative reviews

Instead, you get a movie that's enjoyable enough, but leaves you feeling like it could have been much, much more.

The film's masterful storytelling did its job. The message was clear. No need to overdo.

The film may be flawed, but its message is not.

Fulci does it again! Good Kills, Fun, Woman being torn apart, Beheaded Hero! Good movie. Acting is OK. Dubbing OK, not great. Good music. Good camera work. The story slows in the middle. Maybe a few too many fight scenes. Good kills. A woman is torn apart. The hero is beheaded. In what movie will the hero be beheaded. What director/film maker will take this risk. Fulci does it. I'm not a fan of all Fulci movies. But I've seen some greats. Like Don't Torture a Duckling, and New York Ripper. Great quote "My enemies call me ---" "What do your friends call you?" "I don't have any friends". Good fun movie. The cartoon effects sucked. But all the kills and other effects work well.

Despite being released on DVD by Blue Underground some five years ago, I have never come across this Italian "sword and sorcery" item on late-night Italian TV and, now that I have seen it for myself, I know exactly why. Not because of its director's typical predilection for extreme gore (of which there is some examples to be sure) or the fact that the handful of women in it parade topless all the time (it is set in the Dark Ages after all)…it is, quite simply, very poor stuff indeed. In fact, I would go so far as to say that it may very well be the worst of its kind that I have yet seen and, believe me, I have seen plenty (especially in the last few years i.e. following my excursion to the 2004 Venice Film Festival)! Reading about how the film's failure at the time of initial release is believed to have led to its director's subsequent (and regrettable) career nosedive into mindless low-budget gore, I can see their point: I may prefer Fulci's earlier "giallo" period (1968-77) to his more popular stuff horror (1979-82) myself but, even on the latter, his commitment was arguably unquestionable. On the other hand, CONQUEST seems not to have inspired Fulci in the least – seeing how he decided to drape the proceedings with an annoyingly perpetual mist, sprinkle it with incongruent characters (cannibals vs. werewolves, anyone?), irrelevant gore (we are treated to a gratuitous, nasty cannibal dinner just before witnessing the flesh-eating revelers having their brains literally beaten out by their hairy antagonists!) and even some highly unappetizing intimacy between the masked, brain-slurping villainess (don't ask) and her slimy reptilian pet!! For what it is worth, we have two heroes for the price of one here: a young magic bow-carrying boy on some manhood-affirming odyssey (Andrea Occhipinti) and his rambling muscle-bound companion (Jorge Rivero i.e. Frenchy from Howard Hawks' RIO LOBO [1970]!) who, despite being called Mace (short for Maciste, perhaps?), seems to be there simply to drop in on his cavewoman from time to time and get his younger protégé out of trouble (particularly during an exceedingly unpleasant attack of the 'boils'). Unfortunately, even the usual saving grace of such lowbrow material comes up short here as ex-Goblin Claudio Simonetti's electronic score seems awfully inappropriate at times. Fulci even contrives to give the film a laughably hurried coda with the surviving beefy hero going aimlessly out into the wilderness (after defeating one and all with the aid of the all-important magic bow…so much for his own supposed physical strength!) onto his next – and thankfully unfilmed – adventure!

I have noticed that "Conquest" is one of those divisive films that the viewer will either love or hate. Before watching, it is important to remember that this film was not done on a big budget, nor is it meant to be seen as anything more than a fantasy film. It is not realistic, as so many of Fulci's other films are.Fulci achieved an ambiance of cosmic proportions with "Conquest." The fog and the monsters and the creatures are fantastic, I think. Is it cheesy? A little, maybe. But it's not unlike a dream you wake up from and think, 'what the hell was that?' He treats us to more than you'd expect amounts of gore in "Conquest," more than any fantasy film I've ever seen. People getting ripped apart, bludgeoned, etc.Another thing I really like about "Conquest" is the music and the setting. I think they work so well together. I wonder where he filmed it, and how he achieved the overall darkness. It's like he only filmed on hazy days.Anyway, I recommend this to Fulci fans. Other people won't get it or appreciate it. It's too ahead of it's time.8 out of 10, kids.

Once when I was 15 after watching Conan The Barbarian I drank a bottle of jager, took 5 hits of acid, and spent a weekend in the woods. My only company was Giorgio Moroder's Greatest Hits CD I had in my Sony Discman, a fog machine, and my thoughts. I think the cast and crew of Conquest had a similar pre-production. An ass naked female priestess in a gold mask whose powers supposedly cause the sun to rise and fall has enslaved the people of the land (who appear to be 14 nomadic herders) with her army of coke snorting Wolf Men. Now let me make this clear. These are not were-wolves as they never transform from wolf to man. They are Wolf-Men. Men with bulky fur bodies and wolf monster faces whose masks possess just enough articulation of the jaw to spout such classic lines as, "I'll kill you, I'll kill your people" before tearing a fine maiden apart like a wishbone after Thanksgiving dinner. Enter young Hugh Jackman who is sent on one of those missions where the old sage tells the hero all this stuff he must do to fulfill his destiny but leaves it vague enough that you get the feeling he has no idea what he's talking about. The mission involves thwarting the priestess' reign of terror with a laser bow. Let me just say right now any movie that involves a laser bow is alright with me. Along the way Hugh Jackman encounters Armand Assante. Armand Assante is the world weary warrior to Hugh Jackman's inexperienced hero to be. They become a team after Armand Assante uses some pro-wrestling maneuvers and nun-chuks made from femur bones to dispatch some wolf-men attacking Hugh Jackman. Armand Assante philosophizes to Hugh Jackman that he is a friend to all animals and will never harm one. Wolf-Men are not part of this philosophy. He then kills a hunter and takes his meal for his own justifying the eating of the animal and killing of the man by stating it was already dead and the hunter was a murderer of his friends the animals. I think you can be acquitted in some mid-western states with this same defense. Along their journey Hugh Jackman and Armand Assante battle dopplegangers of themselves sent by the priestess, survive festering poisoned wounds, encounter zombies, and are rescued from death by dolphins. Just when Hugh Jackman seems to have gotten the swing of things he's decapitated (I knew that old bastard had no idea what he was talking about) leaving Armand Assante to take up the laser bow in a finale that showcases FX the like I have not seen since. Blue laser arrows decimate the wolf-men horde and destroy the gold mask of the priestess revealing she has the face of Jason Voorhees from Friday the 13th Part 4. I would still do her. She then turns into a wolf proving she really was a bitch. My earlier discourse on Wolf-Men and Were-Wolves still holds up as she was in fact a She-Wolf. She runs away defeated leaving the people of the land, all 14 of them, freed. Armand Assante walks off into the sunrise as it freeze frames which I take as being a message that no woman has the power to make the sun rise or fall. At this point when the Italian Synth score kicks in for one last time I am confronted with the only problem I had with the movie and why I gave it 9 instead of 10 stars. The first credit reads "any similarities to persons living or dead is purely coincidental" which implies the makers of the film made the whole thing up. I felt a sense of betrayal after being presented with what I thought was a glimpse into our ancient history.