http://blog.movies.yahoo.com/blog/885-meet-the-new-conan I'm pretty stoked for this. Arnold's Conan is always among my top ten all-time and I think Momoa is an outstanding choice to renew the franchise.
I've read all of Robert E Howards books so I'll reserve final judgement till after I see the movie or should I say, when it comes out on Netflix. On the surface, it doesn't look promising imo.
I'm with Nabo. IMO, Jason Momoa would make an excellent Conan. It looks like Ron Perlman is the villain, which also seems to be a good casting choice. A lot of us are going to relish just thinking about the role to be played by Rose McGowan.
Well, good luck to them, what I liked about the first Conan was Arnold's really thick Austiran accent "Crom, I never ahhsked dyu for anyting..." To me, it made the film.
People forget that this film was fresh off Arnold's last Mr. Olympia win in 1980, and that he had zero previous dramatic acting experience. He did fine considering, but Milius had the right idea: have him say only as much dialogue as necessary to advance the storyline. For instance: despite all their scenes together, Conan only says five total words of dialogue to Valeria during the entire film.
It worked really well though, that was one of the things I liked about the original Conan..that and his success at Mr Olympia competitions really preceded his role. To me it is much more difficult for an Actor to have no lines, and carry a film, then to have a phone book full of scenes of dialog. Eh, maybe I'm still pissed that Molly Hatchet Album covers never matched their music.
I always wondered if they actually commissioned those paintings from Frazetta or just licensed existing ones to use on their album covers. I remember always spending an inordinate amount of time drooling over those at the record store, even though I didn't know their music at all.
I can recall listening to Molly Hatchet on the radio, then seeing the album covers, and wondering what the heck they were thinking? Used to be a metalhead and was always let down by them. Used to like the adult format Conan magazines, far more so than the regular comic books. Funny thing is, the old fiction writers like Howard and Burroughs used far more advanced ideas then what the genre has become today, Burroughs mentioned Anthropithacus as a huge part of a Tarzan story line, have to wonder if a modern writer would do the same and expect their reader to follow along.
I wouldn't expect so; read this account of Howard's genesis of the character: How many writers today, especially writers of popular fiction—much less screenwriters—do you believe read Plutarch? Or mythology? People with any sort of education in Howard's time had a well-rounded knowledge of literature; writers, even more so. Today, anyone can "write" a screenplay with just a greenlit treatment and the hiring of a ghost. Generally speaking, there's little to no depth behind anything with a significant budget that makes it to the screen today.
Which is what made the LOTR trilogy enjoyable, Tolkein had written, extensively, his own mythology that the reader could semi follow along with in the film, the first Conan was much the same with Howard creating his own character loosely based on Mythology, and Burroughs wrote of the then exotic African wilderness filling it with characters and concepts from his then modern world. Now though, such depth is sorely lacking as you say, to much Green Screen and Ghost writers mixed into the Genre. Of the modern films I've seen probably the closest to the manner in which those authors wrote would be Jurassic Park, maybe not the whole series, but the first one was right in line with that style of science fiction.
Momoa was good in SG-A. he looks very different with the new hair-do though. actually looks a little smaller.
If they do this right (make it rated R and make it controversially violent and sexual) it will be huge. Every red blooded male between 20 and 60 will want to see it, dragging their beleaguered woman with them. It will make a mint. They would make out better if it WAS controversially violent and sexual, the media will be crying, the critics will kill it and every Christian group in America will talk about how it is destroying the fabric of the nation, giving the film a mountain of free pub. This is Conan. It must be rated "R", it must have a massive amount of violence (good violence, like how I felt the first time I saw Braveheart) and it must have a high T and A factor. If they soften it to make it "teen friendly" and get all PC with it not to offend the delicate masses then it will not be "Conan". Conan is not Spider Man. If it is rated PG-13 it will be an EPIC piece of crap.
So...if I'm reading you correctly, you want this to be violent? By the very nature of the world in which Conan lives, this cannot be anything less than bloody.
Exactly. If it resembles any thing like "Kull The Conqueror" with Kevin Sorbo, it will blow major chunks.
Right on. Kull the Conquerer was just bad, and the new shows like "the Seeker" or whatever it's name is are not what Conan should be about, "Kill the men, hear the lament of the women!" No Shakespearian Soliloquy's concerning inner torment and deep seated angst over his place in the universe.
Just make it good is all I ask. I normally like the first versions of films better. With very few exceptions.