Conan the Barbarian – John Milius, 1982

Conan the Barbarian

USA, 1982

Director: John Milius

Script: Oliver Stone and John Milius (based on stories by Robert E. Howard)

Cast: Arnold Schwarzenegger (Conan), James Earl Jones (Thulsa Doom), Max von Sydow (King Osric), Sandahl Bergman (Valeria), Ben Davidson (Rexor), Cassandra Gava (The Witch), Gerry López (Subotai), Mako (The Wizard/Narrator)

Music: Basil Poledouris

Story

In the Hyborian Era, a remote and forgotten time, little Conan lives in a village in the middle of the inhospitable and snowy landscapes of northern Cimmeria. His father, the village blacksmith, instructs him on the importance of handling weapons, the art of war and the secret of steel: “You can’t trust anyone in this life. Not men, not women, not beasts. Only this (the sword) can you trust”.

One day, Conan watches in the forest as a horde of tough warrior riders approaches dangerously.

The invading soldier is commanded by the sinister sorcerer Thulsa Doom. Once in Conan’s village, the barbarian outsiders loot and raze everything, setting fire to the huts. Conan’s father falls in battle and is eaten by ferocious dogs. Everyone is put to the sword except the children, who are taken prisoner. Little Conan witnesses his mother being beheaded by Thulsa Doom. The child’s memory is engraved with the banner carried by the invaders: Two snakes crossed over a moon and a rising sun. Conan is taken as a slave; and must work for years, chained and whipped, turning a wheel.

As “what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger”, time passes and Conan is transformed into a spectacular colossus. Then his captors sell him to slave traders. With his new masters, he must perform as a gladiator, engaging in fierce fights to the death to the delight of a bloodthirsty public. Conan is always the winner, forging himself into a seasoned warrior. His master wants to make him an elite gladiator, and takes him to the masters of the Far East to learn from them how to wield the sword.

In the tent of a tribal warlord of the steppes, he asks those present:

“What is the best thing in life?” One replies: “The vast steppe, a fast horse, hawks on your fist and the wind in your hair.”

“Wrong! Conan, what’s the best thing in life?” “To crush enemies, see them driven before you and hear the lamentation of their women.” The leader approves with satisfaction of the Cimmerian gladiator’s response.

One night, Conan is released and runs to seek refuge in the rugged mountains. To hide from the wolves that are chasing him, he enters an underground cave, which turns out to be the ancient tomb of an antediluvian king, mummified on his throne next to his sword.

Conan takes that thousand-year-old sword to himself and sets out to find the murderers of his parents, the invaders who destroyed and enslaved his people. The only clue he has at the moment is the memory of the banner that the horde displayed: the two crossed snakes on the sun and the crescent.

During the search for his enemies, Conan reaches out to a voluptuous and enigmatic woman, asking her for information about the banner of the two crossed snakes. While having sex with her, the witch is transformed into a monstrous vampire creature. Before defeating her, the witch tells him to go to Zamora.

On the way to Zamora, Conan meets Subotai, an expert Hyrkanian thief. The two become friends (they have a memorable conversation about their respective gods), and when they arrive in the city (in the “evil” civilized world) they begin to rob together, sharing the booty. Shortly afterwards they are also joined by Valeria, an attractive thief with whom the barbarian falls in love. The three of them decide to enter a high fortified tower, a construction with an evil aura used by the followers of the reptilian order as their headquarters and which arouses fear in many of the city’s inhabitants.

After climbing the tower, they witness the disturbing ceremony that takes place there: Dozens of young people in a trance-like state worship a giant snake, ready to immolate themselves for it. Conan soon discovers that these grotesque rites are being performed by the cult led by Thulsa Doom, the killer of his parents.

Conan and his friends break into the tower, taking the treasures they find there (especially the gem known as “The Eye of the Serpent”) and killing the monstrous snake.

Days after the assault on the tower, they are surrounded by King Osric’s guards and led into his presence.

Osric exclaims: “What audacity! What insolence! What arrogance! I congratulate you.”

For the sovereign does not intend to punish them: He promises them more riches if they release his daughter, who has fallen into the nets of the sect.

One night, Conan sets off in search of the murderers of his family without Valeria and Subotai knowing it (she has tried to persuade him to abandon the search for Thulsa Doom). On the way he meets a magician (the story’s narrator), in charge of guarding a set of stony burial mounds similar to dolmens. Conan arrives at Seth’s Mountain of Power, where a procession of Doom’s followers takes place. After knocking out one of the priests, he disguises himself with his robe and tries to infiltrate the cult’s adherents, but is soon discovered and brought before the cult’s leading sorcerer. Once face to face, they talk about the enigma of steel. The sorcerer tries to show the barbarian that flesh is mightier than steel, and orders one of the young women bewitched by him to jump to her death to prove it: “Flesh, as a weapon, is much mightier than any sword,” says Doom, since steel depends on the flesh of man to be shaped and used. Next, the necromancer orders Conan to be crucified on the Tree of Misfortune, in the middle of a barren desert.

Vultures begin to fly over him, but Conan is still strong enough to bite the neck of one of those birds of prey that try to peck him. Increasingly exhausted, the barbarian is about to breathe his last, but is rescued at the last moment by Valeria and Subotai. His friends lower the badly wounded barbarian from the cross and carry him to the dolmens where the Wizard is located. Valeria begs the thaumaturge of the tumuli to save Conan, and he answers that the gods demand a very high price for this. Valeria claims to be willing to pay it, and from that moment on she devotes herself to watching over Conan uninterruptedly until he is completely restored. She protects him from the ghosts and demons of the underworld who try to take him away at night.

Conan recovers all his strength again and Valeria swears to him that she will always be by his side “even if she has to return from the Beyond”.

All three return to the Mountain of Power of Seth, epicenter of the cult of Thulsa Doom, and enter it through tunnels. There they witness new obscene and depraved rituals in an underground palace, including an orgy and the preparation in a cauldron of a kind of cannibal soup. This time, Thulsa Doom transforms himself into a huge and frightening snake, fleeing the place before the arrival of Conan. Conan and his comrades release the princess and are about to go, but Doom fires a serpentine arrow at the retreating intruders. The arrow mortally wounds Valeria, who succumbs soon after in the arms of the bereaved barbarian. She herself realizes before she expires that this was the price she had to pay to save Conan.

Valeria is cremated at night on a funeral pyre in front of her friends. Conan, brooding and gloomy, now has one more loved one to avenge, and prepares for the final battle…

Commentary

Conan the Barbarian is undoubtedly the most popular and ingrained character in the genre of sword and sorcery. Warrior, adventurer, thief and conqueror, he is also the prototype of the quintessential Nietzschean hero. Created in 1932 by the author Robert E. Howard, who wrote stories for the pulp magazine “Weird Tales”, the stories of the barbarian would reap great successes in the decades to come: first in the comic, after being adapted by scriptwriter Roy Thomas for Marvel publishing, and later also in celluloid, with this one “Conan the Barbarian” by John Milius. The film broke box office records, giving rise to a couple of sequels in the following years (“Conan the Destroyer” in 1984 and “Red Sonja” in 1985, both by Richard Fleischer) and a large number of imitations and rip-offs inspired by the figure of the surly and muscular barbarian.

Milius’ “Conan” would catapult to fame the bodybuilder and former Mr. Universe Arnold Schwarzenegger, who until now had only participated in mediocre and little known films (such as the nonsensical “Hercules in New York”). Arnold was a disciple of one of the greats of the peplum genre, the British Reg Park – an old school bodybuilder who starred in “The Conquest of Atlantis” (Vittorio Cottafavi, 1961) among other titles.

Sandahl Bergman, an actress also quite unknown up to this moment, gives life to Valeria, the female counterpart of the hero. Conan’s mother, who is decapitated in the opening scenes, is played by Nadiuska, an actress of German and Hungarian origin who is very famous in Spain for her participation in films from the late seventies. The role of the little Conan fell to Jorge Sanz, brother of the better known (singer) Alejandro.

“Conan the Barbarian” was shot almost entirely in Spain, specifically in Almeria, where hundreds of westerns were also filmed. John Milius, by the way, was a great admirer of Sergio Leone. There were also scenes that were shot in Segovia (like the initials, set in the snowy Cimmeria) or in the province of Cuenca. Milius and his team were able to convey great aesthetic beauty to the entire film; from the landscapes to the sets, including the costumes and weapons. The film includes epic combat scenes and also touches on the theme of love beyond death (“Do you want to live forever?”). The script was written by Oliver Stone (screenwriter, among many other titles, of “Scarface” by Brian DePalma). The Italian producer Dino De Laurentiis provided the large budget.

Some Howardian purists maintain that the film is not faithful to the character, but the truth is that Milius and Stone (with the collaboration of Roy Thomas) adapted elements of several of Howard’s stories to the script, creating a kind of filmic pastiche combined with a new plot. Among those stories are “The Elephant’s Tower” (set when Conan is a young thief in Zamora) or “A Witch Will Be Born” (where the hero is crucified). Conan’s slavery and the forced labor he must perform on the wheel of pain, as well as his later employment as a gladiator, were innovations to the barbarian’s life brought by Milius. However, the most important thing is the spirit of the character – which, as we will see, is respected.

The director was influenced not only by stories of sword and sorcery or peplums, but also by Japanese cinema. The scene in which Conan’s body is painted with magic rune-like characters to bring him back to health is inspired by the Japanese legend of “Hoichi the Earless” as adapted by Masaki Kobayashi for his “Kwaidan” (1965). Milius incorporated aesthetic elements from “The Seven Samurai” (Akira Kurosawa, 1954) to recreate Conan’s final battle against Thulsa Doom’s men.

One of the essential components of the film is the excellent and very stimulating soundtrack by the composer Basil Poledouris, which contains operistic and choral themes with pompous Wagnerian touches (similar also to Carl Orff’s “Carmina Burana”). It is difficult to imagine a style of music that fits the character and the Hyborian Age better. However, Ennio Morricone would also do a good job of composing the music for “Red Sonja” in 1985 (which is probably the only thing that can be saved from that film).

The character of Thulsa Doom in Howard’s stories does not belong to the Hyborian era in which Conan lives, but to the “pre-Cataclysmic era” (before the sinking of Atlantis) and is a character in the stories of Kull the Conqueror, another Howardian figure. To create “his” Conan’s antagonist, Milius amalgamated into one Thulsa Doom and the evil priest Thoth-Amon, a Stygian king and sorcerer who does appear in Conan’s original stories.

The most important part of the plot, beyond the usual story of the protagonist’s revenge against those who killed his family, is in my opinion the transcendent dichotomy that is established between two opposing world views: Barbarism versus civilization. And in an even deeper dimension: The pure spirit of the hero (Conan) against the grey mentality of the herd (Thulsa Doom’s sectarians).

There are those who claim, that beyond being a usual adventure film with the sole purpose of entertaining, “Conan the Barbarian” also contains a philosophical-esoteric message (which already permeates the writings of Howard). Conan would embody the Nietzschean Übermensch, the one who surpasses himself and manages to free himself from the chains of the material world. Conan represents the purity of barbarism against the decadence and rottenness of civilization. The barbarians are rude, savage and brutal, but at the same time loyal, honorable, brave and even innocent; for they have not yet been corrupted by the materialism, the greed and the softness of the civilized. Throughout Howard’s stories (and this is also reflected in the film), Conan’s contempt for the civilized man (today we would say “bourgeois”) is shown again and again; he considers him vile, petty, soft and pusillanimous.

Besides: Conan does not understand why civilized people bow down submissively before their gods, waiting for them to solve their problems, instead of conquering their destiny by themselves. Conan’s spirituality is diametrically opposed to that of Judaeo-Christianity. The barbarian sees Crom (the god of his people) as a kind of teacher or guide, as a hidden comrade, and not as an idol to which he must kneel or sacrifice (as the “civilized” do in the Hyborian Age). Conan speaks to him as an equal and sometimes even curses him:

“Crom, I have never prayed to you before, I am not good at it, nobody, not even you will remember if we were good or bad men, why we fought or why we died, no, the only thing that matters is that two face many, that is what matters, courage pleases you Crom, grant me then a petition, grant me revenge, and if you do not listen to me go to hell!”

For Conan and his warrior caste, divinity is not something alien, abstract and distant; it is an energy that must be awakened and that each one carries within himself in potential; that is what gives them their courage. “Crom” is only an external symbol of divinity.

The crucifixion of Conan is reminiscent of that of Wotan (Odin) on the Tree of Horror.

The reptilian Thulsa Doom comes to be like the Demiurge that the Gnostics equated with Satan (or as his representative on Earth), and is the architect of an insane cult with planetary pretensions.

Thulsa Doom gains his followers by bewitching them (today we would say “brainwashing” them), nullifying their will. When confronted by Conan on his lavish stage and in the presence of his subjects, Doom tries to “hypnotize” the barbarian, winning him over to his cult (“Who is your father if not me?”). But Conan, with fierce determination, manages to resist his pernicious influences.

The followers of the sect are in a way comparable to modern man: spiritually castrated, unconsciously converted into a servant (of the system, of the prevailing ideology, of money…) Brainwashed beings, who have lost their volitional energy and the more free they think they are, the more they are trapped in the matrix.

But that’s another story…

Videocommentary to Conan the Barbarian

Get Sword and sorcery in cinema: Conan and other barbarians: A filmic guide HERE!

Get Conan the Barbarian HERE!

(This is an affiliate link. I may earn a commission if you purchase through these link, at no extra cost to you. As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases.)

Get a POSTER of Conan the Barbarian HERE!

(This is an affiliate link. I may earn a commission if you purchase through these link, at no extra cost to you. As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases.)