t's been years since I've last watched this one, and I was nicely surprised to see that it's held up extremely well over time. We all know who "Conan the Barbarian" is, especially those of us who grew up reading the Marvel Comics version, so I won't go into to much detail there. The film starts out with a young Conan, played by Arnold Swarzenegger, who witnesses his village and parents slaughtered by a band of marauders led by a dude named Thule, who just so happens to be the high priest in some type of evil snake cult. Kidnapped, young Conan is forced to work in a slave labor camp where he is tethered to a big wheel and forced to push it around all day long. For those of you who are looking to spend all of their cash on some type of overpriced home gym, forget the Bowflex my friends. Just push a big wheel around and you'll soon have the biggest damn muscles in the world, because that's what happens to Conan. Now a grown man, Conan's captors see some warrior potential in him and start showing him how to fight and above all, how to wield the almighty sword. Freed by his captors inexplicably, Conan sets out on a quest to find the snake cult and of course, exact a bloody and barbarous revenge in his parents name. Along the way Conan meets up with an Amazonian blond chick that's got killer legs and is quite skilled with a sword. She soon becomes Conan's girlfriend and partner in his search. Also joining our merry gang is an archer and a wizard dude, both were pretty cool and with the Amazon chick, gave Conan a nice group of supporting characters.

Now for the actual film itself. What made this one work is that it is played dead-on with a definite adult vibe to it. There is plenty of nudity, an amazingly high amount of blood splashed around, and just an overall cool dark atmosphere throughout. The costumes and set design are awesome and the special effects, as I mentioned, are nice and wet. It's not a gore film, but we do get heads chopped off, guts savaged by Conan's sword and an awesome looking thirty foot snake that would be all CGI if this was made nowadays. CGI effects, "The Rock" as Conan, and a PG-13 rating along with a Burger King toy tie-in. Yecch. While it is over two hours long, the film never drags to much as there is always some type of sword fight or something to keep your interest. Good fun and a flick that spawned a million barbarian rip-offs. Recommended.