One tier of fantasy adventure is the kind that everyone knows across different generations – from Star Wars to Lord Of The Rings – while others on the lower tier are tied to a time and place, and probably known more by the one generation that grew up with them on video tape or cable television re-runs. The Beastmaster (1982), directed by Don Coscarelli (Phantasm, Bubba Ho-Tep) and based on a novel by Andre Norton, is a film I’ve been aware of by reputation, seeing its sequels advertised in video store magazines or referenced as a punchline to a joke. I’m not a D&D guy or a fantasy novels guy really, but I do enjoy sword-and-sorcery movies from this 1980s period, most often produced in the wake of Conan The Barbarian’s box office success. While my absolute favourite in this genre remains the hazy, dreamlike, brutal and strange Conquest directed by Lucio Fulci, The Beastmaster was satisfyingly entertaining, mostly around its title concept.
As these stories usually begin, a villainous high priest – named Maxx and played by Rip Torn – learns of a prophecy that he will be killed by the unborn son of King Zed; kidnapping the child and sending them off to be killed by one of his monstrous subordinates, the task is interrupted by a kindly farmer with a hectic weapon. The child grows up to be Dar (Marc Singer), a muscular He-Man type who also has the power to physically communicate with animals. When his entire village is massacred by the Juns – bald-headed murderers allied with Maxx – Dar takes up his adopted father’s weapons, and travels across the mountainous terrain (filmed across California desert) while employing his Beastmaster power. Yes, Dar becomes friends with a mighty hawk, a tiger (dyed black to resemble a panther), and a pair of ferrets that he names Kodo and Podo. So this was the aspect I loved when Dar communicates with the animals, either experiencing the POV of the hawk, or getting into comedy hijinks with his ferret friends; when the Beastmaster squawks for his hawk, I squawk with him – when the Beastmaster cries for his ferret friends, I cry with him.
Eventually Dar bands together with allies including the slave girl Kiri (Tanya Roberts) and the undercover soldier Seth (John Amos) to defeat Maxx and the Juns, and return the kingdom to its original rule. Now this is like a live action version of thirteen year old boys laying with He-Man figures, and is dated by its macho sexism and some of its dated effects (Dar arrives at his kingdom, which is a forced perspective shot of the actor looking at a model city). Yet there’s plenty of imagery and sequences that speak to the fantasy cover/van mural/heavy metal album imagery of sacrificial temples, tunnels with hidden threats, and a climactic swordfight against a backdrop of flames. That, and it’s fantastic to see the shark-grin, salty-dog bellow of Rip Torn as the bad guy complete with fake nose and hawkish eyebrows. I also enjoyed Marc Singer’s muscular physicality – he looks like one of those fantasy paintings come to life. Photographed by John Alcott (cinematographer of 2001, Barry Lyndon and The Shining), and scored by Lee Holdridge.
While a little long and the very instance of a stock 1980s fantasy movie, it still has an earnestness to its sensibility and has enough derring do and occasional strangeness to stand apart from the pack. Available to stream on Amazon Prime. Recommended.
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