What Not to Watch: Conan the Barbarian (2011)

From time to time, cub reporter Mikey Frontalot will give you the lowdown on a Netflix instant streaming movie that you should not watch.

Conan The Barbarian (2011)

Conan-the-Barbarian-2011It’s always a pleasant surprise to see Ron Perlman in another B movie. You might accidentally feel eager to press play on Conan The Barbarian (2011) if you learn that Mr. Perlman portrays a barbarian clan patriarch who is obsessed with zen and forces the village twelve-year-olds to battle-race through the forest while gargling eggs.

But don’t. Don’t press play on this movie. Mr. Perlman gets offed almost immediately, and charmingly ultraviolent child Conan ages into insufferable LA dance club bottle service Conan. Amuse yourself with how dim and tacky the actor seems when he’s interviewed by a movie theater chain’s best journalists:

Predictably, maybe, his acting is smug and shitty, causing every scene in which he has dialogue to drag and rankle. Also smug and shitty: everything else about this movie. It is so gleeful in its sexism that it approaches camp, but the dead heart of the proceedings drains any potential fun. The action sequences are a patchwork of shots from somebody’s list of things that occur in 3D. The running/leaping sequences are particularly tedious and incoherent, though the sword-fighting doesn’t make any sense either. The whole thing is just a mess.

Here is the best scene:

What a hoot! You might think you’ll laugh and enjoy yourself and have a nice time while watching Conan The Barbarian (2011), but again, please remember, do not watch this movie. It is stinky hogwash that will make your life worse.

Yeah, well, you know, that's just, like, your opinion, man.

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