Preview Post 17/09/20

Hello there readers!

I hope everyone is doing as well as can be hoped in this crazy world! Thankyou for joining me for a preview post on next week’s Pound Shop Flick: Red Sonja.

Red Sonja was released in 1985, was directed by Richard Fleischer and starred Brigitte Nielsen and Arnold Schwarzenegger. It was a box-office bomb, making less than half of the money it cost to make, and Arnie himself says it’s the ‘worst film I have ever made’. A suitable candidate for this blog then! But I came about buying it in a slightly different fashion to previous choices. Most of the ‘Flix’ I review here I’ve never heard of, or am aware are notoriously bad; with Red Sonja though all I had was the name and some questions.

You see, Red Sonja is a name I know well- but not, originally, from this film. As I’ve mentioned before in this blog, I’m a big comic book fan, and ‘Red Sonja’ is a comic book character. She was created in 1973 when Marvel Comics owned the rights to Robert E. Howard’s Conan the Barbarian stories. She is loosely based upon a couple of other Howard characters: ‘ Red Sonya of Rogatino’ and ‘Dark Agnes de Chastillon’ and began to appear in Marvel’s Conan stories. In 2005, Dynamite Entertainment began publishing Sonja stories, and she has remained an in-print character ever since. Now, even if you don’t know Sonja, chances are if you have any interest in fantasy pop-culture, you will recognise her traits:

That’s right people, Sonja is petty much the archetypal Bikini Barbarian. She is fearsome and capable yes, but also nearly naked and, as often as not, heavily servicing the Male Gaze. But the gender and sexual politics of the character are perhaps not as straight-forward as one might imagine. Yes Sonja can be, and has been, used to get horny male readers hot under the collar, and there’s plenty of artwork out there doing just that- but she’s been in good, empowering stories too. Noted feminist write Gail Simone had an excellent run with the character from 2013-2017, and the character is currently in the capable hands of Amy Chu.

I realise I’m drifting away from the central point of this post here, so allow me to bring it back; in much the same way that comic book Red Sonja is inherently wrapped up in sexual politics, so too is the film version. There will be much to talk about, and I suspect that much of my review will be examining these kinds of issues. I will do my utmost to make it readable, respectful and interesting! It was, then, my knowledge of the character, and the fact that I had never heard of her appearing in a film which lead to me purchasing it for the blog. If I’VE never heard of it, it must be bad… right!?

I’ll have the review up by 26th September!

Until then, here’s some stuff to check out!:

I recently saw ‘A Matter of Life and Death’, a film from the 1940s which I very much enjoyed. I liked it for many of the same old Hollywood reasons I like The Wizard of Oz. So if you’re into that kind of thing, or need a heart warming date night movie with a partner of refined taste, check out the trailer (this one is for the 4k restoration, but you get the idea): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S0veuSLLWZ0

In anticipation of the Red Sonja review, you might like to read this article about Conan The Barbarian, and how the brand has survived in the modern era: https://www.pastemagazine.com/movies/conan/barbarian-robert-e-howard/

Finally, long time readers may remember when I used a wrestling gif to illustrate something in my Evolution review. One of the wrestlers involved was Adam Copeland (a.k.a ‘Edge’) and he is now starring in a film with Kelsey Grammar about an airborne casino called Moneyplane. It looks… not very good. And its existence gives me more pleasure than I can say: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aETz_dRDEys

Until next time then!

Tom