Conquest

• Directed by Lucio Fulci
• June 2, 1983 (Italy) / August 19, 1983 (Spain) / August 15, 1985 (Mexico)

A young man battles strange creatures on his journey to adulthood. Sounds normal.

You could always count on the Italians during the 80s to produce something, well, different but different is not always good. And sometimes it’s so weird you can’t pull away. Conquest is one such movie. It’s like some serious drug trip without the need to take anything. It is a hypnotic different that hooks you for all the wrong reasons.

You cannot miss the high level of nudity in this. In other words Conquest may not be suitable for children based on that alone. But it goes beyond that. There’s some blood and guts and even a woman getting ripped in half by savage monsters. Fulci is known for his gore and he tried to do that that in a movie that is part Clash of the Titans (original) and part Conan the Barbarian (original) with a dash of weird. There’s an army of werewolves running around in the daylight while ravaging a fog filled land and some bizarre visions/dreams that border on artistic.

The wolf masks themselves are quite good. They only fail when the actors have to talk. I understand this is dubbed but the issues are not because of that. Their mouths engage in the most simplistic of movements and make them look more like Charlie McCarthy with a serious case of hypertrichosis rather than a creature talking. Look the word up.

This can be hard to watch at times. Not because it’s unwatchable but, well, because it is actually. It’s hard to see anything being portrayed. Between the use of smoke pots and the general lack of lighting, following actions and seeing faces is tough. Alien Versus Predator: Requiem was the only movie that I’ve seen that is more difficult to see than this. Low lighting can create mood even if is to hide the cheapness of the production. Done incorrectly-like here-and it makes for a bad film.

The music in this is certainly…different. It’s not big and bombastic like you might expect in a fantasy film but rather has a simplistic synth type sound to it. That’s the best way I can describe it. And much like the steel drum music in Commando it works even though it should not. This is not your normal fantasy film so it requires not your normal music.

Our story initially features a man named Ilias (Andrea Occhipinti) sent out into the world with a magic bow and arrow to become a man who meets up with an outlaw named Mace (Jorge Rivero). Eventually the kid is killed and Mace gets the bow as well as becoming the central character since the spirit of Ilias is now in his body for some reason. What started out as some kind of bargain basement horror version of Clash of the Titans becomes a buddy action film with one of the buddies dead.

While there are some creative shots, the effects are laughably bad and cheap. Mace at one point summons the bow to his hands. What a TV movie of the era could have done adequately or better this completely fumbles. A genuinely funny moment not meant to be so.

Conquest is goofy and awkward but in a charming way. On a low budget and a small cast this manages a level of enjoyment that will make you ashamed for finding it likeable It shouldn’t be good by any metric but it is. On the one hand, the actors are performing their parts very seriously. The voiceover artist, as well as the physical actors are not trying to be silly yet this is filmed and executed in such a way that it becomes silly. The nudity is ridiculously gratuitous, and the gore is the same. It is among the guiltiest of pleasures.

The title is confusing since there is no conquest. A few titles I have read were bounced around before they settled on Conquest though I have no idea what it connects with. The largely naked villainess Ocron (Sabrina Siani) is defeated and then Mace now sharing his body with Ilias goes off for more adventures. But nobody conquers anything.

All I can tell you is despite its flaws I enjoyed Conquest. It may not be good but it is enjoyable.  If you like a good B-movie then check this one out.