Entry 71: Barbarian Queen (1985)

Barbarian Queen (1985)

Dir: Hector Olivera

"No man can touch her naked steel."

 

I will have you all know that I'm near the end of a pretty goddamn book right now, but, as my goal is to get to entry 100 by the end of the year, I'm foregoing finishing it in order to spend a little time down here in the basement.  Now, since I'm in a fantasy mood, journey back with me to an age of savage warriors, undreamed of treasures and bountiful organ-spilling!  Journey with me into the realm of...the Barbarian Queen!

After opening with a rape scene ("Nothing like a virgin to brighten a man's day!") featuring copious breast-fondling (the woman's screams lead to the film's most inappropriately-quotable line, as one of the assailants chuckles and exclaims "Karax never COULD rape a woman quietly!"), we're introduced to a medieval village that looks for all the world like a South American forest.  The victim of the aforementioned rape is Taramis (Dawn Dunlap, Night Shift), younger sister of Princess Amethea (Lana Clarkson, Deathstalker), who is about to be wed.  Turns out the attack on Taramis is just a preamble to an entire raiding party that interrupts the nuptials by laying waste to Amethea's village.  Amethea proves to be no slouch with a sword after she kills a dude by stabbing him in the ass hard enough for the blade to emerge through his dick, and, after her people are either killed or enslaved, she swears vengeance upon the armored horde responsible!  She is joined in her quest by fellow female warriors Estrild (Kat Shea, who went on to direct the Stripped to Kill movies) and Tiniara (Argentinian actress Susana Traverso).   After rescuing Taramis, Amethea gets to make a profound statement about the cruel nature of the world they live in ("There are no 'little girls' any more.") and our small army of amazonian ass-kickers sets off on a series of adventures in the name of vengeance!  They pose as damsels, meet up with a preteen-girl scout, infiltrate a harem, suffer setbacks brought on by the PTSD-suffering Taramis and rescue Amethea's betrothed from a gladiator pit.  Tiniara is killed and Amethea is tortured on a rack by a dude wearing anachronistic glasses and what appears to be a yellow yarmulke, whom she kills by crushing between her thighs and tossing into a vat of acid.  In the end, Amethea and Taramis kill the evil warlord and establish their own kingdom.     

I'm not embarrassed to admit that I enjoyed the hell out of this 72-minute time-waster.  I'm a sucker for movies about ladies who kick ass and, while this features far too much gratuitous nudity to be considered a lost feminist classic, Shea, Traverso and, especially, the 6-foot tall Clarkson acquit themselves well and more than deliver in the ass-kicking department.  It's refreshing to see, considering it's age and genre, a film that takes a completely dim view of men (they're all horrible rapist assholes or incompetents in need of rescuing) and puts the women firmly in charge.  The swordplay is brutal and well-choreographed and there's a surprising amount of gore.  Roger Corman backed this Argentinian feature as an attempt to cash in on the hype surrounding the same year's big-budget Schwarzenegger vehicle Red Sonja.  A (terrible) DTV sequel (also starring Clarkson) followed in 1990.  For fun, sing this movie's title to the tune of Billy Ocean's "Caribbean Queen..."