Adults deserve to have their fairy tales & fantasies too, and I'd say Lucio Fulci cooked up a pretty potent adult pulp fairy tale here. I'll leave it to others to describe the plot: My first indication that this wasn't going to be your average CONAN ripoff when the four guys dressed up like Smokey the Bear rip a cave girl babe into quarters, snort drugs with a nude sorceress witch babe with a body from hell who then copulates (R-Rated style) with her companion python while having a vision of someone shooting her with TRON's bow & arrow. Talk about weird!
The film is an interesting combination of opposites that aims right at the atavistic, adventure-loving 14 year old with a desire to see bared breasts in all of us. While the narrative is somewhat confusing in your typical Fulcian kind of way the visuals are just as striking, with costume design by Mad Max and Larry Flynt, including oddball touches such as the Dog Men, the Gauze Men, Ape Guys and that far-out sorceress. She really is the focus of the film: The two guys out gallivanting around saving each other from imminent doom are more sort of there to give the film an excuse to have such an outrageously sexy harlot as it's force of evil, complete with a bestial contingent of half men half animals to do her evil bidding.
But seriously, if you go into this expecting anything other than complete dreck the movie *WILL* annoy you. For fans of be-headings, clever escapes, back-flips, fights to the death, mystical snake babes, ferocious howler guys, Atari era computer graphics, ridiculous cornball dialog and equal amounts of beefcake and cheesecake, this movie should be your priority rental next time you're in the mood for something other than a Global Warming movie. CONQUEST may not change the world, win any elections or even be that good, but I'd rather be confused by something that knows it's garbage & has fun with the idea than snookered by ideology disguised as entertainment.
7/10, even if it doesn't make much sense ...
