The flame-haired heroine birthed from the pulp brain of Robert E. Howard has smote many an enemy, but even the She-Devil with a Sword couldn’t manage to fight her way out of development Hell for a ridiculously long time. Obviously, we’re familiar with the notorious shonky 80s attempt that saw Brigette Nielsen and Arnold Schwarzenegger trying to out-flex each other in a goofy adventure, but since then, the character has gone through more unfilmed versions than possibly any other franchise. If it wasn’t Robert Rodriguez trying to get his version with Rose McGowan off the ground, Simon West was attempting to pitch Amber Heard and even Bryan Singer had a crack at Howard’s ferocious femazon at one point.
However, in the end, it was the team of M.J. Bassett and Matilda Lutz that ultimately won out and got Sonja back on the screen after an absence of forty years. However, an extended period in development Hell can negatively effect even the hardiest of heroes – did Red Sonja manage to emerge fighting fit after so long on the shelf?
It’s time to take another trek back to the cruel era of the Hyborian Age and as is pretty much standard with films like this, we open with our heroine as a child as their humble village is decimated by an invading force and the majority of the population is sliced to pieces. As a result, young Sonja flees her homeland of Hyrkania in the endless woods and eventually grows into maturity still searching for her people. Still, for a displaced young woman who lives off the earth, she not only proves to be highly resourceful, but highly respectful as she worships the forrest goddess Ashera and gives praise for even the woodland creatures she kills for food. Years later, she comes across poachers who are capturing and butchering random creatures like a dentist on safari and soon finds out that they are gathering various beasts to fight in the gladatorial pits for the amusement of the spiteful Emperor Dragan.
Despite his young age, Dragan has managed to get most of the world under his heel thanks to the technological advancements given to him by half of a Hyrkanian book he owns, however, he feels that total control will inevitably be his if he can get his hands on the other half which he feels still lay with any surviving Hyrkanians. Seeing as Sonja is from that world, she’s soon captured and forced into gladitorial combat until she relinquishes what she knows (spoiler alert: she knows fuck all), but much like Maximus Decimus Meridius before her, she soon make allies and mamages to hone her more feral and erratic fighting style into something far more formidable.
But even after staging a bold escape involving a load of chutzpah and a bloody great cyclops, can Sonja manage to thwart the armies of Dragan, especially as he has a hulking monkey/man as a general and a lethal, schizophrenic swordswoman backing him up.
If you’re turning your nose up at Red Sonja already based on the sheer wealth of talent that wasn’t ultimately involved with this version, then I feel I have to step in and correct you. You see while such names as Simon West, Rose McGowan, Robert Rodriguez or Hannah John-Kamen all sound like they could have potentially knocked up something special, the main names who actually managed to get this film made have way more expertise in this arena than you’d probably think. Firstly, director M.J. Bassett already has something of a history with bringing the works of Robert E. Howard to the screen thanks to her thoroughly decent take on Solomon Kane back in 2009 that saw a moody James Purefoy buckle his swash against the forces of evil. Likewise, while Matilda Lutz may not be a household name like some of the also-rans on the Red Sonja casting list, but anyone who laid eyes on Coralie Fargeat bloody, desert baked 2017 thriller, Revenge will know that the Italian actress has previous form for ferociously removing as much blood from the male form as she possibly can. On paper, it’s a formidable duo who could have done justice to a character who, for the longest time, was merely seen by the uninitiated as just Conan with boobs – however, reality proves to be sadly different.
Once again, we have another attempt at a modern sword and sorcery movie that seems to be lacking any dramatic weight whatsoever and thus tumbles into the exact same pitfalls that made the 2011 Conan The Barbarian such a disappointing enterprise.
Maybe it’s all John Milius’ fault and the unfeasibly gritty tone he set back in the 80s Conan still remains the go to method for putting Howard – not to mention cult artist Frank Frazetta – on the screen, but despite all of Bassett’s admirable ambitions (it really seems like she’s trying her hardest to make a $70 million movie for less than a third of the cost), she’s constantly undone by some impatient editing that sternly refuses to let the film breathe. Characters breeze into the film only to have supposedly tragic deaths despite us never managing to remember their name and the overall feel ends up being awfully reminiscent of trying to make a fantasy Gladiator on the budget of an episode of Xena: Warrior Princess.
However, if I’m being completely, honest, I came surprisingly close to giving this version of Red Sonja a three star rating because for all it’s flaws, issues and shifty CGI, it proves to be actually quite a fun and violently carefree experience if you don’t take it too seriously. It’s less frustrating than the Jason Mamoa Conan and it’s certainly more fun than the 80s version of the savage she warrior and despite the film running out of gas about thirty minutes before the end and a lot of exposition being lazily delivered in voice over by ethereal beings. Lutz sells her fan-favorite well as she convincingly slaughters men and cares for nature like a feral Greta Thunberg and the film even has a nice sense of self awareness to poke fun at such things as the infamous chainmail bikini while still remaining faithful to such a ludicrous notion. However, winning the award for having the most fun is The Umbrella Academy’s Robert Sheehan who seems to be borrowing from the James McAvoy Book of Needlessly Expressive Line Readings and hams shit up mercilessly to a greatly enjoyable effect.
Add to this some cool hench-villains who feel like they’ve stepped right out of a non-existent Willow sequel and some spirited sword play and I have to say that I’ve seen far worse attempts at Howard’s characters in the past, however, thanks to the fact that the movie’s pace seems terrified to pump the brakes in order you start to question how silly it all is. Undemanding sword and sorcery fans will probably find much to embrace within the slow motion takedowns and armour plated C-cups; but for the most part Red Sonja still is a long way from being in the black.
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