Author Archives: Keith West

Regarding a Movie About a Barbarian Seeking to Avenge the Murder of His Family

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I saw a movie over the Labor Day weekend.  It might be of interest to some of you.  The movie was filmed somewhere in Eastern Europe, and the scenery, particularly of the mountains, is gorgeous.

The storyline goes something like this.  There’s this young boy in a tribal village and these raiders swoop down and kill everyone, except this boy, who is the only one to survive.  He watches his friends and family killed.  The leader of the raiders takes a sword that the boy’s father has made.

After he grows up, the boy, now a mighty fighter, goes looking for the man who killed his family.  To pass the time until he finds him, he has a hobby of freeing slaves.  Eventually he finds the man who killed his family.  This man now has a grotesque mask and he’s seeking a particular young woman who is descended from a line of kings.  He needs her blood perform this ritual in which he raises this dark sorceress or goddess or something.  The barbarian is protecting her, but she gets kidnapped by the villain.  There’s a final fight in a citadel and the villain has the princess chained in a spread eagle position to perform the ritual, and there’s this fight on this bridge over a chasm, and…

…and the name of this barbarian…just in case you were wondering,…it isn’t “Conan”.

The name of the movie isn’t Conan the Barbarian, either. The movie I’m talking about is Wolfhound, and in spite of the way I used the common plot elements to make it sound like the recent Conan movie, there’s not much similarity between the two.  Wolfhound is a far superior film.  Not perfect by any means, but far superior.

It’s a Russian film, and stars Aleksandr Bukharov in the title role.  It also stars Oksana Akinshina as Princess Knesinka Helen.  I didn’t catch all the names of the characters, and the credits aren’t in English on my copy, so I’ll not try to list the entire cast.  They’re listed here and here if you’re interested.

And before we go any further, let me state that I am not, repeat, NOT saying that anyone associated with Conan the Barbarian (2011) plagiarized Wolfhound in any way, nor do I mean to imply such.

Rather, my point is what two different production companies can do with similar source material.  I took the common plot elements from the two movies to use in the lead-in for this post.  There are some major differences that bear mentioning.  Wolfhound’s companions actually do something useful.  (His name, which is the only one he has, comes from the fact that the man he’s hunting has a wolf’s head tattooed on the back of his hand.)  The magic is often understated and subtle, and in contrast to the magic in Conan, used for healing. There are gods and godesses (as near as I could figure out) directly helping Wolfhound, with the primary goddess encouraging him in a path of love and forgiveness at one point.  At least I think so.  Not something you would see in a Conan story.

The movie, the version I have at any rate, had English dialogue overdubbed.  It was perfectly understandable most of the time.  Unfortunately, the sound track overpowered the dialogue in a few places.  Since everyone else in the house was trying to sleep, there was a limit to how loud I could turn the sound up, and as a result I missed a few bits of dialogue here and there.  I’m not sure who the woman (goddess perhaps?) who appears more than once to give Wolfhound aid and advice actually is.  But like I said, this is a Russian movie, and her identity might have been obvious to the original audience.  It wasn’t hard to figure out her part in the story, though. 

The comparisons to Conan are pretty depressing. There is more action, more (and better) fighting, more philosophy, more romance, and more story in Wolfhound than in Conan.  In fact, the only thing Conan had more of was bare breasts. 

As I said, Wolfhound is not without a few flaws.  Several of the fight scenes were choppy and poorly edited.  Wolfhound has a pet bat which gets directly involved in the fighting at the end, something I found to be ridiculous.  There’s scene when the princess’s party rescues a woman accused of witchcraft or something along those lines which was a bit over the top.  The movie is based on a Russian novel, and from what little I’ve been able to discover, the film and the book don’t have a lot in common.  Some things seem to be universal in the film world.

But even with the flaws, it’s a much better film than Conan.  The special effects are good; not great, but good.  The story hangs together better.  The characters don’t, for the most part, act in illogical or inconsistent ways.  They grow and change, but their motivations are understandable. 

And it’s definitely a Russian movie.  Sacrifice and fate are concepts that are addressed more than once.  The outlook is bleaker and more fatalistic in places than even the darkest US film.  For instance, the city of Galirad, home of Princess Knesinka Helen, lies under a curse and breaking the curse comes to play a large role in the story.  The city is cold and overcast, even though it’s summer.  As the Princess leaves for her wedding to a nobleman, the contrast between the city the meadow outside the walls is striking.  It makes the motivation for what some of the characters do later understandable.

Wolfhound gives us a glimpse of what Conan could have been, what it should have been.  Sadly, I doubt anyone in Hollywood is paying attention.

I’ve included a trailer from YouTube. There are several of them, and this was the best I could find.

Why I Decided not to Review the August 2011 Issue of Realms of Fantasy

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I was out of town on Monday for a job interview.  Since I had some time between the interview and having to return to the very small airport I was flying out of, I decided to visit some of the local bookstores.  Without adult supervision, of course.  (My suitcase was noticeably heavier on the return flight.)  One of the things I picked up was a copy of the August issue of Realms of Fantasy, which wasn’t yet on the stands where I live. 

I read part of it on the plane, and then finished it after I got home.  I was rather disappointed.  Approximately half of the magazine was devoted to fiction.  No huge surprise there.  RoF is a publication dedicated to all aspects of the genre, so the columns and reviews don’t bother me.  Not all of them interest me, but I don’t begrudge others the chance to read them.  And the art feature is usually worth a look and frequently a second look.  But these things alone are not why I pick up the magazine.  I buy it for the fiction.

There were five stories.  I have to admit by and large they were a let down.  Only one of them completely worked for me, and it was really more science fiction than fantasy. (Any story that opens by trashing It’s a Wonderful Life is one I’m going to be predisposed to like.)   W. R. Thompson, whose work I’ve enjoyed in Analog for years, had a deal-with-the-devil story that started out promising, with wit and humor, but ultimately left me unsatisfied.  I found the mechanism by which the narrator got out of the deal to be a cop-out.  The story following it, a retelling of the Biblical story of Lot, with Lilith thrown in for good measure, contained many of the ideas and themes the Thompson story did.  Since these two pieces together constituted almost half the fiction, I thought this was a bit too much of the same thing, a feeling not dissimilar to the one I’ve gotten at the movies after I’ve gone back for the free refill on the large buttered popcorn.  I should’ve stopped after the first.

So rather than give a breakdown of the contents and what I thought of each individual story, what worked and what didn’t, like in my two previous reviews, I’ll just pass this time.  None the stories were poorly written.  In fact, the way the words were put together in this issue constituted some of the best writing I’ve seen in the magazine, from a technical perspective.  For the most part, there was better emphasis on characters and story rather than pretty words than in the previous issue.  It’s just that most of the stories really weren’t the type of thing I’m interested in reading.  Only the riff on Lot could really be considered adventure fantasy, and I didn’t care that much for some of the themes, in part because they were so similar to the previous story. And while I like other kinds of fantasy besides sword and sorcery and adventure fantasy, most of the selections in this issue really didn’t work for me.  Well written pieces, but not my cup of tea.  Which is why I decided not to review the issue.  I don’t see any point in doing what would essentially be trashing the magazine because the stories weren’t to my taste. If they had been poorly written or had protagonists who weren’t believable as characters, I would have a different attitude.

I write these reviews in part to recommend things I think my readers will like.  That’s tough to do when I didn’t care for most of the stories solely on the grounds of personal taste. 

On the positive side, the price has come down without any decrease in production values, a move that is appreciated.  I suspect this is a move to increase sales.  I hope it works.  Now if I could just get an electronic version in epub format.  There was an ad saying it was available, but the website only shows pdf versions of the current issues.

Blown Away by the Winds of Khalakovo

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The Winds of Khalakovo
Bradley P. Beaulieu
Nightshade Books

If there is any justice in this world whatsoever, this book will be short-listed on next year’s Hugo ballot.

This one has it all:  flying ships, magic, mystery, dark secrets, buckets of intrigue (both familial and political), honor, revenge, sea serpents, selfless sacrifice, a wedding dance that’s just short of combat, assassinations, ship eating squids, and after a fashion, unrequited love. Lifelong friends will become bitter enemies; bitter enemies will become staunch allies.  And for all involved, everything will change.

So what’s the book really about, you say?  I’m glad you asked that.

Here’s the situation and the principle players:

Dark times have fallen on the Grand Duchy of Anuskaya.  The blight is moving through the Duchy, resulting in fewer catches, blighted crops, a disease called the wasting, and death.  The duchies are scattered on archipelagos.  Sea travel is rather dangerous due to the aforementioned sea serpents and squid.  Travel of any distance is conducted by air.

And that’s where the magic system comes in.  There are five types of spirits which can be controlled:  earth, fire, air, water, and the spirit of life.  This is done through different stones.  Controlling spirits of air is essentially how the ships fly, although it’s a little more complicated than that.  Also, the women of the duchies, some of them at least, can travel through a type of astral projection.  They are losing this ability because of the blight.

There are two main cultures in conflict here.  First the Landed, clearly patterned after Imperial Russia.  The others are the Arahman, essentially gypsies, who are somewhat oppressed by the Landed.  A subgroup of the Arahman are the Maharraht, who feel they’re really oppressed by the Landed and have taken up arms against them.  Essentially, they’re terrorists.

The key players in this drama are Prince Nikandr, the youngest son of the Duke and Duchess of Khalakovo.  He’s betrothed to be wed to Princess Atiana, daughter of the Duke and Duchess of Vostroma.  There are two problems with this.  First, he and Atiana have known each from childhood, when she and her sisters played tricks on him and their brother.  His memories do not reassure him when he thinks of his future.  Second, he’s in love with an Arahman woman named Rehada.  The course of true love never did run smooth.

Atiana isn’t any more thrilled with the marriage than Nikandr is.  It’s a marriage of political convenience, to seal an agreement between the duchies of Khalakovo and Vostroma.  Yet Atiana wants more than the marriages she sees her mother and sisters having.  She wants to stand with Nikandr, and it doesn’t take long before she begins to genuinely love him.  The course of true love, yadda, yadda, yadda.

Then there’s Rehada, who is secretly Maharraht.  Her mission is to get close to the Landed, particularly Prince Nikandr, and gain information that will be useful in the coming uprising.  Only she never planned on falling in love with Nikandr.  The course of true love…you know the rest.

Add to this mix Ashan, an Aramahn who is one of the rare masters of all magical disciplines and a young boy named Nasim who is much more than he seems, along with the leader of the Maharraht and father of Rehada’s deceased daughter, Soroush, and you have an explosive mix.

And explode it does.  Literally in places.  The book moves at a breakneck pace, even when Beaulieu is setting up things to come.  He made a dance at one of the wedding events seem suspenseful, which is a real trick since that type of thing tends to be what I skip over.  The characters are multi-layered and deep.  They change and grow, not always for the better, but no one is the same person at the end of the book as they were at the beginning.  I’m speaking of those who survive, of course.  Not everyone will, which makes the suspense more real.

Lest you think I’m in the employ of Mr. Beaulieu, there are a few places where the first novel aspect of this book shows.  Only one was of major consequence.  Early in the story, after Nikandr and Atiana have danced, they go for a moonlit ride away from the castle, where he tells her he has the wasting.  Offended that he had kept such an important thing secret, she returns to the castle in a huff.  He tethers his horse to a tree (he’s on foot at this point), walks a short distance away, and then dismounts.  Without ever getting back on his horse.  A minor thing, but it threw me completely out of the story.  Fortunately, what happened next pulled me right back in.  Read it for yourself cause I’m not gonna tell ya.

If I had to pick a theme for the novel, I’d say it’s the damage that pride causes.  There’s a scene where Nikandr, Ashan, and Nasim are exploring a city on an island that was destroyed centuries before.  When Kikandr asks Ashan what caused the destruction, he replies:  “Hubris”.  That’s the driving force in almost all the conflict right there.  Most of the dukes and their offspring have hubris to spare.  In buckets.

And not just the men.  The women are just as guilty.  This society is somewhat matriarchal in that only the women can do the astral projection thing.  They can communicate with each other and see what’s happening great distances away.  They don’t always have the same goals as the men, and even when they do, their methods are often quite different.  Only Nikandr’s sister-in-law Yvanna shows any sign of being a weeping wallflower, and even that’s only partial.  All the rest of the women are tough, smart, strong, and not to be trifled with.

This was a fantastic book.  I’ve been fortunate so far in that most of the books I’ve selected to review here have been good.  There have been a few that I’ve not really liked, but over all, the past year I’ve been blogging has been one of the best for reading I’ve had in a long time.  The Winds of Khalakovo has been one of the top two or three.  Read it for yourself and you’ll understand what I mean.

A Look Back: Black Gate 3

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This is the first of an occasional series, in which I’ll look back at an issue of a magazine from some years ago.  I’m not sure how far back these looks will extend.  I’d like to restrict myself to things that most of you can find without too much difficulty or expense.  For that reason, I don’t know if I’ll include pulps.  What I won’t focus on in this series is anything that is currently available for free online.  While Beneath Ceaseless Skies and Heroic Fantasy Quarterly are venues I enjoy and will from time to time take a look at, they won’t be part of this series.

I decided to start this series with Black Gate 3, Winter 2002 because I like this publication.  It’s published some great fiction over the years by people who have gone on to have successful careers.  I can’t think of a single issue that hasn’t been a winner.  By the third issue, BG was beginning to hit its stride and had developed a clear editorial style.

Let’s take a look at what this issue holds.

First of all, there isn’t as much fiction as in recent issues, because at this time BG was on a more frequent publication schedule.  It was only after the magazine went to annual issues that the page count increased.  BG 3 clocks in at 224 pages, with approximately 150 pages of fiction and accompanying illustrations, the rest being devoted reviews and articles, the ToC, an ad for subscriptions, and an editorial.  There are eleven stories, and ten of the worked for me.  That’s a pretty good ratio.

The lead piece of fiction is “Iron Joan” by ElizaBeth Gilligan.  This is a story about a woman whose inner strength is more than a match for several men who attempt to treat her badly.   In the process she wins the respect of the town where she’s come to live.

Elaine Cunningham tells of the first meeting of Oberon and Lancelot in “The Knight of the Lake” and shows that you’re never to old to learn something new.  The Faery Court and Camelot have been somewhat overdone through the years, but this is a fresh and entertaining take on some familiar characters.

Veteran author Mike Resnick provides an entertaining glimpse into the life of John Justin Mallory, hero of Stalking the Unicorn with “The Chinese Sandman”.  In this one, Mallory has to retrieve an artifact from his old nemesis, the Grundy, in order to meet the Sandman’s price for returning a dream to his partner.
Harry James Connolly, who has since gone on to publish several novels as Harry Connolly (link to the first shown), returns from the second issue with another story set in the city of Pald.  “Another Man’s Burden” is a heartbreaking tale of what happens when we try to realize our dreams by any means possible.

In “A Taste of Summer”, Ellen Klages (Portable Childhoods) tells the story of a young girl and a very special ice cream shop.  This one was highly reminiscent of Ray Bradbury’s Green Town stories, and it took me back to the summers of my childhood, depsite the fact they weren’t much like the one in the story.  Of all the stories in the issue, this one moved me the most.
Darrell Schweitzer’s “A Dark Miracle” is set in colonial America and concerns the dark events of one winter night, a night that will haunt a man for the rest of his days.
“Tav-Ru’s Troth” reveals the depths some are willing to sink to in order to achieve love.  Unfortunately, love gained under those circumstances rarely lasts.  A dark and disturbing tale, and one of the better ones in the issue.
Jon Hansen spends “Three Nights in Big Rock City” to provide the second humorous detective story.  He also reveals a clever way to cheat at the craps table, although I don’t recommend trying it.  The results can be quite devastating if you’re found out.
The issue ventures into science fiction, with Todd McAulty’s “The Haunting of Cold Harbor”, about a serious (and rather grim) mystery set in a fantasy virtual reality game.  It’s one of the longer stories in this issue.  I also want to play the game.  The world here seems like a lot of fun.
The other long piece is the classic reprint, “Ringard and Dendra” from Brian McNaughton’s The Throne of Bones. I’d picked up TToB at a book sale a few years ago but never got around to reading it.  I will now.  This was a horrifying little gem of a story within a story.  The fact that at least one of the endings is predictable only adds to the mounting sense of dread rather than detract from it. 

Completely opposite was Gail Sproule’s “For Love of Katie”, which rounded out the issue.  This one is told from the point of view of a small dragon-like creature produced in a genetics lab.  Telling a story from an animal’s point of view is a hard trick to pull off and few authors can, which is why I generally don’t care for that type of story.  Unfortunately, the author didn’t quite succeed, at least to my satisfaction.  This one was a little too cute and predictable for my taste.  Still it was well written and I’m sure there are plenty of people who would enjoy it.

All in all, BG 3 is a solid issue, with a great deal of exciting fiction to recommend it.  There’s something here for everyone.  From sword and sorcery to near contemporary to futuristic, from quiet and thoughtful to humorous to horrifying. You can’t go wrong.  And although they may disagree with me, it’s fun to see some of the early efforts of some of the rising stars of the genres

This issue of Black Gate is still available.  If you don’t have a copy and would like to pick one up, you can order here.  It’s one of the first, so I don’t know how many are left.  There’s a back-issue sale going on, so you can probably score some good deals.  If you don’t wait too long.

Home of Heroics and Rogue Blades Entertainment are Back…

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…and I have a post there!  Jason M. Waltz just sent out an email saying that Rogue Blades Entertainment is back online as is Home of Heroics, both virus free.  That’s great news, made even sweeter for me by the fact that I have a post there.  It’s a review of a book entitled The Roads to Baldairn Motte.  Check it out!  Then buy and read the  book.  There are still a few details Jason is working on as far as the look of the site, but it’s great to have RBE and HoH back.

Quick Update

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It’s been hectic this week.  I’ve not posted any new reviews (although I’ve started one on The Winds of Khalakovo) because classes started a couple of days ago.  I’m visiting family out of town today; they’ve just returned from Scotland.  We’ll head home in the morning, then I’ll catch a plane in the afternoon for a job interview on Monday.  I’ll finish the Khalakovo review, then focus on some short fiction I’ll read while in the airport.  I should be back up to speed by the middle of next week, including some more Conan posts.  Then I’ve got four or five novels I’ll be reviewing.  So things will be quiet here at the blog for a couple of days.  But that doesn’t mean you can’t browse the archives…

Rogue Blades Entertainment, Home of Heroics Websites Temporarily On Hiatus

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I got an email earlier today from Jason M. Waltz.  The RBE website has been infected with some sort of virus.  Jason is working to fix it, but at the moment he is swamped with some additional training for his day job and doesn’t have much time (or energy) at the end of the day.  As soon as he can, he’s going to get things back up and running.  In the meantime, the RBE site is in construction mode and new Home of Heroics posts are on hold.  They’ll return once things are fixed, and on a daily basis until HOH is back on schedule. 

Marvin Kaye Buys Weird Tales, Replaces Ann Vandermeer as Editor

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This was announced earlier today, so many, if not most, of you have probably seen it, but I wanted to post it anyway.  (It’s been one of those days.  Power was out over most of the campus for most of the day and classes start tomorrow.)  Marvin Kaye has bought Weird Tales from publisher John Betancourt.  He is replacing the entire editorial staff, including editor Ann Vandermeer.  Vandermeer’s final issue will be #359, which will be published next February.  (The current issue, #358 is shown at right.)  Kaye, who has edited anthologies related to Weird Tales and the now defunct H. P. Lovecraft’s Magazine of Horror, intends to edit the magazine himself.  His first issue, #360, will be a special Cthulhu themed issue.  Stories bought by Vandermeer that aren’t included in #359 will be published in future issues.  Further details can be found in Ann Vandermeer’s farewell post.  Black Gate editor John O’Neill has written a commentary here.

What I Think of Conan the Momoan

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photo courtesy of mattrailer.com

I said in my post last Friday that I thought Conan the Barbarian was a semi-decent movie.  Now that things seem to be slowing down a little and I have time to write, I need to define that term.  Simply put, “decent” means not good but not particularly bad, either.  “Semi” means not even that good.

The problem, as more people than I’m going to try to link to have said, is that the movie simply doesn’t deliver in terms of story.  There are just too many holes in the internal logic.  I’ll discuss the things that stuck out to me, but first I’ll discuss why this character isn’t Conan as written by Robert E. Howard.

There were a couple of attempts to tie this movie to what Howard wrote.  Some of the initial lines narrated by Morgan Freeman in the opening were quotes from Howard.  One of the characters summarizes the events of “The Tower of the Elephant” in about one sentence when he’s bragging about Conan’s exploits.  Then there’s the famous quote, “I live…I love…I slay, and I am content” that was taken completely out of context and not even quoted correctly.  The actual quote is from “The Queen of the Black Coast” and is “I live, I burn with life, I love, I slay, and am content.”  Beyond that, there’s nothing directly from Robert E. Howard in the film.

The argument to counter this criticism is that the film captures the spirit of the Conan stories.  But even there the film falls short.  I won’t rehash the origin story criticisms.  Others have said it better than I.  Nor will I get into the depiction of Conan as a crusader against slavery.  There’s no point in throwing stones at the fight choreography.  In this type of movie, the If-I-Did-This-In-A-Real-Fight-I’d-Be-Gutted school of combat is almost unavoidable.  Instead I’ll point out a few lapses in logic that others seem to have missed.

First, Tamara.  She seems to be the only one of the female monks who has any idea how to fight, and she’s quite accomplished at it.  Why?  Is she unique in her interests and abilities in this area, or was she singled out for special training?  If she was, what explanation was given to her and the rest of the monks?

If Tamara’s such a great fighter, and tells Conan that she won’t go with him after he rescues her, why is she docilely accepting being tied up in the next scene and at no time trying to escape?  Is she into bondage?  The sex scene didn’t indicate she was, but maybe that was too racy for the R rating.  Nah.  Probably not.

In the final fight scene, Tamara falls through a bridge of wooden slats.  She has a chain on her wrist, and Conan catches the chain to save her.  The distance she falls before he catches her is enough to dislocate her shoulder if not tear her arm off.  She isn’t even bruised.  That’s pushing things a little too far.

Last gripe about Tamara.  If she was supposed to fill the role of Belit in this film (it was Belit the above quote was spoken to), why does he ride off and leave her in the end?  Belit was the one great love of Conan’s life.  There was no real reason for him to leave her.  Except maybe that since he’d bedded her, it was time for new conquests.  And he would never do that to Belit.

I can’t buy Conan deliberately allowing himself to be taken prisoner in order to get close to one of the men he’s after.  My memory may be misleading me, but I don’t recall Conan ever doing anything like that.  I do remember more than once him threatening to kill anyone who laid a hand on him.

When Tamara is kidnapped from the ship, why wasn’t there a man on watch?  Robert E. Howard’s Conan would never be so stupid as overlook a thing like that.  And earlier, when Khalar Zim first tries to kidnap her, don’t any of these people realize they’re coming.  Khalar Zim has a land ship pulled by eight elephants, fer cryin’ out loud.

I didn’t buy the scene where young Conan fights and kills the Picts early on, either.  Not while holding an egg in his mouth.

On the other hand, there were some things I liked about the movie.  The fight scene with the sand demons was exciting and (I thought) genuinely suspenseful.  Of all the scenes, I thought this one best captured the spirit of Robert E. Howard, at least until he defeats the sand demons and fights Khalar Zim directly.  Too bad more of the others didn’t.

I don’t have any major gripes about the sets and the cast, although I know some people do.  Jason Momoa did a much better job as Conan than I expected him to.  I can see him playing this role again.  I only hope he gets to, and in a film that’s actually based on Howard’s work.  Unfortunately, the movie is doing so poorly that it will probably kill any chance for a genuine Howard adaptation for another generation.

One final thought.  The makeup Rose McGowan wore as Marique placed an image in my head that I can’t get out, so I’m going to share it with you.  Her hair reminded me of Londo Mollari from Babylon 5, while the spots on her neck and forehead made me think of Dax from Star Trek:  Deep Space Nine.  If those two ever had a love child, Marique is what she would look like.