Danger is my trade

Red Sonja (1984)
Quickly, before I've come to my senses after Hercules, let's try to cram in Red Sonja.  This is not a good movie.  My memories of this movie are... unpleasant.  Bridgite is not just a bad actress, she is a breathtakingly bad actress.  She was crazy-hot back then, there's no getting around that, but this is what happens when you base your casting choice for lead actress on a magazine ad.   At least this makes Conan the Destroyer seem pretty solid by comparison.

Arnold is decent in this, and this is one of his first opportunities to really turn on the charm, but the movie is such a black hole of despair, he can't really carry it on strength of personality alone.  He's got a great smile though, and he's starting to look far more comfortable on screen compared to his previous outings.  Who knows, this guy may even turn into some kind of Hollywood star some day...

I can't help but wonder if this is the quality of movie the first Conan would have turned into with anyone less skilled and passionate than John Milius at the helm.  Richard Fleischer may have had his day and turned out some good work in the 50s-70s, but IMDB confirms my suspicion that his career had to be over after the back to back body blows of Conan the Destroyer and Red Sonja.  Milius took completely green actors and made magic with them.  Fleischer...  not so much.  I'm not sure how many times he would have had to shoot a scene to get a marginally acceptable performance out of Bridgite, but it really doesn't look like he tried.

I can't believe I just watched Hercules and Red Sonja in the same day.  Mama always said I was "special"

Ahnold Quotient - 7
He's hamming it up quite nicely through most of this and there some wonderfully goofy expressions during the battle sequences in particular.  The "mating ritual" in the forest was a little much, but still not going completely over-the-top just yet.

Rewatchability - No way
It was brave of me to give it another go to see if I had misjudged this all these years and perhaps it's actually a diamond in the rough.  It.  Is.  Not.  Good.  I'll can't say I'll never watch it again, but it's hard to imagine the circumstances under which that would happen.  I would presume alcohol and/or memory loss would have to be involved.