An Age Of Mystery And Magic

There once was a warrior named Kain, who was played by David Carradine, who played Caine on TV’s KUNG FU. On a strange desert planet with two suns, Kain entered a tiny village ruled by two opposing tyrants, Zeg (Luke Askew) and Balcaz (William Marin). Both sides claim ownership of the town’s only well. Why one of them doesn’t just dig his own hole someplace else, I don’t know.

The village peasants live only for the few drops of water provided them by whichever ruler controls the water that day. Kain thought this process was not very fair. Since he had seen YOJIMBO nine times, he decided to pit both sides against each other, hiring out his sword to both sides surreptitiously and plotting against them until all the bad guys were dead.

There was a sorceress too, that’s true, although she did precious little sorceressing. Her name was Naja (Maria Socas), and what she did best of all is walk around naked. Oh, my, was she naked. Really, her only job involved being naked, and she did that job very well. Rarely have I seen such majestic nudity for so little purpose. Not that I’m complaining, mind you.

THE WARRIOR AND THE SORCERESS, directed by John Broderick and released by New Horizons in 1984, runs about 80 minutes, which is what it has going for it the most. Carradine isn’t trying very hard, but he is having a good time. Of course, I imagine it’s hard to be miserable when you’re pretending to mow down 200 Argentinean stuntmen and extras while staring at Maria Socas’ luscious breasts all day. Thank Roger Corman for this pallid CONAN imitation that does manage to entertain on the simplest level.