Not "Conan The Barbarian," but pretty damn close!

Rating: Null/10 (30 August 1999)

I saw it on opening weekend -- not really knowing what to expect -- and was pleasantly surprised. I'm not an Banderas fan at all, but I loved the Viking northmen. Lots of violence, lots of cool music. Let me stress that again -- the musical score is outstanding. The story is a little hard to follow at first, mainly because act 1 -- the setup -- was told through a translator and it was hard to keep track of what he was saying. Bad directing there.
But we catch up soon enough. It's about a group of 12 viking warriors and Banderas (the 13th) who travel north to save a village from a horde of vicious, man-eating cavemen who think they are bears. Simple enough plot.
Character development is very light, and that's a disappointment because I bought into the whole thing, and wanted to know more about these people.
The movie would have been much better if Banderas was not the film at all and instead have the Viking leader as the main character.
In the end, if you like Conan, you'll like this movie. Listen to the soundtrack even if you don't see the film.