The Four Warriors

Every now and then I want to give some B movie the benefit of the doubt. Sometimes it turns out great, sometimes it doesn't. This is on of the latter.

Story: four crusaders (no idea which crusade, since their costumes are a hotch potch of anachronistic equipment) are on their way back from the holy land, only to come across a village full of hot looking MILFS who's sons and husbands have disappeared. The crusaders, of course after some disagreements, decide to stay and help the MILF in distress.

The movie then slowly drags along with endless silly conversations, one of the warriors performing a (badly choreographed) weapon practice or one of the damsels falling in love with one of our heroes. The entire middle 1/3rd of the movie is a giant bore lacking any kind of flow.

There are some nice scenery shots here and there, but they could not safe this crapfest. Maybe if one of the MIFLS in distress would go naked it would rank a bit higher in score, but I guess that was too much to ask.

2/10

OK, so this isn't a big budget production. In fact, it's probably a 'micro-budget' production. But what I really enjoyed about it is that the filmmakers didn't let that limit the scale of their story.

The people who made this film obviously love big, epic fantasy films... and they decided to make one despite the budgetary limitations. And they did a really good job!

Some of the baddies makeup effects don't quite come off and let it down a little, but this is an enjoyable ensemble film with some very nicely written bits of buddy-movie dialogue that could very easily be in a Hollywood blockbuster. And the relationships between the four warrior characters are nicely drawn, with the characters well acted.

It's also nicely shot, with good use of locations - which usually let lower budget films down.

If you only like fantasy films with $100m budgets and thousands of CGI warriors going into battle etc, then this probably won't be for you.

But if you enjoy fantasy stories and buddy movies give it a try.

Let's be honest, The Four Warriors is a low budget project that barely able to produce basic fantasy script. It's arduously slow and rigidly acted while the action part consists of the participant randomly flailing sword. Basically, it's a group of people reciting tired fantasy plot like a costume play.

The plot follows four soldiers, survivors of the Crusade who must now take arms again to defend the innocents. An hour is spent talking about stuffs off-screen, the mandatory evil abductor and some relics of the past. These guys practically narrate the entire time, and when it comes to interaction between characters, the acting is amateurish at best.

Merely talking will definitely not get the tension rolling, unfortunately the battle sequences don't fare better. Action is less than ten minutes of sword hurling, which is more painful to watch than to actually receive the blow. They also use slow motion to better capture the feeble combat.

This is, by all means, a small personal project from the cast, not remotely a fantasy flick for casual viewing.

Terrible script, laughable acting talent and childish make up. This film is so bad that it is like a poor school play. I stuck with it over three days as I kept falling asleep watching it. I persevered simply because I could not believe how bad it was and wanted to see whether there was anything good. In the end I discovered something - the reason Odo in Game of Thrones has no lines is because he's a useless actor. Positively the worst film I have ever seen and if I could give it a minus score I would. The location was not bad I suppose - but then that's nature. The monsters were worse than a 1960s Doctor Who special effect trial. The few special effects they tried were silly. All I can say is bad bad bad bad bad.

The dialogue is a bit weak here and there, but not absolutely terrible, considering. The story itself is not particularly engaging. The acting itself was OK, all things considered, and above par for a low budget movie. The fight scenes, however, were ridiculous -- swing a sword like you mean it, man! The final fight was just as ridiculous.

I will say that I thought it was mostly well shot and edited, though, everything considered.

I found most of the characters personable which offers a certain amount of redemption to the film, and of them I liked the Mule although I spent the first 30 minutes wondering why they had him carrying around a bundle of wood when there is wood all over the flippin' place...