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FAST FACT: Coscarelli recently revealed his intention to reboot “The Beastmaster” for modern audiences after he got his hands back on the property.
Dar sprouts nightmares, like the time he single handedly took on oversized bats that gather around your body, and think of you as their next meal. We also get sent of scene of the “eagle vision” where he gets to have a drone like view with the help of showed buddy eagle who is on his flying friend.
There’s also a giant skull that looks like a paper Mache boulder, and a cool bit: henchmen with glowing green eyes.
During the conversation, one certainly did not want to care about how much conviction Singer’s performance lacks, but it is impossible to take one’s eyes off of The Beastmaster putting a dead dog beside its dead owner. Torn is not good either, but at least John Amos does rise to the occasion.
Dialog is of a comic book kind (“When did this come out”), scenes that must be terrifying are comical, while the those that are supposed to be comical are the worst kind of grotesque comedy.
The first shot we see is Tanya Roberts emerging from a pond entirely nude with a waterfall behind her. It’s a pretty shot but Coscarelli keeps switching back to Singer, who is suggestively peeking at her through a cluster of bushes like John Belushi in “Animal House” would do.
At the very least, Dar (not unlike Conan) is an obnoxious brute who thinks he is superior to everyone else. I did feel sorry for Roberts and got protective of her after seeing her in this absurd, overly sexist role…but then I remembered Sheena, Queen of the Jungle, in which she plays basically this character two years later.
While this Coscarelli film deserves the rude nickname of The Cheese master, it’s still much better than “Sheena, Queen of the Jungle.” Of all things, Roberts excels in films that are PG but should rightly be R rated even more so than “Sheena, Roberts, and this movie “Tourist Trap.”
If Coscarelli’s “Phantasm” is placed alongside other horror greats such as “Night of the Living Dead,” “Carnival of Souls,” and “The Evil Dead,” then “The Beastmaster” should also be on the same pedestal. Theaters did fine with it, but it became a huge hit on premium cable channels. The same viewers who enjoyed “The Beastmaster” in theaters became huge fans of the franchise.
Like a very famous stand up comedian said:
“HBO means ‘hey Beastmaster’s on!”
Looking at it now, it’s actually worse. More people sat back on their couch and clicked on TBS or TNT compared to viewers who purchased tickets to the theater.
“The Beastmaster” is considered a cult classic due to its abysmally ridiculous yet entertaining storyline that was executed with heart. Fans gobbled it up, making way for the long awaited sequel as well as a TV series. And get this, the sequel was bad, but enjoyable bad since it starred a fan favorite: Singer.
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