If you want to get into the weeds on Krull, there's this 2-hour interview between Krull's producer and the creature designer about the whole process of getting Krull made. ua-cam.com/video/R4Edmf6Mfnw/v-deo.html
Krull as a name of the planet in which the story takes place could be a way towards cinematic or literary universe. I made a comment a few days ago about "House of the dragon" being wasted on a series that covers pretty much only "Dance of dragons" and could have been named so. Hotd can cover the whole time before Aegons conquest up to eventual ending of Asoiaf.
Krull was written by the same guy who wrote Ice Pirates. I worked with his niece once. According to her, it was originally supposed to be a D&D movie, and "the Beast" was supposed to be a dragon, but the budget didn't allow it.
I love krull so much. its not a particularly deep or complicated story. but the there's a warmth and humanity to it. the wizard turning himself into a puppy to comfort a boy. the cyclops who can predict his own death. everyone has their own emotional journey. plus the surreal, sci-fi fantasy setting just has a vibe to it. the giant spider in the crystal cave lives in my head rent free.
I appreciate its sincerity. Way too many films treat being earnest as a flaw and suppose that everything has to be ironic or have a cynical edge behind it.
@@Izelikestea that’s one thing I loved about Krull. It wasn’t a fantasy or sci fi setting. It was silence-fantasy! Aliens with magic and tech invade a sword and sorcery world that must have emerged after a cataclysm because they also have low tech.
Torquil's speech when he meets Colwyn is superb :) _"Fame? It's an empty purse! Eat it and go hungry, Seek it and go mad!"_ The Fire Mare sequence is one of the most wonderful scenes in all of filmography, IMHO!
I saw this in the cinema by myself as a 7yr old while wandering around town by myself while my mum was at work (80s were a different time and this was a sleepy coastal town in Australia). I had images from this film stick with me for decades, coz back then when you only saw it once, with no pause button, your brain replays it in high definition, always way cooler and with better effects. The crawling worm things, the swamp, the glaive all really stuck in my brain.....and especially the cyclops getting squished. The movie attendant that let 7yr old me in was either exercising very dark humor, or was totally based....or both lol. I'm eternally grateful that he let me in.....those hd nightmares were top notch quality that replayed for years. I definitely got my moneys worth lol
Son of a Feudal Fantasy Kingdom becoming ruler of the Galaxy still sounds like a helluva story. I know Dune exists, but House Atreides was a part of a Galactic community. Krull is basically still pre-industrial.
You sound like someone who should read Poul Anderson's "The High Crusade." (There is a movie adaptation, but I haven't seen it and have no idea if it's good.)
If you want some of your questions answered, like the marriage fire thing, just read the novelisation of Krull. It's based on the original screenplay of the movie and fills in a lot of gaps. Likewise, the novelization of Dragonslayer also gives you some really awesome backstory elements that the movie didn't have.
A timely review! On a whim, we JUST watched KRULL last weekend. A fine LOOKING film, as far as cinematography, sets, costumes and locations, but sorely lacking in true scope. In the pre-wedding info dump, Lyssa tells her kingly father about all the damage the invaders have done to the people, and destruction all across the kingdoms, but the news of this high-powered otherworldly enemy takes a back seat to the rather chummy-threat from the rival kingdom. We never see the destroyed towns and crops, nor are there any displaced refugees imploring our hero's band for assistance. Plenty of gorgeous mountain climbing and they must have spent weeks on that swamp set! I enjoy your comparisons of scrying and SIGINTEL!, and the multiple sleeper agents really should have kept the party on their toes after their spy was "turned" by the enemy. I feel like the editing was really phones in, after watching all the uneven pacing, and the outrageous use of the heroic main theme being trumpeted over the opening title sequence, that seemed to just feature the monolithic space fortress approaching the planet. Maybe they shoulda showed the peaceful villages and towns, and prosperous city states, bringing in a bountiful harvest with happy villagers, and noble warriors? Colwyn says they lost 300 men coming to the wedding, but it's all taken off-handedly. Does make me wonder if this movie was massively rewritten in post, or if the director was working on another project while working on this. Anyway, I enjoyed your take on the film, and I too had fonder memories from the days of yore. This film is a pretty solid 30s-40s black and white epic, it was just made 50 years too late :D
I don't think a director has time to work on another project during a shoot. Seriously, they have a TON of responsibility. MAYBE some very early brain storming for a ROUGH draft of something in very preproduction. Even then ..
The alien leader is still one of the creepiest alien designs ever put into a film. You don't want to randomly bump into that one the roads at night. (or in the daytime either).
I love how this film accidentally expresses a theme flawlessly that so many fail at when deliberately attempting it. Technology so advanced as to appear as mysticism and magic to the lay person. At least that is what I have always assumed 'The Beast' was using. Kind of like the vampire society of Hideyuki Kikuchi's Vampire Hunter D series.
I simply LOVE Krull. Just to share my context, I was 5 year old kid in Manila in 1983 and I was scared of dark moviehouses and didn't like going to the movies in general but Krull was one of the few experiences that I still vividly remember from beginning to end. I remember that most of the audience including me, really liked Ergo a lot especially when he transforms into a tiger. I barely could understand English but I still thoroughly enjoyed watching this movie, still one of the best sci-fi/fantasy movies for me.
This was a great video- you should totally do a “I’m Overthinking It” series on 80’s era fantasy/sci-fi films. A few classics are Ice Pirates, Time Bandits, Battle Beyond The Stars, The Hidden, Enemy Mine, Trancers- there’s tons of great, B movies which were amazing stories told 40 years before the effects technology was ready.
You left out my favorite part: power is fleeting, love is eternal line spoken by Lyssa. As a 5th grader when this came out…. It shaped my whole outlook on fantasy.
My enjoyment of this movie increased exponentially when a friend reframed it as a random adventure in a human world during Warhammer 40k's Age of Strife.
@@BrendanSchmelter Yes exactly. All the magic stuff could easily be Warp shitfuckery that was rampant in the Age of Strife and the aliens could be one of the thousand Xenos species that attacked humans during that period.
Krull is very much a dnd quest. But by the same token, i do wish there was more krull. More backstory on the beast. How they know he is on the way the magic system that allows ftl spaceflight, backstory about the glaive, the cyclops people, all of it. It really leaves you wanting more while having a satisfying conclusion. I too grew up with Krull, and its always been my go to adventure movie when i just want to turn my brain off, relax and enjoy some good old fashioned imaginative adventure fantasy scifi. It kindof really does have it all.
I've always had a soft spot for Krull, mostly based on particular aspects. It's like a whole that's less than the sum of its parts. The cast is good, the production design is really cool with some really disgusting and strange creatures and locations, and I love how the Beast is always kept in a partial or distorted view, so you never get a strong sense of what he really looks like. And of course I loved the Glaive. The arcade game is pretty cool, too. But I can only watch it like once every decade or two. Have you read Poul Anderson's The High Crusade? I would be interested in your take on that one (it's one of my favorites).
Always a good day when Feral Historian uploads! I seriously look forward to your videos it's crazy how much this channel has grown keep up the good work!
First saw it as a kid, and I distinctly remember doing a mental double take when they talked about the prophecy. "Wait...do these medieval people know what a galaxy is?" I also recall profound dissapointment that the Glaive was only used once. Even *The Sword and the Sorceror* got more milage out of its goofy tri-blade weapon.
I remember being disappointed about the glaive too. It's like every image of the movie had that cool looking glaive and I was thinking it was going to be a quest to get the super weapon that mows through everything, but naw not really. It was the one doodad that truly made the movie unique among all of the other sword and sorcery stuff and we barely got to see it.
God this takes me back This was one of the first movies I went to where I was old enough to follow the plot (after Empire Strikes Back). I think it stuck in my mind to this day because it wasn't quite sci-fi, and wasn't quite fantasy. Two things: I was surprised to see Liam Neeson was one of the bandits, and just noticed that thanks to this video; and secondly, there were rumours floating around almost a year ago about J.J. Abrahms working on a reboot.
I am too young to have experienced these films as current. I was 10 years old when my Grandmother got me Fellowship of the Ring and the newly released Two Towers on DVD. And later that year she agreed to take me to watch Return of the King at the cinema. She fell asleep multiple times, but I remained as spellbound. I don't know how many times I have watched the scene in Two Towers, where Gandalf cures Theoden of Saruman's influence. It must be in the hundreds. As a child I would watch it over and over. There is no doubt that the late 90s and early 2000s was a Renaissance for the "epic" movies. But this was not just because of new technology, but a change in attitude by the moviemakers and storytellers. They started taking their own movies seriously. No longer just doing stuff for the sake of it, but actually taking the telling of the story seriously. Yes, of course, there were serious elements in older movies, but generally only in Historical movies, generally War Movies. But we do get a little touch of it in movies such as the original "Red Dawn", where we have one of the best scenes in movie history. Where the Air Force Colonel Andy Tanner sits down with the kids around the fire, and explains to them what is actually going on. A perfect scene. A perfect scene in a very dishonest and silly movie. Invading through Alaska? The U.S. allowing millions of soldiers to consolidate in Mexico without doing anything about it? Come on.... But this is my point. The magical tool in Krull.... is a big blinged up shuriken. It doesn't take itself seriously. So how and why could I take it seriously? From everything James Bond to Star Trek saving the whales. It's silly towards the absurd, but without going to the fullness of "Hot Shot" or "The Naked Gun". Just sort of stuck in the middle. And sadly I do not have the ability to care if it doesn't care about itself. And then, surrounded by an ocean of silly. We get the first Star Wars movie. Where we get a fantasy-scifi movie that indeed does care and does take itself seriously. The Emperor dissolving the Galactic Senate in a throwaway line, with the characters fully knowing a realizing what that means. And using Obi Wan, we get to see that this is a fallen society. Almost post-apocalyptic mixed with dystopia. A world that used to have Democratic institutions and noble knights, now fallen to a Nazi-esque absolute tyranny. It is serious and it takes itself seriously. It has the meat to back itself up. Compared to Krull or Schwarzenegger Conan. Which feels like a bunch of people raided the costume department and went wild with zero cohesion and without any sort of vision at all. Compared to Peter Jackson and the Lord of the Rings trilogy. When he met with the prop and costume people for the first time, he told them that Lord of the Rings was real. That these creatures had once lived, and that these people and these countries really had existed. And they were here to recreate history. And it shows. You can feel it. In historical films, you have always found honesty and seriousness from the beginning. "Zulu" is great, and so is "The Longest Day". And I absolutely love "Heaven Knows, Mr. Allison" While fantasy and sci-fi from this same era, all had an attitude of "eh whatever". And so that becomes my attitude to the product. -------- Yet now, I am sad to see that movies are reverting back to the mentality of before the late 90s. Now once again, dishonest and "whatever" has become the rule of the new storytelling. In the Marvel movies, we have an Elon Musk-esque Billionaire with a super suit. We have a nuclear physicist turned into a raging green monster whenever he gets angry. We have a World War Two super-soldier who was frozen in 1945 before the war ended and has just now recently been unfrozen. And we have an alien warrior Prince and heir to the alien Empire he comes from. They would unite to fight for Earth, sure. But what could possible keep them on the same page after that? Captain America is an Irish-Catholic from the New York Metropolitan area. New York had some of the strictest Segregation Laws against Blacks in the entirety of the United States. While at the same time he would be barred from entering many businesses on the grounds that he is Irish. If Captain America had held modern views back in the 1930-40s, he would have been classified as an extreme Communist. And they would never have given him any sort of serum. Or, he holds Social views from his time, in which he would have been considered the most "Alt-Right" mega-racist-sexist. And in reality, he would probably have sought out fringe Militias within the interior of the United States. OR, he has been effectively brainwashed by "the good guys" ever since they unfroze him. Which makes it really difficult to place them within the group of "the good guys". And with Thor, Asgard just happens to have the exact same social laws and customs as modern Earth. What a coincidence! Even though it is still a heavily physical marshal society, yet they have achieved perfect gender equality... somehow. And Bruce Banner can just suddenly control the Hulk because, apparently, he is always angry........... With Captain America Civil War in the cinema, my then underdeveloped 23-year-old brain had the high hopes that they would actually touch upon something real. I was wrong. Instead of having obvious and fundamental differences, it just sort of fades out into a nothing-burger, and everybody just gets along again. And with that I fell off the Marvel wagon for good. The DC universe, though they try with the more "Watchmen" approach of making it real, they too fail miserably. I was forced to watch both Aquaman movies recently. Apparently, Atlantis is an Unconstitutional Monarchy with a Parliament. The Parliament has legislative power and the Parliament has the power to appoint the Prime Minster. Yet the King also has legislative power. And, you can challenge the King to a duel, and if you win the duel, you become the new King of Atlantis. This is not a system that ever could endure. And then at the end of the second movie, Atlantis reveals itself to the world and joins the United Nations... and everybody is just happy about it... Even though, if I remember correctly, all the oceans are seemingly annexed by Atlantis. The legal repercussions of this are mindboggling. The entire oil industry of Norway would be annexed overnight. Travelling on the ocean places you under Atlantean law. Which changes the entire legal framework of most of the globe. And what happens to fishing rights? I doubt Atlantis is happy about us fishing in their lands. Again, this completely changes the global fishing and our global caloric foundation. Norway, having lost both the oil industry and the fishing industry, would face the greatest economic collapse any European country has ever seen. And yet, the movie supposedly ends on a happy note. I also watched "Dune: Part One" last week for the first time. Taking the movie as its own thing that is independent from the books, it is one of the most nonsensical movies I have seen in a long time. It is really no different from a fantasy movie from the 1970s. It's extremely long and drawn out. Most of the time nothing happens, and when something does happen it doesn't matter.... but with good CGI. One minute we are told about some serious and necessary thing, then in the next scene the characters themselves ignore it. And we are told about stuff like the "voice" thing right at the beginning, yet nobody at any point decides to tell us what the extent of those powers are. And in the movie, they only use the voice for a scene or two to kill a couple baddies, and that's it. There is no meat to any of it. Compared to the first Star Wars movie, where the Force comes up again and again throughout the entire film. And the politics of the movie is just... One family got too powerful for the Emperor's liking, so the Emperor wants to take them down. The End. Krull has a more interesting political situation going on. ------ I see your overthinking and I raise it.
(looks at overthink ante. shakes head) Fold. Your mention of being a kid when the Lord of the Rings films came out gets me thinking though. Had those movies been around when I was 10 I'd have watched them constantly. Instead I had movies like Krull, the Dark Crystal, Conan and all the imitators. And I can't decide who got the better deal on fantasy movies coinciding with childhood. As a little kid I could watch the Beastmaster and be perfectly entertained by it, it didn't matter as much that the world didn't make any sense. Whereas I first saw the LotR trilogy with my first wife. Very different frame of mind. Lord of the Rings is a multi-course steak dinner while Krull is a powdered donut. I like both things, but they each have their place. Which reminds that I've been meaning see how Clash of the Titans holds up after all these years.
@@feralhistorian It's a strange thing, the time we're born. As a child, I saw 9/11 on TV when I was 8. As a child I lived in a world under Bush, and as a teen under Obama. My movies were: Troy, LotR, Gladiator, Kingdom of Heaven, Saving Private Ryan, The Last Samurai, The Matrix, The Star Wars Prequels, Hulk (2003), and King Arthur (2004). Go back a single decade, and we're talking about a childhood under Reagan and with the Soviet Union, where the movies seemed to be just a slight nudge away from being in black-and-white. Where the ships in Star Trek were held up with... a piece of string. You go right ahead and enjoy your Clash of Titans from... what seems to be from around the time of the invention of the printing press. All I know about it, is that the remake had Liam Neeson as Zeus and Ralph Fiennes as Hades, and they somehow made it terrible boring. And I quite like Sam Worthington. Him and Paul Bettany are incredible together in "Manhunt".
You'll have to excuse if I call bullshit on your ideas about disqualification from the ranks of serious movies. In particular, I don't see how a telepathically controlled drone of whirling death is any less 'serious' than space wizards armed with laser swords. The key thing is that the film takes it seriously. The glaive (which mostly irritates me because I have a pretty good idea of what the word actually means) isn't any more obviously absurd than a lightsaber or a giant robot. Now, I'm not here to make sweeping claims about what is, or isn't, allowed to break suspension of disbelief. I'm just pointing out that there are a lot of absurd things that don't yank you out of the story, which implies when you _do_ cite absurd things that the show treats with seriousness that break twig your disbelief, that it's probably not that a man can turn green and triple his mass from nowhere that's the actual problem, it's just the big green man is easy to point at.
Yeah, that image of him trying to get it back really stuck with me too. I remember feeling a profound sense of loss that he couldn't get it to return to him.
@@Strideo1 I'm glad I wasn't the only person that felt that way! Haha! The Glaive is one of those iconic 80's Sci-Fi/Fantasy weapons that is still my favourite to this day. While Krull is not as iconic as the blockbuster juggernaut that was Conan the Barbarian, it was still very much as integral to the overall story of the main character's progression as was the Atlantean Sword to Conan's own. Shame we will never get movies like these again, when Hollywood was daring and bold and didn't just manufacture commercial films for general audiences.
@@antiantifa886 Exactly! I know the Glaive was just a non-sentient tool but the movie made it FEEL like it wasn’t! Felt more analogous to a companion, in some ways. It’s not quite like other legendary weapons as depicted in movies like Conan’s Atlantean Sword (Conan the Barbarian movie, 1982), Excalibur (1981), even the Lightsaber from Star Wars. I suppose kudos to the folks that made Krull in making something so iconic, intentional or not! Not sure if you’re a gamer, but if so, and if it’s your cup of tea, there’s a game called Dark Sector which features an equally iconic Glaive which had a unique system where you could control the Glaive’s flight! Really felt like a kind of sci-fi/military thriller version of Krull. Pretty enjoyable boss fights and mechanics with the Glaive as well!
Krull is, imho, James Horner's co-masterpiece, sharing the title with Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan. I have the two-disc complete score and listen to it all the time.
The Princess did indeed go on to rule the galaxy. That is the advert for the chocolate bar, Cadbury Galaxy. I did see this at the time and more recently, although I rather gave up on it. It was only here that I realised that it was a rather more svelte than I am used to Robbie Coltrane in a couple of shots.
@@peterjanssen5901 That’s my third favourite line in film. Second is “No you won't, you're not leaving me in here alone. Those are the kind of windows faces look in at.” Good old Withnail and I.
I was about 10 or 11 when this movie came out... For me it was a fun adventure film, not unlike the STAR WARS saga... The James Horner score was suitably epic and contained components that sounded a lot like his later score for STAR TREK II: THE WRATH OF KAHN. This film is FAR from perfect! But if find yourself on lonely Saturday afternoon with nothings else important to do... You don't have a thought in your head and you like that way... You can't go wrong with this one!
This is the first movie I ever watched. It scared the crap out of me but me and my cousins always got together to watch and rewatch it over and over because having a VHS movie at home was an event. I LOVE this movie
I saw this movie twice in the movie theater when it came out. Both times I was the only one in the theater so I've always considered this "my" movie. I love it.
Been thinking of this movie lately, mainly because I forgot the name and a lot about it. Glad you made a video on it. I recognized it immediately when I saw the cyclops.
The '80s is the best decade to watch movies in the theater no matter what genre it would be. I was a kid in that decade when I saw Robocop, Sorceress, Return To Oz, and all movie icons like Freddy Krueger, Michael Myers, James Bond, the Aliens, Stallone, Swarzenegger. Blood, gore, sex, and violence...the darn good old days!
Appreciate your clear and deep perspective. Someday I may finally get to see this…for Free. Even today it’s still a bit obscure to find. Oh well I’ve waited 40 some years so far. Hopefully it’s worth the wait?
@@scottneil1187 no. Words mean things, or they don’t. Sit down in the tuba, turn on the shelf, and prepare to consume your automobile. What? Confused? Not Earth, I can call things by the wrong name, because. It isn’t my fault if the use of a word in the wrong way confuses you, it is just to create an otherworldly atmosphere…
hey Feral Historian just wanted to ask after your previous video about gi joe if you are know about the original plan for gi joe a real american hero season 2 original plan for gi joe a real american hero season 2 (or season 4 has you put it) was called 'the most the most dangerous man in the world' in which we would discovered that cobra was founded by a different person than the commander and originally it was an organization for peace before it was usurped by cobra commander (which is a normal human in this story) who than imprisoned him and the story is about that man escaping
I'm pretty meh on Krull - aside from its GOAT soundtrack - but I just wanted to toss in that you've almost instantly become my new favorite UA-camr I've stumbled upon. Love the channel!
No, Krull was *not* a Great movie; but it was a great movie! I thought the Slayers and their weapons were some of the coolest things I'd ever seen. Still do! My dad took me to the dusty old theater with a single torn screen, cob webs, bats and ugly 60s vintage sconces in the Mayberry-like small village where I grew up. This is among the most treasured memories I have of my childhood. Wouldn't trade it for anything.
I remember my Mom taking me to see this film in the theater when I was a kid, I enjoyed it back then but I enjoy it infinitely more as an adult…I truly think this film is a great example of the Hero’s Journey & while it’s not perfect, I think it gets soo much right!!!!! After watching this video in absolutely going to watch it again ASAP!!!!
I love some cheese in films, so Krull is one that I'll keep coming back and rewatching. It helps that it has some good actors, some who became famous and others really only known by Brits. My overthinking of the film is "that's not a glaive".
Standford Sherman's script is full of great lines, cheesy and wonderful. And though the Beast is lacking as a threatening antagonist, he has some good lines. To this day I use: "Love is fleeting, Power is eternal" And the Widow in the Web & Ynir scene is genuinely touching and even a little profound.
Krull is my second favourite film, Aliens being first, I adore it. Did you know the glaive lives on in video games?, the actual, same weapon is yours in Dark Sector and it's spiritual sequel Warframe.
Aliens is a superb fllm. If modern writers and directors would just sit down and watch Aliens and Predator back to back they'd learn a lot about pacing, efficient character building, and story structure.
Blizzard has been known to use _Krull_ style glaives, too. They're a common weapon for Night Elf Sentinels in _Warcraft,_ and are also used by _Diablo's_ Demon Hunters.
Had forgotten what a good looking movie this is - the sets, the costumes, the whole design look. Obvs the special effects are dated, but the rest of it still looks great. Would say the most recent Dungeons and Dragons movie achieved that balance between fun and action in a fantasy movie.
Still love it, still trying to come up with my own Ergo the Magnificent-style introduction. I am Matthew the Unique Person! Average in height, long of hair, narrow of throat and plentiful in puns! Naw...that sucks.
I was flipping through an old Overstreet and came across an ad with that Black Cat cover showcased. Inspired, I took a pair of scissors, cut it out and stuck it on my fridge. The next day someone paid $840,000 for the same cover and, presumably, stuck it on their fridge. 2 days after that I spot it in this thumbnail after video is recommended. I then click video learning about the historic sale. Synchronicity or sinister level of cell phone surveillance?
You overthink this movie but don't mention some of the most interesting things about it: they dubbed Lysette Anthony's voice with a young American because they thought her real voice was too British sounding for American audiences; it was Robbie Coltrane himself who is responsible for his character having dialogue in the film, he begged the director to give him some lines and they ended up being some of the most memorable in the entire film; and the actor who played the cyclops had to do so practically blind, he couldn't see a thing through the cyclops makeup, which makes his running through a tree filled swamp all the more awesome; and lastly, Peter Jackson cites the widow of the web sequence as inspiration for the Shelob sequence in LOTR. Good video anyway, liked and shared! If u have the blu ray or DVD I highly recommend the director's commentary, it's clear he knew exactly what kind of movie they were making, and he's really enthusiastic and proud of what they achieved.
This channel led to me looking into Sanderson's _Stormlight Archive_ (The first three books were good, but I really prefer books that end rather than checkpoint) and _Buckaroo Banzai_ (which disappointed me, probably because decades after it came out most of what was neat about it has been recycled into everything since, causing a bad case of "Seinfeld is Unfunny.")
Horner's soundtrack is pretty banging. The themes he reuses in Wrath of Khan are very clear though (or maybe Khan came first and he repurposed them, not sure). Either way, great soundtracks. I always liked Krull although it's admittedly cheesy. This is one I would love to see a remake, but it would go so over the top CGI it would just be a cartoon.
I love this movie!!! Watched it as a kid in the mid 00's and it's been leaking into my D&D games ever since. Wish there was more to it, and kind of shocked it never game back as a retro TTRPG setting.
As a kid, when this film came out I got the comicbook adaptation (popular things back then for tykes who, like me, were stuck out in the American suburban sprawl without a movie theater nearby; I read comic versions of Little Shop of Horrors, Dune, Return of the Jedi and several others long before I finally got to see the actual films). I remember this because the comic ended with a one-page text appendix gushing about "Krull-Mania," an alleged run-away fandom sparked by the film (illustrated by crude sketches of paraphernalia like Halloween costumes and pinball machines, notably in place of any real pictures of such). Even my child-brain that had liked Krull could tell that this alleged "Krull-mania" was total hogwash.
i still enjoy the combination of sci fi and sword and sorcery style. The characters were a lot of fun, and the journey was enchanting. Still one of the most fun films of the time, in my opinion, and you cannot get a cooler weapon than the glaive.
I forget liam neeson, alun armstrong, robbie coltraine, guy from east enders where all in this. Probably other well known british actors I’m forgetting. Need to rewatch this movie
What I appreciate about Krull vs virtually any modern fantasy or scifi movie is it’s not a pretentious movie. There’s no unnecessary moral wrapped in the plot. Krull isn’t trying to teach us anything about humanity or the evils of the patriarchy or how big government destroys lives. It’s fun and whimsy and at least partially self aware how silly it is. I’m so tired of modern movies beating us over the head with on the nose metaphors a 5 year old can figure out.
Krull is more than it is, somehow. Like Flash Gordon with Queen, James Horner spun bard-like magic and boosted that film to an 11, just like... disco-rock Hawk the Slayer.
My two favorite fantasy flicks from the 80s were Time Bandits and Legend. The former I could rewatch. Despite the lovely Mia Sara and the awesome Tim Curry, probably couldn't sit through the latter
My wife and I tried to watch Legend a few years ago. We didn't make it through. And yet it remains on my "I know it's not good but I still kinda like it for some reason" list.
I've come to quite like Legend after really disliking it for many years. Tim Curry and Rob Bottin's makeup effects are way too good to dismiss the movie entirely, and I do think the director's edition with restored Jerry Goldsmith score helps the movie, despite the Tangerine Dream score being so memorable factor for many folks.
@@feralhistorian Wacky idea, and likely outside the themes of your channel, but I recently re-watched 'Network', released same year as 'Star Wars' and vastly more prophetic. Your take would be appreciated.
Star Knight is another underrated eighties classic (4/10 IMDB). The English dubbed version has a terrific musical score. There are two versions with different musical scores. Could be worth considering on a wet Sunday afternoon. Full movie is on YT. The one with Future Zone stamped on it has the superior score, really quite epic
Honestly, i unironically love this movie. yeah, its cheesy, but its it s fun flick to watch and mix of scifi and fantasy is something i been in love with ever since.
Your right about fun, I wish for more movies like willow, where there’s a humbleness and goofiness to the characters, they are not grim resolute people, the villains are, the heroes are lively and want to live lively lives
I saw it at 4 and a half years old and loved it had an action figure. Just re-watched it expected it to be so bad it was painful but was pleasantly surprised that it wasn't that bad
Saw this the summer I graduated High School with a group of friends and we loved it at the time, even though the critics pretty much universally based it. Yeah, it's not perfect but overall I still enjoy it.
If you want to get into the weeds on Krull, there's this 2-hour interview between Krull's producer and the creature designer about the whole process of getting Krull made. ua-cam.com/video/R4Edmf6Mfnw/v-deo.html
Krull as a name of the planet in which the story takes place could be a way towards cinematic or literary universe.
I made a comment a few days ago about "House of the dragon" being wasted on a series that covers pretty much only "Dance of dragons" and could have been named so.
Hotd can cover the whole time before Aegons conquest up to eventual ending of Asoiaf.
Cheers.
Killer soundtrack
Krull was written by the same guy who wrote Ice Pirates. I worked with his niece once. According to her, it was originally supposed to be a D&D movie, and "the Beast" was supposed to be a dragon, but the budget didn't allow it.
Ooh, the Ice Pirates was SO MUCH FUN. Loved that movie.
@mirceazaharia2094 "the ship has herpes!"
cool to know ty
Loved both of those movies.
@@blackc1479Space Herpes!
I love krull so much. its not a particularly deep or complicated story. but the there's a warmth and humanity to it. the wizard turning himself into a puppy to comfort a boy. the cyclops who can predict his own death. everyone has their own emotional journey. plus the surreal, sci-fi fantasy setting just has a vibe to it. the giant spider in the crystal cave lives in my head rent free.
I appreciate its sincerity. Way too many films treat being earnest as a flaw and suppose that everything has to be ironic or have a cynical edge behind it.
@@Strideo1 you can thank Joss W and Marvel for that.
One of my many formative movies. The slayer dying always freaked me out a little😂
It's honestly perfect 👌 . I can't believe it was not a box office success.
@@Izelikestea that’s one thing I loved about Krull. It wasn’t a fantasy or sci fi setting. It was silence-fantasy! Aliens with magic and tech invade a sword and sorcery world that must have emerged after a cataclysm because they also have low tech.
Torquil's speech when he meets Colwyn is superb :) _"Fame? It's an empty purse! Eat it and go hungry, Seek it and go mad!"_
The Fire Mare sequence is one of the most wonderful scenes in all of filmography, IMHO!
"Count it... go broke." A great line lost to time.
@@finnreypoe722 Yup :) the film had style and the cast was SUPERB
The Fire Mare sequence also features one of James Horner's greatest-ever music cues!
@@robertsrobots6531 I think the film has *the* best music score ever made :)
That scene had a huge impact on me as a teenager
And that cast! Ken Marshall( after Marco Polo), 2 stars from Dune 1984, Liam Neeson, Lysette Anthony...
I saw this in the cinema by myself as a 7yr old while wandering around town by myself while my mum was at work (80s were a different time and this was a sleepy coastal town in Australia). I had images from this film stick with me for decades, coz back then when you only saw it once, with no pause button, your brain replays it in high definition, always way cooler and with better effects. The crawling worm things, the swamp, the glaive all really stuck in my brain.....and especially the cyclops getting squished. The movie attendant that let 7yr old me in was either exercising very dark humor, or was totally based....or both lol. I'm eternally grateful that he let me in.....those hd nightmares were top notch quality that replayed for years. I definitely got my moneys worth lol
Great story
It's a D&D quest
Pretty much
It started as a D&D film, so yeah.
I was gonna say, it's the best D&D movie.
I was born 80 and remember seeing this in 83 or 84 and loved it! Best dnd movie ever even though it’s not dnd.
D and d? Huh?
My main takeaway from this video is that Feral Historian hasn't realised that geting married on Earth grants a magical fireball spell.
Usually only to the woman who uses it to take the guys stuff when she is done with him
@@davefletch3063 yeah its the divorce that creates the magic spell where all the guys stuff vanishes
Son of a Feudal Fantasy Kingdom becoming ruler of the Galaxy still sounds like a helluva story. I know Dune exists, but House Atreides was a part of a Galactic community. Krull is basically still pre-industrial.
You sound like someone who should read Poul Anderson's "The High Crusade." (There is a movie adaptation, but I haven't seen it and have no idea if it's good.)
If you want some of your questions answered, like the marriage fire thing, just read the novelisation of Krull. It's based on the original screenplay of the movie and fills in a lot of gaps.
Likewise, the novelization of Dragonslayer also gives you some really awesome backstory elements that the movie didn't have.
A timely review! On a whim, we JUST watched KRULL last weekend.
A fine LOOKING film, as far as cinematography, sets, costumes and locations, but sorely lacking in true scope.
In the pre-wedding info dump, Lyssa tells her kingly father about all the damage the invaders have done to the people, and destruction all across the kingdoms, but the news of this high-powered otherworldly enemy takes a back seat to the rather chummy-threat from the rival kingdom. We never see the destroyed towns and crops, nor are there any displaced refugees imploring our hero's band for assistance. Plenty of gorgeous mountain climbing and they must have spent weeks on that swamp set!
I enjoy your comparisons of scrying and SIGINTEL!, and the multiple sleeper agents really should have kept the party on their toes after their spy was "turned" by the enemy.
I feel like the editing was really phones in, after watching all the uneven pacing, and the outrageous use of the heroic main theme being trumpeted over the opening title sequence, that seemed to just feature the monolithic space fortress approaching the planet. Maybe they shoulda showed the peaceful villages and towns, and prosperous city states, bringing in a bountiful harvest with happy villagers, and noble warriors? Colwyn says they lost 300 men coming to the wedding, but it's all taken off-handedly.
Does make me wonder if this movie was massively rewritten in post, or if the director was working on another project while working on this.
Anyway, I enjoyed your take on the film, and I too had fonder memories from the days of yore.
This film is a pretty solid 30s-40s black and white epic, it was just made 50 years too late :D
I don't think a director has time to work on another project during a shoot.
Seriously, they have a TON of responsibility.
MAYBE some very early brain storming for a ROUGH draft of something in very preproduction.
Even then ..
Krull was just 1 of the post-Conan sword&sorceror fantasy movies that make the 80's the best decade for fantasy movies.
Absolutely!
HAWK THE SLAYER!
The alien leader is still one of the creepiest alien designs ever put into a film. You don't want to randomly bump into that one the roads at night. (or in the daytime either).
I love how this film accidentally expresses a theme flawlessly that so many fail at when deliberately attempting it.
Technology so advanced as to appear as mysticism and magic to the lay person. At least that is what I have always assumed 'The Beast' was using. Kind of like the vampire society of Hideyuki Kikuchi's Vampire Hunter D series.
I simply LOVE Krull. Just to share my context, I was 5 year old kid in Manila in 1983 and I was scared of dark moviehouses and didn't like going to the movies in general but Krull was one of the few experiences that I still vividly remember from beginning to end. I remember that most of the audience including me, really liked Ergo a lot especially when he transforms into a tiger. I barely could understand English but I still thoroughly enjoyed watching this movie, still one of the best sci-fi/fantasy movies for me.
Dark Crystal is what happens 1000 years after a Krull-like invasion by magical ETs succeeds.
Except the aliens came in peace and only became evil conquerers after they split from the urRu.
This was a great video- you should totally do a “I’m Overthinking It” series on 80’s era fantasy/sci-fi films. A few classics are Ice Pirates, Time Bandits, Battle Beyond The Stars, The Hidden, Enemy Mine, Trancers- there’s tons of great, B movies which were amazing stories told 40 years before the effects technology was ready.
A couple of those are on the "get to this one" pile. I can't give a timeframe, but it'll happen.
You left out my favorite part: power is fleeting, love is eternal line spoken by Lyssa. As a 5th grader when this came out…. It shaped my whole outlook on fantasy.
If only that was true...😢
@@cmbaz1140 It's always been true in Fantasy (well, mostly) ...until Game of Thrones.
My enjoyment of this movie increased exponentially when a friend reframed it as a random adventure in a human world during Warhammer 40k's Age of Strife.
That really does make it better... It's kind of like how Event Horizon is a 40K movie about early humans discovering the Warp can be used for FTL.
Wow! That's an awesome head-canon take!
@@BrendanSchmelter Yes exactly. All the magic stuff could easily be Warp shitfuckery that was rampant in the Age of Strife and the aliens could be one of the thousand Xenos species that attacked humans during that period.
Then the men of iron turn up?!
@@Shoutatclouds Chaos corrupted Men of Iron. (The Beast is a greater Chaos Demon)
Krull is very much a dnd quest. But by the same token, i do wish there was more krull. More backstory on the beast. How they know he is on the way the magic system that allows ftl spaceflight, backstory about the glaive, the cyclops people, all of it. It really leaves you wanting more while having a satisfying conclusion.
I too grew up with Krull, and its always been my go to adventure movie when i just want to turn my brain off, relax and enjoy some good old fashioned imaginative adventure fantasy scifi.
It kindof really does have it all.
I've always had a soft spot for Krull, mostly based on particular aspects. It's like a whole that's less than the sum of its parts. The cast is good, the production design is really cool with some really disgusting and strange creatures and locations, and I love how the Beast is always kept in a partial or distorted view, so you never get a strong sense of what he really looks like. And of course I loved the Glaive. The arcade game is pretty cool, too. But I can only watch it like once every decade or two.
Have you read Poul Anderson's The High Crusade? I would be interested in your take on that one (it's one of my favorites).
I finally read High Crusade just a few months ago, It's definitely on worth a breakdown on its own.
Always a good day when Feral Historian uploads!
I seriously look forward to your videos it's crazy how much this channel has grown keep up the good work!
I know it was a video game many many years ago. But I've often thought this is one of those stories that would make an amazing modern RPG
That would be awesome
First saw it as a kid, and I distinctly remember doing a mental double take when they talked about the prophecy. "Wait...do these medieval people know what a galaxy is?"
I also recall profound dissapointment that the Glaive was only used once. Even *The Sword and the Sorceror* got more milage out of its goofy tri-blade weapon.
I remember being disappointed about the glaive too. It's like every image of the movie had that cool looking glaive and I was thinking it was going to be a quest to get the super weapon that mows through everything, but naw not really. It was the one doodad that truly made the movie unique among all of the other sword and sorcery stuff and we barely got to see it.
God this takes me back This was one of the first movies I went to where I was old enough to follow the plot (after Empire Strikes Back). I think it stuck in my mind to this day because it wasn't quite sci-fi, and wasn't quite fantasy. Two things: I was surprised to see Liam Neeson was one of the bandits, and just noticed that thanks to this video; and secondly, there were rumours floating around almost a year ago about J.J. Abrahms working on a reboot.
Your videos popping up always bring a smile to my face, even in these trying times.
Thank you!
I am too young to have experienced these films as current. I was 10 years old when my Grandmother got me Fellowship of the Ring and the newly released Two Towers on DVD. And later that year she agreed to take me to watch Return of the King at the cinema. She fell asleep multiple times, but I remained as spellbound.
I don't know how many times I have watched the scene in Two Towers, where Gandalf cures Theoden of Saruman's influence. It must be in the hundreds. As a child I would watch it over and over.
There is no doubt that the late 90s and early 2000s was a Renaissance for the "epic" movies. But this was not just because of new technology, but a change in attitude by the moviemakers and storytellers. They started taking their own movies seriously. No longer just doing stuff for the sake of it, but actually taking the telling of the story seriously.
Yes, of course, there were serious elements in older movies, but generally only in Historical movies, generally War Movies. But we do get a little touch of it in movies such as the original "Red Dawn", where we have one of the best scenes in movie history.
Where the Air Force Colonel Andy Tanner sits down with the kids around the fire, and explains to them what is actually going on.
A perfect scene.
A perfect scene in a very dishonest and silly movie. Invading through Alaska? The U.S. allowing millions of soldiers to consolidate in Mexico without doing anything about it? Come on....
But this is my point.
The magical tool in Krull.... is a big blinged up shuriken. It doesn't take itself seriously. So how and why could I take it seriously?
From everything James Bond to Star Trek saving the whales. It's silly towards the absurd, but without going to the fullness of "Hot Shot" or "The Naked Gun". Just sort of stuck in the middle.
And sadly I do not have the ability to care if it doesn't care about itself.
And then, surrounded by an ocean of silly. We get the first Star Wars movie.
Where we get a fantasy-scifi movie that indeed does care and does take itself seriously.
The Emperor dissolving the Galactic Senate in a throwaway line, with the characters fully knowing a realizing what that means. And using Obi Wan, we get to see that this is a fallen society. Almost post-apocalyptic mixed with dystopia. A world that used to have Democratic institutions and noble knights, now fallen to a Nazi-esque absolute tyranny.
It is serious and it takes itself seriously. It has the meat to back itself up.
Compared to Krull or Schwarzenegger Conan.
Which feels like a bunch of people raided the costume department and went wild with zero cohesion and without any sort of vision at all.
Compared to Peter Jackson and the Lord of the Rings trilogy.
When he met with the prop and costume people for the first time, he told them that Lord of the Rings was real. That these creatures had once lived, and that these people and these countries really had existed. And they were here to recreate history.
And it shows. You can feel it.
In historical films, you have always found honesty and seriousness from the beginning.
"Zulu" is great, and so is "The Longest Day".
And I absolutely love "Heaven Knows, Mr. Allison"
While fantasy and sci-fi from this same era, all had an attitude of "eh whatever". And so that becomes my attitude to the product.
--------
Yet now, I am sad to see that movies are reverting back to the mentality of before the late 90s. Now once again, dishonest and "whatever" has become the rule of the new storytelling.
In the Marvel movies, we have an Elon Musk-esque Billionaire with a super suit. We have a nuclear physicist turned into a raging green monster whenever he gets angry. We have a World War Two super-soldier who was frozen in 1945 before the war ended and has just now recently been unfrozen. And we have an alien warrior Prince and heir to the alien Empire he comes from.
They would unite to fight for Earth, sure. But what could possible keep them on the same page after that?
Captain America is an Irish-Catholic from the New York Metropolitan area. New York had some of the strictest Segregation Laws against Blacks in the entirety of the United States. While at the same time he would be barred from entering many businesses on the grounds that he is Irish.
If Captain America had held modern views back in the 1930-40s, he would have been classified as an extreme Communist. And they would never have given him any sort of serum.
Or, he holds Social views from his time, in which he would have been considered the most "Alt-Right" mega-racist-sexist.
And in reality, he would probably have sought out fringe Militias within the interior of the United States.
OR, he has been effectively brainwashed by "the good guys" ever since they unfroze him. Which makes it really difficult to place them within the group of "the good guys".
And with Thor, Asgard just happens to have the exact same social laws and customs as modern Earth. What a coincidence!
Even though it is still a heavily physical marshal society, yet they have achieved perfect gender equality... somehow.
And Bruce Banner can just suddenly control the Hulk because, apparently, he is always angry...........
With Captain America Civil War in the cinema, my then underdeveloped 23-year-old brain had the high hopes that they would actually touch upon something real.
I was wrong.
Instead of having obvious and fundamental differences, it just sort of fades out into a nothing-burger, and everybody just gets along again.
And with that I fell off the Marvel wagon for good.
The DC universe, though they try with the more "Watchmen" approach of making it real, they too fail miserably.
I was forced to watch both Aquaman movies recently.
Apparently, Atlantis is an Unconstitutional Monarchy with a Parliament.
The Parliament has legislative power and the Parliament has the power to appoint the Prime Minster.
Yet the King also has legislative power.
And, you can challenge the King to a duel, and if you win the duel, you become the new King of Atlantis.
This is not a system that ever could endure.
And then at the end of the second movie, Atlantis reveals itself to the world and joins the United Nations... and everybody is just happy about it...
Even though, if I remember correctly, all the oceans are seemingly annexed by Atlantis.
The legal repercussions of this are mindboggling.
The entire oil industry of Norway would be annexed overnight.
Travelling on the ocean places you under Atlantean law. Which changes the entire legal framework of most of the globe.
And what happens to fishing rights?
I doubt Atlantis is happy about us fishing in their lands. Again, this completely changes the global fishing and our global caloric foundation.
Norway, having lost both the oil industry and the fishing industry, would face the greatest economic collapse any European country has ever seen.
And yet, the movie supposedly ends on a happy note.
I also watched "Dune: Part One" last week for the first time.
Taking the movie as its own thing that is independent from the books, it is one of the most nonsensical movies I have seen in a long time.
It is really no different from a fantasy movie from the 1970s.
It's extremely long and drawn out. Most of the time nothing happens, and when something does happen it doesn't matter.... but with good CGI.
One minute we are told about some serious and necessary thing, then in the next scene the characters themselves ignore it.
And we are told about stuff like the "voice" thing right at the beginning, yet nobody at any point decides to tell us what the extent of those powers are. And in the movie, they only use the voice for a scene or two to kill a couple baddies, and that's it.
There is no meat to any of it. Compared to the first Star Wars movie, where the Force comes up again and again throughout the entire film.
And the politics of the movie is just... One family got too powerful for the Emperor's liking, so the Emperor wants to take them down. The End.
Krull has a more interesting political situation going on.
------
I see your overthinking and I raise it.
(looks at overthink ante. shakes head)
Fold.
Your mention of being a kid when the Lord of the Rings films came out gets me thinking though. Had those movies been around when I was 10 I'd have watched them constantly. Instead I had movies like Krull, the Dark Crystal, Conan and all the imitators. And I can't decide who got the better deal on fantasy movies coinciding with childhood. As a little kid I could watch the Beastmaster and be perfectly entertained by it, it didn't matter as much that the world didn't make any sense. Whereas I first saw the LotR trilogy with my first wife. Very different frame of mind.
Lord of the Rings is a multi-course steak dinner while Krull is a powdered donut. I like both things, but they each have their place.
Which reminds that I've been meaning see how Clash of the Titans holds up after all these years.
@@feralhistorian It's a strange thing, the time we're born. As a child, I saw 9/11 on TV when I was 8. As a child I lived in a world under Bush, and as a teen under Obama.
My movies were:
Troy, LotR, Gladiator, Kingdom of Heaven, Saving Private Ryan, The Last Samurai, The Matrix, The Star Wars Prequels, Hulk (2003), and King Arthur (2004).
Go back a single decade, and we're talking about a childhood under Reagan and with the Soviet Union, where the movies seemed to be just a slight nudge away from being in black-and-white. Where the ships in Star Trek were held up with... a piece of string.
You go right ahead and enjoy your Clash of Titans from... what seems to be from around the time of the invention of the printing press.
All I know about it, is that the remake had Liam Neeson as Zeus and Ralph Fiennes as Hades, and they somehow made it terrible boring.
And I quite like Sam Worthington. Him and Paul Bettany are incredible together in "Manhunt".
You'll have to excuse if I call bullshit on your ideas about disqualification from the ranks of serious movies. In particular, I don't see how a telepathically controlled drone of whirling death is any less 'serious' than space wizards armed with laser swords.
The key thing is that the film takes it seriously. The glaive (which mostly irritates me because I have a pretty good idea of what the word actually means) isn't any more obviously absurd than a lightsaber or a giant robot.
Now, I'm not here to make sweeping claims about what is, or isn't, allowed to break suspension of disbelief. I'm just pointing out that there are a lot of absurd things that don't yank you out of the story, which implies when you _do_ cite absurd things that the show treats with seriousness that break twig your disbelief, that it's probably not that a man can turn green and triple his mass from nowhere that's the actual problem, it's just the big green man is easy to point at.
The scene near the end when the Glaive wouldn’t/couldn’t return to the main character made me bawl my eyes out as a kid. 😹
Yeah, that image of him trying to get it back really stuck with me too. I remember feeling a profound sense of loss that he couldn't get it to return to him.
@@Strideo1 I'm glad I wasn't the only person that felt that way! Haha!
The Glaive is one of those iconic 80's Sci-Fi/Fantasy weapons that is still my favourite to this day.
While Krull is not as iconic as the blockbuster juggernaut that was Conan the Barbarian, it was still very much as integral to the overall story of the main character's progression as was the Atlantean Sword to Conan's own.
Shame we will never get movies like these again, when Hollywood was daring and bold and didn't just manufacture commercial films for general audiences.
I was really sad to! I always wondered what happened to it!
@@antiantifa886 Exactly! I know the Glaive was just a non-sentient tool but the movie made it FEEL like it wasn’t!
Felt more analogous to a companion, in some ways. It’s not quite like other legendary weapons as depicted in movies like Conan’s Atlantean Sword (Conan the Barbarian movie, 1982), Excalibur (1981), even the Lightsaber from Star Wars.
I suppose kudos to the folks that made Krull in making something so iconic, intentional or not!
Not sure if you’re a gamer, but if so, and if it’s your cup of tea, there’s a game called Dark Sector which features an equally iconic Glaive which had a unique system where you could control the Glaive’s flight!
Really felt like a kind of sci-fi/military thriller version of Krull. Pretty enjoyable boss fights and mechanics with the Glaive as well!
@@auribusteneolupum2977 PC? And it was a iconic dim for me as a 3 or 4 year old! I was born 80.
Krull has been and always will be one of my favorites. That, Dragonslayer, and Legend.
Krull is, imho, James Horner's co-masterpiece, sharing the title with Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan. I have the two-disc complete score and listen to it all the time.
This movie, Star Wars, and Clash of the Titans were my jam in my childhood
I bloody love this movie. Over think some of the classic fantasy you mentioned in comparison. Please. Thanks for the content.
The Princess did indeed go on to rule the galaxy. That is the advert for the chocolate bar, Cadbury Galaxy. I did see this at the time and more recently, although I rather gave up on it. It was only here that I realised that it was a rather more svelte than I am used to Robbie Coltrane in a couple of shots.
Also note that the Widow of the Web is played by Francesca Annis, who played Lady Jessica Atreides in David Lynch's Dune (1984).
Brilliant. No one ever seems to know Krull. It has my favourite line in film: “Gooseberries”!,
A gooseberry pie as big as mountain. ...Nah, that's a big greedy. I'd settle for one as big as a house.
@@peterjanssen5901 That’s my third favourite line in film. Second is “No you won't, you're not leaving me in here alone. Those are the kind of windows faces look in at.” Good old Withnail and I.
Watching Ready Player One and the Glaive appears on screen.
Me the only one who cheers.
This is great, thanks....but what's up with that weird spike room towards the end? (10 year old me loved the weird spike room)
I was about 10 or 11 when this movie came out... For me it was a fun adventure film, not unlike the STAR WARS saga... The James Horner score was suitably epic and contained components that sounded a lot like his later score for STAR TREK II: THE WRATH OF KAHN. This film is FAR from perfect! But if find yourself on lonely Saturday afternoon with nothings else important to do... You don't have a thought in your head and you like that way... You can't go wrong with this one!
This is the first movie I ever watched. It scared the crap out of me but me and my cousins always got together to watch and rewatch it over and over because having a VHS movie at home was an event. I LOVE this movie
Thank you UA-cam algorithm for suggesting me this video! Loved it and now am a subscriber
I absolutely love your channel. More, please! 😊
More inbound.
I saw this movie twice in the movie theater when it came out. Both times I was the only one in the theater so I've always considered this "my" movie. I love it.
I will always remember "Krull movie,"It's one of my favorite! ❤❤❤ ( 08-07-24 ) Wednesday
*KRULL 4 Life*
I forgot how much I loved this movie as a kid! Thanks for the reminder!!!
I love this movie to this day
As a '78 kid, I truly love this movie.
Been thinking of this movie lately, mainly because I forgot the name and a lot about it. Glad you made a video on it. I recognized it immediately when I saw the cyclops.
The '80s is the best decade to watch movies in the theater no matter what genre it would be. I was a kid in that decade when I saw Robocop, Sorceress, Return To Oz, and all movie icons like Freddy Krueger, Michael Myers, James Bond, the Aliens, Stallone, Swarzenegger.
Blood, gore, sex, and violence...the darn good old days!
"When a movie could just be a movie"
Indeed.
Appreciate your clear and deep perspective.
Someday I may finally get to see this…for Free.
Even today it’s still a bit obscure to find.
Oh well I’ve waited 40 some years so far.
Hopefully it’s worth the wait?
How is it obscure?, it's just over a tenner on Blu-Ray on Amazon. Tons of copies on both Dvd and Blu-Ray, it's streaming on all major platforms too.
I was obsessive enough to be quite unhappy about the misuse of the term ‘glaive’ and only forgave them because of the luminous Lysette Anthony.
You're forgetting this isn't Earth, glaive just happens to mean something else on Krull.
@@scottneil1187 no. Words mean things, or they don’t. Sit down in the tuba, turn on the shelf, and prepare to consume your automobile. What? Confused? Not Earth, I can call things by the wrong name, because. It isn’t my fault if the use of a word in the wrong way confuses you, it is just to create an otherworldly atmosphere…
hey Feral Historian just wanted to ask after your previous video about gi joe if you are know about the original plan for gi joe a real american hero season 2 original plan for gi joe a real american hero season 2 (or season 4 has you put it) was called 'the most the most dangerous man in the world' in which we would discovered that cobra was founded by a different person than the commander and originally it was an organization for peace before it was usurped by cobra commander (which is a normal human in this story) who than imprisoned him and the story is about that man escaping
I vaguely recall reading something about a story with Cobra starting as a sort of peacenik technocrat organization but I can't recall the source.
I'm pretty meh on Krull - aside from its GOAT soundtrack - but I just wanted to toss in that you've almost instantly become my new favorite UA-camr I've stumbled upon. Love the channel!
No, Krull was *not* a Great movie; but it was a great movie! I thought the Slayers and their weapons were some of the coolest things I'd ever seen. Still do! My dad took me to the dusty old theater with a single torn screen, cob webs, bats and ugly 60s vintage sconces in the Mayberry-like small village where I grew up. This is among the most treasured memories I have of my childhood. Wouldn't trade it for anything.
One of my childhood movies. Love it.
I remember my Mom taking me to see this film in the theater when I was a kid, I enjoyed it back then but I enjoy it infinitely more as an adult…I truly think this film is a great example of the Hero’s Journey & while it’s not perfect, I think it gets soo much right!!!!! After watching this video in absolutely going to watch it again ASAP!!!!
I love some cheese in films, so Krull is one that I'll keep coming back and rewatching.
It helps that it has some good actors, some who became famous and others really only known by Brits.
My overthinking of the film is "that's not a glaive".
Standford Sherman's script is full of great lines, cheesy and wonderful.
And though the Beast is lacking as a threatening antagonist, he has some good lines.
To this day I use: "Love is fleeting, Power is eternal"
And the Widow in the Web & Ynir scene is genuinely touching and even a little profound.
Oh, and James Horner's score is friggin' magic!
When I saw the Widow of the Web scene as a kid I thought "cool spider!"
When I saw it in my 30s it landed on an entirely different level.
One of my favorite movies as a kid!
Krull, is a great film.
Stayed within story the whole movie.
The cheese was welcome not gut wrenching or out of place.
Love this movie it’s nostalgia for me. Watched it many times as a kid and played the Arcade game.
Krull is my second favourite film, Aliens being first, I adore it. Did you know the glaive lives on in video games?, the actual, same weapon is yours in Dark Sector and it's spiritual sequel Warframe.
Aliens is a superb fllm. If modern writers and directors would just sit down and watch Aliens and Predator back to back they'd learn a lot about pacing, efficient character building, and story structure.
Blizzard has been known to use _Krull_ style glaives, too. They're a common weapon for Night Elf Sentinels in _Warcraft,_ and are also used by _Diablo's_ Demon Hunters.
@@feralhistorian Another movie in which James Horner shone through. Love it.
" YEAH YOU DON'T NEED TO SEE KRULL " -Family Guy (S07E04)
But you do need to see it.
Had forgotten what a good looking movie this is - the sets, the costumes, the whole design look. Obvs the special effects are dated, but the rest of it still looks great.
Would say the most recent Dungeons and Dragons movie achieved that balance between fun and action in a fantasy movie.
I love how you went about telling this
Liam Neeson’s benchmark role. It was all downhill from Krull.
Still love it, still trying to come up with my own Ergo the Magnificent-style introduction.
I am Matthew the Unique Person! Average in height, long of hair, narrow of throat and plentiful in puns! Naw...that sucks.
I was flipping through an old Overstreet and came across an ad with that Black Cat cover showcased. Inspired, I took a pair of scissors, cut it out and stuck it on my fridge. The next day someone paid $840,000 for the same cover and, presumably, stuck it on their fridge. 2 days after that I spot it in this thumbnail after video is recommended. I then click video learning about the historic sale. Synchronicity or sinister level of cell phone surveillance?
You overthink this movie but don't mention some of the most interesting things about it: they dubbed Lysette Anthony's voice with a young American because they thought her real voice was too British sounding for American audiences; it was Robbie Coltrane himself who is responsible for his character having dialogue in the film, he begged the director to give him some lines and they ended up being some of the most memorable in the entire film; and the actor who played the cyclops had to do so practically blind, he couldn't see a thing through the cyclops makeup, which makes his running through a tree filled swamp all the more awesome; and lastly, Peter Jackson cites the widow of the web sequence as inspiration for the Shelob sequence in LOTR. Good video anyway, liked and shared! If u have the blu ray or DVD I highly recommend the director's commentary, it's clear he knew exactly what kind of movie they were making, and he's really enthusiastic and proud of what they achieved.
I loved this movie as a kid. Everytime it wss on i got excited to see it again.
I took my little brother to this movie (more than once). Loved it! Still do!
The 80's rocked for good and bad Fantasy.
This movie had so much backstory only hinted at.. still waiting on the sequel
Aaaand I'll just add this to the heap of movies you've talked about that I now want to watch lol
This channel led to me looking into Sanderson's _Stormlight Archive_ (The first three books were good, but I really prefer books that end rather than checkpoint) and _Buckaroo Banzai_ (which disappointed me, probably because decades after it came out most of what was neat about it has been recycled into everything since, causing a bad case of "Seinfeld is Unfunny.")
Youve done the impossible: You kind of made me want to watch Krull. (Im an 80s kid but I stuck to the AAA productions like Willow and Starwars)
Horner's soundtrack is pretty banging. The themes he reuses in Wrath of Khan are very clear though (or maybe Khan came first and he repurposed them, not sure). Either way, great soundtracks. I always liked Krull although it's admittedly cheesy. This is one I would love to see a remake, but it would go so over the top CGI it would just be a cartoon.
I love this movie!!! Watched it as a kid in the mid 00's and it's been leaking into my D&D games ever since. Wish there was more to it, and kind of shocked it never game back as a retro TTRPG setting.
As a kid, when this film came out I got the comicbook adaptation (popular things back then for tykes who, like me, were stuck out in the American suburban sprawl without a movie theater nearby; I read comic versions of Little Shop of Horrors, Dune, Return of the Jedi and several others long before I finally got to see the actual films). I remember this because the comic ended with a one-page text appendix gushing about "Krull-Mania," an alleged run-away fandom sparked by the film (illustrated by crude sketches of paraphernalia like Halloween costumes and pinball machines, notably in place of any real pictures of such). Even my child-brain that had liked Krull could tell that this alleged "Krull-mania" was total hogwash.
Somehow I still have my copy of that old Return of the Jedi comic.
i still enjoy the combination of sci fi and sword and sorcery style. The characters were a lot of fun, and the journey was enchanting. Still one of the most fun films of the time, in my opinion, and you cannot get a cooler weapon than the glaive.
I forget liam neeson, alun armstrong, robbie coltraine, guy from east enders where all in this. Probably other well known british actors I’m forgetting. Need to rewatch this movie
we haven't had a good science fantasy in a long time
As a kid I loved this movie... though parts of it scared the hell out of me. 80's movies are peak cinema for me.
Yeah, some of it is pretty intense.
The "GLAVE". Say it with the respect it deserves!
What I appreciate about Krull vs virtually any modern fantasy or scifi movie is it’s not a pretentious movie. There’s no unnecessary moral wrapped in the plot. Krull isn’t trying to teach us anything about humanity or the evils of the patriarchy or how big government destroys lives. It’s fun and whimsy and at least partially self aware how silly it is. I’m so tired of modern movies beating us over the head with on the nose metaphors a 5 year old can figure out.
I thought the glaive was really cool when I was a kid.
I'm now 48 and still think it's cool.
Krull is more than it is, somehow. Like Flash Gordon with Queen, James Horner spun bard-like magic and boosted that film to an 11, just like... disco-rock Hawk the Slayer.
The thing that traumatized me as a kid was the creepy wizard thing
I do love a good trope filled adventure.
"When a movie could just be a movie" and also for a dozen lucky couples, a wedding as a sweepstakes prize. But that's another story.
Yes! I still love this movie. It was what it was, and it does it well. Classic 80's high fantasy.
Really enjoyed your take on the story and what today’s story telling struggles to reproduce
My two favorite fantasy flicks from the 80s were Time Bandits and Legend. The former I could rewatch. Despite the lovely Mia Sara and the awesome Tim Curry, probably couldn't sit through the latter
My wife and I tried to watch Legend a few years ago. We didn't make it through. And yet it remains on my "I know it's not good but I still kinda like it for some reason" list.
I've come to quite like Legend after really disliking it for many years. Tim Curry and Rob Bottin's makeup effects are way too good to dismiss the movie entirely, and I do think the director's edition with restored Jerry Goldsmith score helps the movie, despite the Tangerine Dream score being so memorable factor for many folks.
Both really dark films. Surprised you didn't mention the dark crystal
@@feralhistorian Wacky idea, and likely outside the themes of your channel, but I recently re-watched 'Network', released same year as 'Star Wars' and vastly more prophetic. Your take would be appreciated.
@@platoplombo15 Interesting. I haven't seen Network in what feels like a thousand years, but I can see some threads that could tie it back.
Krull looks like a film made by A.I sent back in time.
Star Knight is another underrated eighties classic (4/10 IMDB). The English dubbed version has a terrific musical score. There are two versions with different musical scores. Could be worth considering on a wet Sunday afternoon. Full movie is on YT. The one with Future Zone stamped on it has the superior score, really quite epic
Honestly, i unironically love this movie. yeah, its cheesy, but its it s fun flick to watch and mix of scifi and fantasy is something i been in love with ever since.
Feels a bit like a Holodeck Programm that Chief Michael Edington would play.
Your right about fun, I wish for more movies like willow, where there’s a humbleness and goofiness to the characters, they are not grim resolute people, the villains are, the heroes are lively and want to live lively lives
I saw it at 4 and a half years old and loved it had an action figure. Just re-watched it expected it to be so bad it was painful but was pleasantly surprised that it wasn't that bad
Saw this the summer I graduated High School with a group of friends and we loved it at the time, even though the critics pretty much universally based it. Yeah, it's not perfect but overall I still enjoy it.
Krull is responsible for decades of me being mistaken about what a glaive is.