Conan The Vegetarian

I'm sure we all have some fond memories of Arnold.

The Conan saga is still one of the better fantasy movies pre-LOTR. In the last millenium, when one thinks fantasy, the few movies that will always come up are almost invariably: Willow, Labyrinth, Conan the Barbarian, and maybe DragonHeart.

Austrian accent and all, the Californian governor had few greater successes than Conan.

But my favourite is still the movie where he went all soft, and N.A.G. (New Age Guy), and didn't eat meat.

You know, the one where he muttered the immemorable, "I know now why you cry. But it is something I can never do."

. . . . . .

Full marks if you answered T2: Judgment Day

I just watched this movie again last night.

I think this movie was one of my best memory of the early 90's. Growing up in boring Bandar Seri Begawan, the number of times I've been to the cinema, I can count off one hand. (Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles was one of those...)

I read multiple movie reviews on T2. Long write-ups in the Straits Times. Interviews with Arnold, Linda, James Cameron etc. The technology that made the movie possible. I used to be able to tell you how much this movie costed, and how much Arnie was paid.

I knew this movie well. It was incredible because it was groundbreaking. They created the most unbelieveable effects with the technology available at the time. And even in these times when computers are developing at a geometrical pace, those effects were not surpassed until The Matrix.

I just watched the Director's Cut of T2. I think I know the theatre cut well enough to tell which parts are new. In general opinion, the parts that sucked were the ones in the director's cut.

Sarah Connor got a wet dream sequence where she got to snog Kyle, her epic one night stand from before.

John got to teach the T-800 to smile.

Then in the scene where Sarah was picking out bullets from Arnie, they pried open the CPU of the T-800 to switch it to write-mode so that the T800 can learn. Sarah tried to destroy said CPU, and John stopped her with, "Look, Mom, if I'm supposed to ever be this great leader, you should start listening to my leadership ideas once in a while."

Then a boring family scene of the Skynet programmer. And we see how he switches off his computer by pressing on the [ENTER] key. Without saving his super important work.


Just goes to show that sometimes, the Director's Cut makes the movie worse. The original cut was awesome enough on its own. Cameron just wanted to make a few more bucks with extra footage that really deserved to remain on the cutting room floor.


And asides from the memorable N.A.G. quote, there's a piece of narration that Sarah said that's very thought provoking as well...

"Watching John with the machine, it was suddenly so clear. The terminator would never stop. It would never leave him. It would never hurt him; never Shout at him, or get drunk and hit him, or say it was too busy to spend time with him. It would always be there, and it would die to protect him. Of all the would-be fathers who came and went over the years, this thing, this machine was the only one who measured up.

"In an insane world, it was the sanest choice."

It's interesting when you think about this in a biological, Darwinian aspect... A machine makes the perfect step-father.

Think how natural selection has favoured the gene that favoured women who go weak-kneed at dashing rogue pirates, but instead marry the boring man with financial security. There are research that has postulated this to be a significant survival trait. Think about it.

Similar research has also vindicated men who obsess about large bosoms and round hips. It's a survival trait.


ANYHOO.... I also discovered that there is an alternate ending for T2. Managed to dig up the script.