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Quest for the mighty Sword
AKA Ator 3: The Hobgoblin
AKA Ator: The Invincible (the remake)
AKA Troll 3? (in Germany apparently)
Apologies for bad quality pictures, I had to take to the hi tech method of taking photos of my tv screen with my mobile for these ones.
I had spent six months looking for this movie. This was for many reasons.. partly because it's director was the executive producer of 'Troll 2', and the movie was made at around the same time, and party because it was rumoured to have used one of the goblin costumes from ‘Troll 2’. This I had to see.
The Quest for the mighty sword is a very interesting movie. Starring a barbarian called Ator, it is a ‘Sword and Sorcery’ movie with so many reasons that it should never have happened at all. TQFTMS is a culmination of almost a decade of bad movies. It is in fact the fourth movie in the 'Ator' quadrilogy. This series of movies is one that is amazing to have survived so long. The first one promotes incest, and Ator fights a giant spider. In the second he fights a giant sock puppet snake, and has a mute ninja partner called 'Thong'. By the time we get to the third, Ator has dyed his hair, grown a ponytail and gotten all arty, with scantly clad women dancing about, and very little spoken in the entire film. That’ll be a new director for you. But the fourth movie, this is where the bad movie magic lives. Back with the original director (so soon? He’d only just left) but with a whole new actor for Ator, TQFTMS pulls out all the stops despite being the third lower budget sequel of an already low budget movie.
T
QFTMS is the sort of movie that should win awards. It should win every kind of movie award you have never heard of. If I had a say in the Oscars, TQFTMS would be winning the following …
Best mis-leading title in a movie
It’s called ‘The Quest for the mighty sword’. But Ator Jr. finds the mighty sword, within the first half hour of the movie, under a rock IN THE CAVE THAT HE LIVES IN! Some ‘Quest’ that was. As for the rest of the plot, he wanders about randomly until he bumps into an ex-goddess that once tried to save his dad. After shacking up with the demigod, he wanders about randomly until he bumps into his long lost cursed mum. After fixing her, he wanders about randomly until he bumps into a god-king that kidnapped his demigod lover at some random point in the movie. After that, he wanders about randomly until he is declared complete winner of the movie. Then he just wanders about randomly, but happily ever after.
Best 'Hot-pants on a Hero'
Not entirely sure what Ator was thinking with that one. But I know what I think…. "He must work out"
Best use of the same actor to play both father and son
So what, he’s playing his seventeen year old son now? That’s some acting range. It actually takes a bit of effort to work out that he is now a different character. Perhaps too much effort for a movie of this caliber.
Best use of costume borrowed from directors other movies
For the actual use of a goblin costume from troll 2.
Best use of the same costume for every goblin in a movie
For use of a goblin costume … er, from troll 2.
Best use of girlie laugh for a monster
And the Goblin from troll two scores a hatrick!
Best incestual use of costume ideas from movies with the same character.
Isn’t that the iron warrior costume from the 3rd movie? did that director let you do that after what you said about his movie?
Best use of the 'Hero dies in the first five minutes' plot twist
I never thought I’d see that twist in a movie. Brave story choices like that kind of makes you feel alienated towards Hollywood though.
Best use of atmosphere destroying light hearted music to represent an evil character
Oh he can’t believe it, four out of four, the goblin is Ecstatic!
Best use of XXL T-shirt to create a Siamese two headed robot
This is the stupidest robot ever. For something that was described to Ator, as practically invincible, he outsmarts it pretty easily, the old ‘duck below it’s field of view and sneak up from behind’ trick, I bet it had never seen that one before.
Best use of monster costumes from entirely different movies
For the use of the Japanese Godzilla costume. They did change it significantly though, by covering it in snot.
Best use of joke shop dentures in a robot face
For that same Siamese two headed robot … it’s teeth didn’t do that a minute ago.
Best use of boomerang as a weapon
For the random guy that starts to follow Ator and his lady. He can take out three people at once, and catch it again. Fantabulous!
Best use of the 'star wars' bar scene in a completely different type of movie
Let me get this straight. This is a sword and sorcery flick. I’m thinking barbarians, kings, queens, castles, and perhaps the odd legendary monster. But to have the bar scene, full of aliens, neon lighting and pub-brawls … the only thing that was missing was the blaster guns. Well done that movie!
Although ‘Yor’ gets an honorable mention, for having ‘Star Wars’ invade his movie and take over by the end.
Best use of the 'sleeping beauty' cliché in a movie.
Well, it had ripped off every other type of movie. I suppose the cartoon genre was the next obvious choice.
As you know, howver, I unfortunately have no control over the Oscars (yet) and so TQFTMS will have to remain a little heard of, underdog to the big budget giants.
In Conclusion
This is a movie that seems to be scraping the barrel for plot ideas. Our hero bumbles about, discovering one coincodental, yet random, event after another... and then it ends. With an absolute zero budget, Joe D'Amato thought far bigger than any sane man would, and used every corner cutting device to try and create and all action blockbuster. He failed miserably.
Bad rating (out of Five):
Brainmelt:
SBIF:
"You'll make the world ring with your exploits!"
bravenet.com