If you grew up in the 1980's, there were several reasons that you didn't know Masters of the Universe" – like, having been raised by wolves or being in a coma, for example. Naturally, much greatness was expected from the motion picture adaptation of "Masters of the Universe". Oh, what grandness would await us! Lundgren seemed perfect for the role of the kid-friendly, "blond version of Conan the Barbarian". This film would be bigger than "Star Wars" and "Lord of the Rings" (had we known about this one back then) combined! Just think of the myriads of creatures from the toy-line, Trap-Jaw, Battle-Cat and all the others.
Well, there was no Battle-Cat. No Trap-Jaw. No Man-E-Faces, no Mer-Man you get my point. Instead, we got a couple of new creatures; we got annoying teenagers that could only exist in 1980's Americana and, of course, Charlie, the most pointless character in the annals of cinema. And they gave Man-at-Arms the name "Duncan", which animated a friend of mine to quip: " and Skeletors first name is Fred". And the movie committed one faux-pas that was common for productions with a limited budget: it took the setting to contemporary settings (that's 80s Los Angeles, to you and me).
This review may sound negative, having so far pointed out mainly the short-comings, but not all is bad: Frank Langella makes a wonderful Skeletor, who obviously enjoys hamming it up to 11; Meg Foster was born to play Evil-Lyn and, as mentioned, Lundgren was a very convincing He-Man, even though there really was no need for that cape. Though the absence of all the characters like Stratos and Zodiac was painful, the new 'creatures' Sauron (not related), Blade (not related either but one of the movie's highlights) and Gwildor (as obnoxious as the cartoon-Orko, but made a better toy) were very well designed and performed.
So, all that's left is to wait and dream of a remake, that probably will never materialize – unless of course the toy-line is revived one day and a remake is turned into some kind of CGI-monster-production (a crate of beer says, it will be in 3-D).
If this movie would have had a bigger budget and would have stuck closer to the original story, it could have worked. As it is, the flaws outnumber the merits, and giving 5 points from 10 is plain fair.
Well, there was no Battle-Cat. No Trap-Jaw. No Man-E-Faces, no Mer-Man you get my point. Instead, we got a couple of new creatures; we got annoying teenagers that could only exist in 1980's Americana and, of course, Charlie, the most pointless character in the annals of cinema. And they gave Man-at-Arms the name "Duncan", which animated a friend of mine to quip: " and Skeletors first name is Fred". And the movie committed one faux-pas that was common for productions with a limited budget: it took the setting to contemporary settings (that's 80s Los Angeles, to you and me).
This review may sound negative, having so far pointed out mainly the short-comings, but not all is bad: Frank Langella makes a wonderful Skeletor, who obviously enjoys hamming it up to 11; Meg Foster was born to play Evil-Lyn and, as mentioned, Lundgren was a very convincing He-Man, even though there really was no need for that cape. Though the absence of all the characters like Stratos and Zodiac was painful, the new 'creatures' Sauron (not related), Blade (not related either but one of the movie's highlights) and Gwildor (as obnoxious as the cartoon-Orko, but made a better toy) were very well designed and performed.
So, all that's left is to wait and dream of a remake, that probably will never materialize – unless of course the toy-line is revived one day and a remake is turned into some kind of CGI-monster-production (a crate of beer says, it will be in 3-D).
If this movie would have had a bigger budget and would have stuck closer to the original story, it could have worked. As it is, the flaws outnumber the merits, and giving 5 points from 10 is plain fair.