I honestly don't know why they bothered making this movie (or Outlaw of Gor either).
Now, I know that people are tired of listening to the fans of books put down movies because they stray too much from the books, but in this case, listen up. They didn't just "stray" from the books. This is nothing like them at all.
In the books, there is a counter Earth called Gor. This planet orbits our sun directly opposite the Earth, so it cannot be seen. The "Gods" of Gor are a technically advanced race of giant insects called the Priest Kings. These insects use their technology to prevent humans on Earth from detecting Gor.
The Priest Kings realize that humanity is close to destruction by their own hand (nuclear war) and so they bring a large sampling of Earth's population to Gor, but forbid them from making any form of technology other than medical. Because of this, Gor has developed Stabilization Serums that allow them to stop ageing.
The people of Gor are organized into a caste system, with slavers, warriors, builders, physicians and so on. The main character Tarl Cabbot is in the caste of Warriors. He is a professor from Earth, who was kidnapped and brought to Gor. It turns out his father was a leader of one of Gor's city-States called Ko-Ro-Ba.
The books are all based on his learning the way of Gor, and becoming the best swordsman the planet has ever seen.
Because of the sampling of humanity brought to Gor, the peoples there are separated into areas of the planet they would naturally be from on Earth, thus you have Viking like people in the north, Arab like people in the desert and so on. Many of the books take place with the main character in different areas of the planet amongst different peoples.
Due to the caste system on Gor, they have developed slavery. All slaves are branded and become property of their masters. Many women are used as pleasure slaves, and the author John Norman often goes overboard (especially in the later books) trying to convince the reader how women naturally want to be dominated by men. He gets so involved in this in his later books that I often found myself skipping chapters that had nothing to do with the story.
All of this back-story is basically completely missing from the movies, and the Priest Kings have been relegated to being played by Jack Palance's Xenos character.
So, basically, everything that made this book series "epic" was removed, and they made it into a bad warrior-journey movie ala The Beast Master.
One of the problems is that they may have not had the budget or the capability to pull off some of the great things about the books, like some of the encounters between the Priest Kings and their deadly enemies the "Others", or the ability to see Gor's warriors riding their mounts, Tarns, which are giant hawk-like birds (I can just see them trying to pull this off at the time and failing miserably).
The book that follows the first two, The Priest Kings of Gor, Cabbot actually goes to the mountains the Priest Kings live under, and meets them and is involved in a civil war between the forces of The First and the Fifth (those are the leaders of the Priest Kings, as in the first born, and the fifth born).
Nothing like these characters, events, or even the true nature of the Gor books is even touched on in these two complete failures they called movies. They should have just called them something else considering how bad they were, and how little they had to do with the books.
Personally, I think that if they were to make a real attempt at making these books into new R rated movies, they could have some real block busters on their hands. They could remove 75% of Norman and his fetish with dominating women, but still had a great, bloody, sexy series of movies that could interest a lot of adult scifi/fantasy fans.
As for the movies, just skip them, They're so bad they will leave a bad taste in your mouth. Just don't let it stop you from reading the books.
Now, I know that people are tired of listening to the fans of books put down movies because they stray too much from the books, but in this case, listen up. They didn't just "stray" from the books. This is nothing like them at all.
In the books, there is a counter Earth called Gor. This planet orbits our sun directly opposite the Earth, so it cannot be seen. The "Gods" of Gor are a technically advanced race of giant insects called the Priest Kings. These insects use their technology to prevent humans on Earth from detecting Gor.
The Priest Kings realize that humanity is close to destruction by their own hand (nuclear war) and so they bring a large sampling of Earth's population to Gor, but forbid them from making any form of technology other than medical. Because of this, Gor has developed Stabilization Serums that allow them to stop ageing.
The people of Gor are organized into a caste system, with slavers, warriors, builders, physicians and so on. The main character Tarl Cabbot is in the caste of Warriors. He is a professor from Earth, who was kidnapped and brought to Gor. It turns out his father was a leader of one of Gor's city-States called Ko-Ro-Ba.
The books are all based on his learning the way of Gor, and becoming the best swordsman the planet has ever seen.
Because of the sampling of humanity brought to Gor, the peoples there are separated into areas of the planet they would naturally be from on Earth, thus you have Viking like people in the north, Arab like people in the desert and so on. Many of the books take place with the main character in different areas of the planet amongst different peoples.
Due to the caste system on Gor, they have developed slavery. All slaves are branded and become property of their masters. Many women are used as pleasure slaves, and the author John Norman often goes overboard (especially in the later books) trying to convince the reader how women naturally want to be dominated by men. He gets so involved in this in his later books that I often found myself skipping chapters that had nothing to do with the story.
All of this back-story is basically completely missing from the movies, and the Priest Kings have been relegated to being played by Jack Palance's Xenos character.
So, basically, everything that made this book series "epic" was removed, and they made it into a bad warrior-journey movie ala The Beast Master.
One of the problems is that they may have not had the budget or the capability to pull off some of the great things about the books, like some of the encounters between the Priest Kings and their deadly enemies the "Others", or the ability to see Gor's warriors riding their mounts, Tarns, which are giant hawk-like birds (I can just see them trying to pull this off at the time and failing miserably).
The book that follows the first two, The Priest Kings of Gor, Cabbot actually goes to the mountains the Priest Kings live under, and meets them and is involved in a civil war between the forces of The First and the Fifth (those are the leaders of the Priest Kings, as in the first born, and the fifth born).
Nothing like these characters, events, or even the true nature of the Gor books is even touched on in these two complete failures they called movies. They should have just called them something else considering how bad they were, and how little they had to do with the books.
Personally, I think that if they were to make a real attempt at making these books into new R rated movies, they could have some real block busters on their hands. They could remove 75% of Norman and his fetish with dominating women, but still had a great, bloody, sexy series of movies that could interest a lot of adult scifi/fantasy fans.
As for the movies, just skip them, They're so bad they will leave a bad taste in your mouth. Just don't let it stop you from reading the books.