THE BLADE MASTER (1983)

 

PHENOMENALITY: *marvelous*
MYTHICITY: *poor*
FRYEAN MYTHOS: *adventure*
CAMPBELLIAN FUNCTION: *cosmological*

As cheap and sloppy as ATOR THE FIGHTING EAGLE was, one can probably enjoy it in an indulgent frame of mind, and I've the impression that, in addition to being a theatrical success in its time, it's become known as one of the more memorable Italian cheese-fests of the 1980s, in part due to being riffed by Mystery Science Theater.

MST3K riffed the sequel BLADE MASTER as well, but the script for this one-- credited to director Joe D'Amato-- was so formless that even a spoof couldn't make it interesting. D'Amato commented online that he didn't really have a script when he began the project, and indeed, BLADE seems mostly like a stitched-together assemblage of scenes. I imagine the director telling the actors to waltz around in various settings while he tried to figure out the next scene.

The opening seems to imply that we may not be in a sword-and-sorcery neverland this time, but in some post-apocalyptic era in which people dress like ancient barbarians. Isolated scientist Akronos discovers a "geometric nucleus" and wants it protected from a horde of approaching bandits who may misuse the device's power with cataclysmic results. Akronos sends his daughter Mila (Lisa Foster) to appeal to all-round good-guy Ator (Miles O'Keeffe) to protect the nucleus project from the bandits. Oddly, though there's a line that seems to tie this Ator to the one from the previous film-- at least he's said to have married his love Sunya-- Sunya is never seen and the viewer has no idea what Ator's been doing since his last adventure. He does have a new mentor with the risible name of "Thong." The latter is apparently teaching Ator martial arts because the guy's played by an Asian, but if so Thong's not a great teacher, because the barbarian's swordplay looks as bad as it did in the first film.

And after that? Well, lots more episodic stuff happens, occasionally coming back to the menace of the bandits and their nasty leader Zor. Fights with a tribe of cannibals and a giant snake don't prove nearly as entertaining as they sound. Eventually, after Zor is defeated, the scientist lets the device be destroyed somewhere and it creates a nuclear explosion.

There's no romance subplot this time to make either hero or heroine somewhat palatable, and it's just as well, because Foster is just as bad at emoting as O'Keeffe. The most amusing thing about BLADE is that D'Amato was apparently enjoined to work in some scenes from a separate film about cave-people-- indeed, the title MST3K uses for its spoof is CAVE DWELLERS-- and these are so incredibly out of place with the sword-and-sorcery look of everything else that they're a little diverting-- but only a little.