Deathstalker II (1987)

the audience applauded

Good movie but grossly overrated

I cannot think of one single thing that I would change about this film. The acting is incomparable, the directing deft, and the writing poignantly brilliant.

By the time the dramatic fireworks start popping off, each one feels earned.

I quite enjoyed the first Deathstalker film, a knowingly silly barbarian romp. This sequel is from writer/director Jim Wynorski and is pretty typical of his output: cheap, poorly acted, but with lots of T&A and a spot of softcore sex.This time around, warrior Deathstalker is played by John Terlesky, whose s**t-eating grin, wisecracks and big chin (Bruce Campbell has some serious competition from this guy) really got on my nerves. He's not exactly Arnold Schwarzenegger either, making for a rather lacklustre hero. Thankfully, the heroine of the piece, Princess Evie, is played by stunning softcore actress Monique Gabrielle who gladly shows off her assets and very nice they are too. Also displaying great form are Toni Naples as wicked sorceror Jarek's evil sidekick Sultana, and Maria Socas as an Amazon Queen.Hot women in various states of undress aside, the film is pretty dire: there are numerous poorly choreographed battles, a really dumb wrestling scene between Deathstalker and an Amazonian warrior woman (played by wrestler Queen Kong), some bargain basement zombies, a few scenes borrowed from the first film to keep down costs, and lots of terrible dialogue delivered unconvincingly by the 'stars'.3.5 out of 10, rounded up to 4 for the dwarf playing a lute.

Deathstalker (John Terlesky) is not a real hero, but rather a reckless rogue who fights only as long as it is fun, and his only ambition is to marry a rich princess some day. He meets Reena (Monique Gabrielle) who claims she can see the future in her crystal ball, but the results are not convincing. However, she also tells him she is a princess, and once the evil sorcerer Jarek (John La Zar) is out of the way, she might sit on the throne, rightfully. Before they face Reena's enemy, the queen of the amazons (Maria Socas, I recognized her from 'The Warrior and the Sorceress') has a special challenge for Deathstalker: wrestling a fat amazon to the death...'Deathstalker II' is a comedy in the first place, the dialogs are hilarious! Actually, 'Deathstalker II' doesn't look like a sequel to 'Deathstalker' at all. 'Deathstalker IV' had Rick Hill return as the hero, 'Deathstalker III' was at least written by the same scriptwriter, but in 'Deathstalker II' there is no personal continuity with the first movie. Which is probably a good thing, because this comedy within the series works very well as a movie of its own.

"Deathstalker" of 1983 was an incredibly crappy movie, but in its own way incredibly entertaining and fun to watch, simply due to its value as an unintentional comedy. The first sequel, "Deathstalker II: Duel Of The Titans" of 1987 almost seems to be a spoof of its predecessor. As the first movie, "Deathstalker 2" is again extremely crappy and therefore quite funny, but it seems that director Jim Wynorski as well as the actors and everybody else connected with this film were actually willing to do a movie as crappy as possible on purpose. While the Deathstalker was basically a brutal and invincible Barbarian cheapo version of Conan played by muscleman Rick Hill in the first movie, the title character became a skinny guy with a tendency towards stupid jokes. The dialogue is even sillier and out of place than in the first movie ("a cigar for the lady", "is that your sword or are you just happy to see me"...), the acting is (intentionally?) terrible and hardly anything in the movie makes sense.The movie is set in some fantasy land and fantasy time that seems lie an in-between of the middle ages and the stone age. The fact that the people are clearly pagans, of course, doesn't stop graves on cemeteries from having crosses on them. At one point of the movie a warrior explains that he had fought under Attila The Hun's command, while his buddy has served for Ghenghis Khan. The fact that Attila The Hun died over 700 years before Ghenghis Kahn was even born is, of course, ignored. Scenes like these, and other oddities, should keep the viewer entertained. "Deathstalker II" also features an Amazon tribe and warriors with human bodies and pig heads (one of those was my favorite character in the first film). Some of the women are lovely to look at, especially Monique Gabrielle, who plays the female lead, and Maria Socas, who plays the Amazon Queen, are a treat for the eye. One of the main aims of "Deathstalker II" is to show breasts (although not quite as often as the first film), but sadly it fails to achieve the amount of gore featured in its predecessor. All said, "Deathstalker II" is an extremely crappy movie, but great fun to watch. I recommend to watch the first "Deathstalker" before watching this, and I personally laughed more during the first film, but I guess it doesn't quite make a difference. People with a sense of humor and able to bear a bit of awfulness should certainly have a good time, 3/10

One of those very few sequels that exceeds the original by far. Although Deathstalker wasn't too bad in its genre, Deathstalker 2 exceeds it both in `cheapness' and in `ridiculousness'. It wasn't going to be pretty and they knew that while making it. They broke almost every rule in film making, and ended up with a hilarious movie, full of `functional' nudity, hilarious dialogues and `fierce sword fighting'. It's so full of cross references with other movies, (copied set's e.g.) that even for the notorious movie freak it's impossible to find the all. This is truly one of the best films in its genre!I'm still happy I bought this ex rental VHS a few years ago, mainly because of the extremely overdone cover and the addition: `Also with former Penthouse Pet Monique Gabrielle' ha ha. It must have cost the makers more to hire her than the budget for the entire movie..