Some Oliver Stone's script possible inspirations I found

Reading Oliver Stone's script, wow, so the "This you can trust" monologue of Conan's father wasn't by Milius! I allways thought it was, indeed it sound pretty much like something he could have writte with his fascination to weapons, and his phylosophy of "guns give you a sense of freedom" and so.



Also, another interesting thing, Stone is already saying Conan holds his sword in a Samurai style, when fighting.

So, the idea of Conan using Kendo ala Kurosawa was in Stone, before, maybe only in a suggested way... And maybe Milius took it literal and developed it... Dunno, Milius already loved Kurosawa and indeed he practiced Kendo.

Some Oliver Stone's script possible inspirations I found::

Well, surely Stone had read "Conan the barbarian" comis issues -probably more than REH original stories- as preparation for the script. The beginning of the witch-wolf scene is no doubt inspired by the comic issue #45 Cromulus posted several months ago.

Besides, some other moments like the arrival of Conan to Zamora -when a thieve thinks about attacking him, then Conan wanders down his hand to his broadsword, is directly taken from this issue #78 (sept 1977):



Also, it was first published, b/w, in Savage sword of Conan #1 dated aug 1974.

From that very same story (by Roy Thomas) came the scene where some whores call to Conan, if i'm not wrong.



Interesting that wrestling scene with the "creature" in the Tower of Set -surely transformed into the "mirrors room monster" scene in "The Destroyer"... The creature is described as really ugly and horrible, some kind of undead ape-man.

The there is a throttling fight between them both. That is directly taken from "Shadows of Zamboula", the REH literary tale,

Quote :

Slightly taller than Conan and much heavier, Ball-pteor loomed before him, a daunting image of muscular development. His mighty arms were unnaturally long, and his great hands opened and closed, twitching convulsively. Conan released the hilt of his imprisoned sword and fell silent, watching his enemy through slitted lids.

And like the stroke of twin cobras, the great hands closed on Conan’s throat. The Cimmerian made no attempt to dodge or fend them away, but his own hands darted to the Kosalan’s bull-neck. Baal-pteor’s black eyes widened as he felt the thick cords of muscles that protected the barbarian’s throat. With a snarl he exerted his inhuman strength, and knots and lumps of ropes of thews rose along his massive arms. And then a choking gasp burst from him as Conan’s fingers locked on his throat. For an instant they stood there like statues, their faces masks of effort, veins beginning to stand out purply on their temples. Conan’s thin lips drew back from his teeth in a grinning snarl. Baal-pteor’s eyes were distended, in them grew an awful surprise and the glimmer of fear. Both men stood motionless as images, except for the expanding of their muscles on rigid arms and braced legs, but strength beyond common concept was warring there – strength that might have uprooted trees and crushed the skulls of bullocks.

though Stone could have taken it directly from the comic adaptation. "Savage sword #14" (1976):









Valthemos prophecy of the future -and spaceships- is taken from "Conan the barbarian #1"



or also from "Savage sword #7":



also in this story, the evil wizard uses neanderthals as soldiers.





The kung-fu type leap that Brak does, (cape billowing behind him), then the head of Conan smashed against the pillar (that kind of unrealistic cartoon ultraviolence), and also the whole Conan vs Mutants fight is very reminiscent of RICHARD CORBEN comics like DEN. In fact I don't know why but DEN is the kind of images I have while reading Stone's script -half barbarian, half scifi-, also the languaje is closer to these kind of underground comics than to marvel's Conan. Things like:

-Eat my steel!

-I saved your ass, now kiss me.

-How you dare, punk!









I truly believe Stone was more influenced by Corben infinitely more than than by Marvel (Roy Thomas, Buscema, etc). Interesting. -Could have been the idea of hiring CORBEN originally by Stone, then used by Milius?



Also the concept of post-apocaliptyc future with barbarians and mutants has nothing to do with REH or Marvel's Conan comics, but is essentially a common theme in Corben's work:

Stone seems to have been influenced by the comics and novels and mythology. The "This you can trust" stuff may be some historical quote from somewhere else, but I'm no expert.

Yeah, but I find Stone is not really following REH's world, it could be any fantasy world. REH was very much into describing cultures, ethnics, cities, lands, etc. Not Stone, he isn't concrete in his descriptions, he doesn't use too much of REH creations, and even he describes Conan with black eyes -any REH literary tale would have the "blue eyes" info for sure-. Maybe he simply read the comics, and didn't realize about the colour?? Strange, why would he change the color? I do think he didn't read the REH tales, there is nothing in the script that can't be found on Marvel adaptations, and there is a lot in the script that can only be found in Marvel comics.

I find strange his quotes about other inspirations like Dante or William Blake or Bosch... You know, it's simply aesthethic, ok, he created a monster inspired by one creature painted by Bosch... so what? I feel he is trying to give some "artistic value" to his script, which is anything but deep in any way. It's a cartoon and that's all, with good and inspired moments but nothing really "artistic" in it. Still, it could have been a wonder of artistic design. Think about Corben's scripts for his comics, the scripts are shit, the images are amazing. But the story itself is really empty, I doubt it could have really work. Dunno.

In Stone's defense though he laid the ground work, which in turn may of been laid by Roy Thomas for the movie. They all seem to be pastiches of pastiches, including Howard who tried imitating various authors and ancient Celtic and Greco-Roman books and myths.

Stone though pretty much already left the skelton for Milius' movie we love and assign him the most credit, milius just added the muscle.

Stone's script is much a elaborate spectacle of images and ideas woven together from various sources..Milius' scripts are more polished and personal, but still not that drastic a change from Stone's vision.

I want Roy Thomas' script, we may be assigning to much credit to Milius and Stone(which they deserve alot of it), but we may have to adjust some things!

Cromulus The Destroyer wrote:

In Stone's defense though he laid the ground work.

Stone though pretty much already left the skelton for Milius' movie we love and assign him the most credit, milius just added the muscle.

Stone's script is much a elaborate spectacle of images and ideas woven together from various sources..Milius' scripts are more polished and personal, but still not that drastic a change from Stone's vision.

Agree.

Cromulus The Destroyer wrote:

I want Roy Thomas' script, we may be assigning to much credit to Milius and Stone(which they deserve alot of it), but we may have to adjust some things!

Yeah, that would be great, really.

These "Conan the barbarian" marvel comics you mentioned once, "The devourer of the Dead" and so... Didi you said they were actually the Thomas script transformed into a comic? Did I got it wrong?

Shit, William Smith claimed he was the author of the "This you can trust" monologue, which wasn't even by Milius!!!

Quote :

William Smith (who plays Conan's father in the film) gives himslef the merits of the monologue in question in this interview carried out by Louis Paul (during which he also reveals to have beaten Schwarzenegger when arm-wrestling!):

"In CONAN, I just had one speech, to the baby Conan, and John Milius kept saying to me "I want something about steel and fire and strength." Now, I was on the set for thirteen weeks and I was on the screen for only seven minutes, and he came to me one day, and he said "We're gonna' shoot that monologue of yours now" and I said "What monologue?" and he said "What I've been telling you about..." So, the monologue that I did in CONAN was off the top of my head "Not man, not woman, not beast can you trust. This can you trust..." the sword. I did the same thing in RED DAWN. I wrote the whole Russian speech in that."

Amazing, since the Stone script wasn't avaibale for anyone to check it out, anybody can even claim they created Conan

Flaming Turd wrote:

since the Stone script wasn't available for anyone to check it out

Not anymore!

http://www.conancompletist.com/EN/home.htm

(But yeah, Smith seems to be stretching reality a little bit! )

Yeah, there is a old convo we had there, shit back in 2004 already?