Psychotic Cinema

Genre: 80's Sword and Sorcery

Occasionally after a hard days work, I have a craving to see semi-naked warrior women fighting - or even better still, topless warrior women fighting and today was one of those days. Luckily my craving was satisfied by the 1986 Roger Corman produced soft-core sword and sorcery movie, Amazons.

Now let me take you back in time… to a time when the Earth was ruled by the powers of light and darkness… where half-human creatures roam the deep forests – capturing beautiful maidens to sacrifice… where a dark evil wizard conquers and enslaves the peasants… and where there is a tribe of busty warrior women with 80’s hairdos… meet the Amazons.

Dyala and Tashi

Kalungo (Joseph Whipp) is the evil wizard and with his magic powers and his army of back clad soldiers, he has invaded a small fortified town. In the process he ruthlessly kills and enslaves its population.

In the nearby forest live the Amazons. They are a tribe of warrior women ruled by a good queen, her advisor (a guy with a headband and Burt Reynolds moustache) and a high priest.

Tshingi at the home of the Amazons

One of the girls, Dyala (Ty Randolph using the pseudonym Windsor Taylor Randolph), has a dream about an Excalibur type sword. The Queen tells her that if she can find the sword and bring it back to the tribe, they will be able to defeat Kalungo.

Kalungo (right) with his sidekick (left)

Dyala takes a companion with her called Tashi (Penelope Reed), but not before Tashi’s evil mother Tshingi (Danitza Kingsley) tells her to kill Dyala once Dyala has found the sword and to bring the sword back to her.

Dyala and Tashi set out on their quest for the sword and soon run into trouble when Tashi is captured by the half-humans and is to be sacrificed along with a cage full of buxom topless maidens.

A cart full of captured maidens

The scene in the cage is actually fairly creepy as the maidens purposely drug themselves so as to be anaesthetized from any pain when they are sacrificed.

Kalunga’s pet lion is also sent to find the sword, but first the lion temporarily metamorphosis into a naked girl before disappearing into the forest. Meanwhile, Tshingi double-crosses the Amazons by making a pact with Kalunga and it isn’t long before she is riding upon his pork sword.

A maiden awaiting sacrifice

With the help of a good witch, Dyala and Tashi find the sword in a cave, but the lion has found it too. The witch had prophesized that three will enter the cave, but only one would leave. Will Dyala get the sword and will she return to defeat the evil Kalunga?

There was a real fad for these sword and saucery movies during the 1980's and this is one of the better Americanized ones which came out during this era. Everything seems rather standard until about 22 minutes into the film when we are suddenly treated to the Amazon's splashing around naked in a river. This scene would have made Russ Meyer proud. From there on we are treated to plenty of soft-core nudity for the remainder of the film's running time.

The Amazons: battling she-babes

Amazons also contains its fair share of violence and at times it can be quite strong. One notable scene is the half-humans sacrifice of the maidens with one sacrifice being especially gory.

Kalungo’s lion is far from ferocious and is noticeably quite small when involved in the fight scenes with the Amazons. The lion looks more like it would enjoy a nice bowl of milk.
The acting, especially be the Amazons, is laughable, with terrible fight scenes and any scene of a dramatic nature is hilarious. Don't let this put you of - it just adds to the general low-brow entertainment value. Overall this is a fun film to watch, with plenty of titillation, a fairly descent plot and would compliment a crate of strong beer nicely.

Amazons (1986)