Bullet Points: She (1984)
1984’s She was a movie that after watching it, I had to take a moment and really process what I had just experienced. I say experienced because saying I watched She doesn’t do it justice. I assume what I was feeling after my She experience was similar to some sort of drug induced state. Part post-apocalyptic, part sword and sorcery, all batshit crazy is probably the best way I could describe She. But if you are looking for more details, these Bullet Points should do the trick…
- Two Guys, a Girl and a Jackass: Fresh off the boat from the other side, Tom (David Goss), Dick (Harrison Muller) and their sister named (you guessed it) Hari (Elena Wiedermann) have arrived at the town of Heaven’s Gate, to set up shop at the local swap meet where vendors sell and trade a variety of items including boxes of cereal that have to be well past their expiration date. But stale cereal is the least of everyone’s problems when Hector and the Norks show up, looking like they just raided a costume shop, and start tearing shit up. Tom and Dick aren’t the type of guys to simply stand by, so they start fighting the Norks, but the Norks have the numbers advantage and worse they end up harpooning Hari in the leg and kidnapping her!
- Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner?: As the dust begins to settle, Tom and Dick are perplexed at what their next move will be. Who were those guys? Where did they take their sister? They didn’t have an answer to either at that point, but what they did have was a dinner invite from a local woman, who slipped a mickey into the stew she had cooked up. When Dick wakes up he is chained up in the pig pen and when Tom wakes up he finds himself the property of the Goddess of the land simply known as She (Sandahl Bergman, Conan the Barbarian). While Dick is forced to peel potatoes for his captor, Tom finds himself being blindfolded and forced to walk the “path of blood”… a path surrounded by spikes and with the Goddess’ army of Amazon like warriors beating the crap out of him as he passes by, forcing him into the spikes. Tom is then left for dead, while She and her army return to their palace. Tom is assisted by a scientist of sorts, who in addition to patching him up answers some questions… like the fact that the guys who took Hari, were the Norks and that they took her to Nork Valley (naturally). The only problem, the only one who knows the way to Nork Valley is She.
- Let’s All Chant: Tom goes back to the last place he saw Dick and finds him in the pig pen… he helps Dick escape and the two then go undercover as She worshippers taking part in the daily She! She! She! chant. The two end up in She’s inner sanctum and that’s when they kidnap her… they are going to force her to show them the way to Nork Valley… or so they think. When they stop for the night in a region where underground mutants rule, all three find themselves held captive and placed in a room, but this is no ordinary room… the walls start closing in on them and it is only a matter of time before all three are squished to death. Fortunately She’s right hand woman Shanda led a search party for their goddess and got their just in time… it isn’t long before Tom, Dick, She and Shanda go on the journey to Nork Valley together.
- Ralph Waldo Emerson: I believe it was Emerson who said it best… it’s not the destination but the journey. I doubt Ralph had anything like She in mind when he coined that phrase, but it certainly is applicable to the movie. From “creatures of the night” throwing wild orgies like the good ol’ days… to a dude with glowing green eyes and the ability to make people levitate… to a giant hairy guy wearing a tutu… our fearless foursome see it all before they end up separated only to be reunited at the Nork Fortress where they find themselves as part of the Nork monthly recruitment event… I took a great deal of solace knowing that in this post-apocalyptic world, filled with so much random chaos, that somebody was still sticking to a schedule, even if that somebody was Hector, leader of the evil Norks.
She is a movie that I had been meaning to check out for some time and all it took was the Tubi expiration warning to finally get me to pull the trigger on what ended up being one of the most bizarre movies I have ever covered for the site. Does She deserve a thumbs up or thumbs down? I’m not really sure… it kept my interest through out and I feel like it is a movie that will be burned into my memory. So if nothing else it left a lasting impression on me..
Will these Bonus Bullet Points leave a lasting impression on you? Read them and find out…
- Skin to Win: There is a scene early on in the movie where She goes into a cave that seems to be a warehouse of sorts and a variety of “swordsman” pop out of crates and she battles them. She kicks some ass but doesn’t come out of the battles unscathed. So her next step is a hot spring, where we get some Sandahl Bergman boobs as she rejuvenates her body and spirit. This scene seemed to be designed solely to get Bergman partially nude… something I doubt the intended audience was upset with.
- The Name Game: Not to be confused with the 1935 film She starring Helen Gagahan or the 1965 film She starring Ursula Andress. Although like the 1935 and 1965 films, the 1984 version of She was based on a novel by H. Rider Haggard.
- Directed by: She was directed by Avi Nesher. Nesher would go on to direct two Olivier Gruner movies in the 1990s, Savage and Mercenary.
