The High Crusade (1994)

hyped garbage

An Exercise In Nonsense

Absolutely the worst movie.

All of these films share one commonality, that being a kind of emotional center that humanizes a cast of monsters.

Poul Anderson's book "The High Crusade" is an enormous milestone in the rare genre of historic alien invasions, a true work of fine penmanship, and this movie doesn't hold a candle to it.In all honesty though, alien invasion movies, and historical realism movies generally require huge budgets to be done "right" by Hollywood standards, and combining the two sounds to me like a movie maker's nightmare. While it would be great to see the original book done justice, the budget needed for an epic battle between knights and aliens isn't likely to be forthcoming.The movie version of the high crusade sticks with the original premise, but due to the restrictions of a very tight budget, it was necessary to scale everything back. The special effects are sparing, the sets are repetitive, the script is a little worn around the edges, and the actors are, for the most part, not huge names.All things considered, the movie does especially well for what it has. The slick, smart humor of Poul Anderson is cut out to make room for a lot of silly European humor, but thankfully, it all works great. Certainly, there are not a lot of surprises, but the gist remains funny, and it is the first movie I've seen my boorish father laugh at in over five years, which has to say something.Also, the movie is pretty clean. The worst language is the repetitive use of "bloody," "bastards," "Hell," and "Devil's." The bloodiest wound in the movie is a bump on the head. Two battle scenes, and a severed leg don't spill a drop though. A certain amount of reproductive humor adds a bit of spice to the movie, but this is done in as tasteful a manner as the matterial can be done.Certainly, a lot was lost from the book, but the movie that is left makes for several good laughs, and memorable one-liners.

A very bizarre movie but highly amusing, at least it was years ago, when I watched it on video. Back then, all the aliens had comedy Sean Connery accents which the English could not understand. All very high camp and kind of stupid, but definitely amusing. However, when I watched it recently on DVD, all the Aliens spoke alien gibberish which subsequently required subtitles. This lost a massive amount of the comedy value of the original version. It seems a shame that the directors or whoever, would mess with the original format when the end result is vastly less entertaining. The acting is still pretty good (for such a daft film) as are the effects. I guess the budget was pretty low but it doesn't show as much as you might expect. Certainly it has a better production values than so called "B movie classics" such as Spaceballs. For those who've read the book and are now complaining that the film is not the same, hard luck, get over it. As a movie, it was pretty good (originally).

Years ago the very first SF magazine I ever saw had a knight battling an alien -- it was Astounding SF with "The High Crusade." For a kid it was a great adventure, reading as an adult it is truly hilarious. Poul Anderson handled comedy and tragedy equally well. Had they filmed the book they would have had a hit. Rick Overton would have been a perfect Sir Roger, John Rhys-Davies is worth watching even if he isn't very 'parvus (ie. 'measly.')They clearly did not have the budget for the cast that would have been required The best lines are the ones taken from Anderson's book, such as the 'negotiation' scene. My recommendation, if you have time to kill Rhys-Davies is always worth watching as is Overton. The novel was recently brought out again by i-Books in a cover evidently modeled on the movie. Add the book to your collection and enjoy. Really, it's a very good book and someone should make a movie out of it.

This film has almost everything it needs to be first class science fiction, except a decent screenwriter. The effects, makeup, photography, and direction are all perfectly acceptable for the story. However, the script is a disaster. This is a highly inept adaptation of Poul Anderson's classic sifi novel. Most of the basic premise, and introduction, are preserved. However, the rest is terrible. Anderson's competent crusader knights are replaced by idiots and buffoons. The subtle humor of the original is replaced by inane slapstick. The result is implausible, and embarrassing. If they had simply cut for time, without trying to replace or add, the film would have been vastly better.