I think one of my most anticipated movies in the next few years is Legend of Conan, in which Arnold Schwarzenegger is set to reprise the role that made him a movie star. The actor is incredibly excited about the film and is up for the physicality of it even though he's 65 years old. In a recent interview via TheArnoldFans.com, Schwarzenegger and producer Fredrik Malmberg talk about the film, revealing that they want Peter Jackson's WETA workshop to provide the special effects.
As you know right now, we’re concentrating on the story and the script, and then we’ll go out and find the right director who has the same passion as the rest of us in the group. And you always have to let the creative side and let the director put his stamp and mark on it so you never know what’s going to happen with the production design. I mean, we’re trying to get the TOP production people involved. We’re talking all the time about who we’d see doing the production, and our dream would be to have the WETA Workshop guys, the Lord of the Rings and Hobbit guys. They are huge Conan fans and they would be great to be involved on the creative side.
I'm sure WETA will do an incredible job with it if everything goes as planned. Schwarzenegger went on to talk about staying in shape and prepping to play Conan again. Basically, age doesn't mean anything to him, and he's ready to wield his giant sword!
Well, age doesn’t mean anything to me, because I work out every day. I work out twice a day, as a matter of fact. At night I work out with weights, and in the morning I do cardiovascular training. So for me, to get on the set and to swing the sword around again and to ride the horses and all those things doesn’t mean anything [does not scare me], because I feel like I did thirty years ago. So as long as I stay in shape, that’s the key thing, and to keep your body young. Even though you do feel the pain when you wipe out and when you do your fight scenes and you get more sore and the body doesn’t come back as quickly and all this . . . but just grind through it, you know? That’s what it’s all about!
The film will be a direct sequel to 1984's Conan the Barbarian and will skip over the events of the other films, Conan the Destroyer and the craptastic recent reboot. Universal looking to release the movie in 2014, and here's how it's previously been described:
I want the warrior whose joints have started to fuse together, who has to crack the cartilage so he can pick up a sword again. I want the guy who’s not necessarily lost a step, but there’s some rust he has to shake off. I want to embrace that. It makes it a greater hero story.
Conan needs to be faced with challenges. The greatest challenge to him isn’t the armies that are set before him. It’s, on some level, self-doubt, a little bit of slowing down and forcing yourself to be heroic beyond what people expect of you. What I don’t want is for him to step back in and look the same. That would defeat the purpose of our story.
That's so damn awesome!