Friday 3 June 2011

Friday's Cheese: There Can Be Only One




Reminiscing about B-grade films with Queen soundtracks, one of the best examples is 1986's Highlander. The film tracks the story of Connor MacLeod of the clan MacLeod who discovers he is immortal, and that there can be only one.

Check out the trailer here (reminder: it is vintage).



The film opens with a fight scene between two men in an underground garage. They carry ancient swords, and one kills the other by decapitation which unleashes some sort of force. And thus we are introduced to MacLeod (played by Frenchman Christopher Lambert whose accents lollops along between Scots and French). Through flashbacks we're told the story of how he discovers his immortality and his introduction to the evil, sleazy Kurgan (superbly acted by Clancy Brown). He's helped along the way by Sean Connery as Juan Sanchez Villa-Lobos Ramirez (his native Scots accent as broad as it is wise for one who is supposedly Spanish).

Ramirez explains to the perplexed MacLeod that he is one in a line of Immortals who must fight each other to the death in order to win an incredible prize. Hence, there can be only one. Lots of head rolling ensues and MacLeod finds himself head-to-head, or rather sword-to-sword with the Kurgan in the final battle.

It's not all action, mind, as Queen laments 'Who wants to live forever?', lending a melancholy to the film which echoes after the film ends.

Directed by 80's music video hotshot, Russell Mulcahy, needless to say, it was slated on release yet has subsequently become a cult classic spawning some horrible sequels and even a TV series.

But nothing can top this original.

What's your favourite quote from a movie?

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