Reviewed by

Christopher Armstead

Crixus is in the house! Obviously keeping himself busy in between seasons of ‘Spartacus Blood and Sand’ actor Manu Bennett has lent his physique and fighting skills to some low budget swashbuckling in this movie ‘Sinbad and the Minotaur’ while thankfully keeping his pants on. Thank you for this Manu! Of course Manu Bennett as Sinbad might be a bit of a change for a lot us who were raised on lighter skinned, blue-eyed Sinbad’s but Sinbad is supposed to be Persian or something like that right? So after hundreds of years worth of Sinbad styled entertainment the swashbuckling Arabian hero finally looks somewhat similar to what he’s supposed to look like.

When we first visit Sinbad, he and his swashbuckling sidekick Karim (Pacharo Mzembe) have just invaded the camp site of crazed sorcerer Al Jibar (Seven Graves) in search of the sage scroll of Minos. Within the scroll lies the location of the golden head of… something fancy sounding that I can’t remember… something that will deliver riches to the one who can find it. Sinbad finds the scroll, the guards are alerted and massive amounts of swashbuckling ensues. In the midst of this swashbuckling action, Sinbad makes the acquaintance of sizzling hot captive Princess Tara (Holly Brisley) and then using the Cloak of Mists they escape on their adventure.

Not surprisingly Al-Jibar is none too happy about this, losing his scroll and his captive princess so he is hot on Sinbad’s ass, along with his hawk and his regenerating, sharp toothed vampire cannibal sidekick who gets the truth out of people by eating them. It’s complicated.

Eventually Sinbad and his crew make to the uninhabited Isle of Minos only to find out its inhabited. But it’s cool because these people are real nice and helpful folks. Eventually Sinbad, his crew and the hot Princess make it to the volcano cave of Minos that houses the golden head and… dang… the Minotaur. And as angry as Al-Jibar might’ve been, the Minotaur is even more pissed off. Try not to get too attached to too many members of Sinbad’s crew. One of Sinbad’s crew members Nestor (Terry

Antoniak) has the ability to interpret ancient texts and it would’ve been really helpful if he had read that scroll before they made it to Minos because there was some vital information in that scroll about these friendly people that live on Minos.

Eventually Al-Jibar and his cannibal vampire sidekick make to this island and start causing a ruckus, but as it turns out Al-Jibar isn’t the real problem here. Actually the real problem is the people of Minos and their lovely bar maiden with the large eyes and the flowing blonde hair Arianna (Lily Brown). She’s a problem. Not just for Sinbad but for the audience because she we will yell and scream and become extremely irritating very quickly. Anyway, good luck Sinbad, the hot Princess and what’s left of your crew in getting off this island without getting gored. And shrieked at by the irritating bar maid.

I’m thinking a more accurate title for this movie would’ve been ‘Sinbad vs. The Minotaur Zombies’ which you have to admit sounds kind of hot doesn’t it? We spent way more time in this flick dealing with a bunch of crazed, possessed, demonic looking freaks with chintzy demon horns sticking out there foreheads than the actual Minotaur. And when you take a look at the separate parts of ‘Sinbad and the Minotaur’ say from the poorly done CGI Minotaur with his red Minotaur vision, some suspect acting here and there, the over reliance on Minotaur Zombies, and a Sinbad who had the swashbuckling and hostility thing down pat but was a tee bit lacking in charm and romanticism… you would think that we had yet another Sci-Fi style crap movie on our hands. Well you would be wrong my friends! Then again maybe not… with this solely dependent on your level of tolerance with these kinds of movies, but I’ll have you know that we enjoyed this wacky, crazy version of Sinbad that featured Minotaur Zombies.

For comparisons sake we could contrast this to the last Sinbad movie we saw, that being The Asylum’s ‘The Seven Adventures of Sinbad’, quite possibly the worst Sinbad movie ever made. Check that, most definitely the worst Sinbad movie ever made. That movie had Patrick Muldoon as Sinbad, this movie has Crixus. That’s an easy choice. That movie had a bad guy that consisted of… well…nothing really. This movie had actor Steven Graves over-acting his ass off. That movie had a narrative that made absolutely no sense where this movie had a story that made almost no sense. We have a winner! Even our prerequisite damsel in distress was superior, and while Holly Brisley has take a back seat to the hottest damsel in a Sinbad movie ever, that being Jane Seymour in Sinbad and the Eye of the Tiger… I mean Jane was straight smoking in that movie… Holly ain’t so bad. Director Karl Zwicky keeps this thing moving, Manu Bennett never stopped swashbuckling, Minotaur Zombies never stopped mindlessly running around and grunting, actress Lily Brown never stopped being shrill and Steven Graves never found that top that some performers go over while acting. He just kept on reaching. We call that Outstanding where I come from. You people out there go rent this movie so they’ll make more these.