Movie Swords

Back in the 1980’s, the film Highlander became hugely popular, with cult film fans, featuring numerous exciting sword fights, a great villain and a spectacular piece of miscasting with Frenchman, Christopher Lambert playing a Scotsman (Connor McLeod), and the very Scottish Sean Connery playing Juan Sanchez Vlla-Lobos Ramirez! Despite the quirky accents, the film gained cult status, in large part thanks to the excellent sword fights, with fans and collectors soon seeking out replicas of the many weapons used in the film.

At the start of the film story, Connor MacLeod wields a single-handed broadsword. Although no official replica exists, there are numerous unlicensed versions available to buy, mostly of decent quality although none are 100% accurate to the movie prop.

Later in the film Connor MacLeod wields an ancient Japanese Katana that once belonged to his mentor, Ramirez. Previously collectors have been forced to put up with unofficial replicas, often badly sculpted, and rarely accurate to the original film. Excitingly, United Cutlery have recently release a new, officially licensed version, that accurately matches the film versions intricately carved dragon-head handle, and featured a hand-forged carbon-steel blade. Serious collectors should spend the extra money and get this, as it is a huge improvement over previous versions.

After the first highlander film, there were several sequels, but none that were as memorable or entertaining as the first. During the 1990’s a Highlander TV spinoff show was created that followed the adventures of another MacLeod family member, Duncan. Like Connor he also wielded a dragon-head katana, although of a slightly different design. The show is generally considered to be the best follow-up to the original movie and attracted a large cult following, with things eventually coming full circle with a film that united Duncan and Connor.

Like Connor’s Katana, there are a number of mass-produced unlicensed replicas available of Duncan’s Sword, although for copyright reasons none is an exact replica. Fortunately, collectors can now buy an officially licensed version made by United Cutlery, manufactured to the same high standards as their reproduction of Connor’s sword, and also an exact copy of the prop versions used on the show. This is definitely the version collectors should go for, as it uses a higher-quality full carbon blade, and the intricate ivory dragon-head is replicated exactly using a weathered single piece resin casting that replicates the original exactly.

There are numerous other memorable swords used in the movies and series, such as the Kurgan’s multi-part blade, but there are very few replicas of these available to buy, other than a few very limited editions.

The fate f the Highlander series is now unknown. The series has now finished, and recent films, while they have their loyal fans, were not particularly big commercial successes. Given the money earned by other recent sword-filled fantasy films such as 300, The Lord of the Rings and the Pirates of the Caribbean movies, it’s not surprising that there is talk of re-booting the franchise with a re-make of the original. Whatever the eventual result of this, with the recent United Cutlery releases, fans of Highlander can at least own true replica’s of the most iconic swords from the Highlander franchise.

Perhaps the most famous prop weapon in the history of movies is the lightsaber, used by both the brave Jedi Knights and the evil Sith Lords, in George Lucas’s Star Wars film series. This iconic movie weapon is one of the most coveted movie memorabilia, and not surprisingly, the originals props used in the movies are almost never for sale. Despite this, given the appeal of the lightsaber, it’s not surprising that a wide range of replica versions are available to collectors.

The origin of the lightsaber is variously attributed to classic science fiction stories that describe force-field weapons, and to certain episodes of sci-fi TV shows, but Lucas is on record as stating that he simply wanted a weapon that allowed for swordfights like those in period adventure films, such as The Adventures of Robin Hood, and since simple metal swords would seem out of place, and the film already contained laser guns, the obvious solution was for “laser swords”.

The original props seen in A New Hope were scratch built from old camera-flash battery packs and miscellaneous hardware. Perhaps not surprisingly, the exact battery packs used are now invariably difficult to find, due to collectors wishing to “remake” the original props. Later films used custom machined designs, although in some cases components from earlier models were re-used, such as part of Obi-Wan’s lightsaber being used as the basis for Luke’s lightsaber seen in the final film.

The lightsaber effect seen in the movies is entirely done in post-production, even on the original films, with the film frames individually painted over to produce the pulsing glow. This was not the original intention however, as the initial plan was to use spinning blades coated with alternating patches of reflective material, and mount a directional light beside the camera, so that the blades would physically reflect back the light. In practice the end result wasn’t particularly effective, so the post-production option was taken instead.

Inevitably there have been numerous plastic toy versions released down the years, and a whole other article could probably be written about collecting those. The best known current versions are the “Force FX” lightsabers, which despite being only plastic present a surprisingly convincing appearance, as long as you discount the optional plastic light-up blade.

For more accurate replicas of the lightsaber range, the recent Master Replica models represent the very best versions available. Master Replicas was founded to work with movie studios in offering “exact” reproductions of their famous props to serious collectors, at serious prices! The very best models offered were the Signature Editions of all the lightsaber models seen in the films, and cost around $500 each. These metal and plastic versions precisely match all the materials and detailing seen in the films and represent the very best versions that a collector can own.

For a lower price tag, Master Replicas offered scaled down versions of their lightsaber range, maintaining all the details of the full scale versions at a more reasonable price. These editions are ideal for collectors who want to display a range of the lightsabers used in the Star Wars films, and there is even a range of custom-designed display cases on offer for this purpose.

Sadly for collectors, most of the Master Replica range of items is now sold out, at least from Master Replicas themselves. If you hunt around the net or on auction sites you might be able to find some of these items for sale, although most likely at prices far higher than they originally went for. Given the popularity of Star Wars in general, and the lightsaber in particular, it seems unlikely that these will be the last versions of these iconic movie weapons to be released.