ZARDOZ (vhs) Sean Connery in the year 2293, and 50 similar items

Due to the following defects this is a reduced price item and is still quite watchable despite the opening hiccups. Pre-viewed for quality and had lines on the long black leader, logo, and Arthur Frayn's ("Zardoz") introduction scene. Then, there's an occasional light line after this till the opening credits. It looks worse on my Emerson vcr Vizio tv than it does on my JVC vcr Sony projection tv. Cassette has a foil security sticker on the right endcap assuring you of first generation quality. The top label has a long narrow 'please rewind tape' across it's edge. The box has been cut and mounted in a white, hard plastic clamshell display case. Out Of Print (OOP) in all formats and no longer being manufactured. ZARDOZ, represented by a huge floating stone head that wears a grimace, dwells in a place known as the Vortex. He is the god of a warrior class, the Exterminators, that dwell outside of the Vortex. Their mission is to rape, plunder, and murder the Brutals, a subclass of farmers and villagers who live in the Outlands. The film's hero, Zed (Sean Connery) experiences an epiphany when he realizes that the god he and the other Exterminators worship is a sham. During an attack on a Brutal village, Zed is lured into a decaying library by a mysterious figure whom he later learns is called Arthur Frayn (Niall Buggy)--the magician who is also the manipulator of the fake god, Zardoz. There, he is shown a book titled 'The Wizard of Oz', which Zed recognizes as the source of Zardoz's name (a conflation of "Wizard" and "Oz"). He determines that his mission as an Exterminator is evil, a machination in the name of some unhallowed cause. Desiring to learn the truth behind Zardoz, Zed devises a plan to gain access to the god. During the performance of a seasonal ritual through which the Brutals attempt to please Zardoz, Zed hides inside one of the baskets of grain emptied into the god's mouth as a kind of offering. When he is sure he has entered the god's head, Zed emerges from the grain, executes a surprised Arthur Frayn, Zardoz' manipulator (who is later resurrected) and rides the head into the Vortex. The humans who live within the Vortex are Eternals, members of an intellectual upper class who have discovered the secret to eternal life. Because Arthur Frayn is an Eternal, his body undergoes "reconstruction" allowing him to return later in the story to reprise his role as the "magician." Despite the achievement of intellect and immortality, life inside the Vortex is sterile and uninteresting. Most are either "Apathetics" (those who have lost all sexual urges and are nearly catonic) or "Renegades" (unhappy Eternals perpetrating crimes against their society, for which they are punished by being aged). Zed's penetration into this world instills it with new life, precisely because he reintroduces violence, virility, and death. The Eternals discover that, in addition to his physical superiority, Zed possesses a powerful intellect, and thus, they wish to kill him. Zed attempts to ascertain the secret of immortality the Eternals have invented, a secret hidden in a place known as the Tabernacle. To enter it, he approaches May (Sara Kestelman), an Eternal who seems to have a premonition of Zed's true function--the Chosen One who will either be destroyer or deliverer of those who dwell in the Vortex. Another Eternal, Consuella (Charlotte Rampling) initially opposes Zed, viewing him as a beast who must be killed. However, she realizes that in her desire for his death she has perhaps also become the mirror image of that which she loathes in him, a predator, and she must decide to whom she must owe her allegiance--the vital, compelling, yet dangerous Zed, or the evolved, "superior" citizens of the Vortex. ZARDOZ is extremely rich in ideas, and features superb performances by Connery and Rampling in the height of their careers.