A Legend to Ride

This obscure TV movie for children, made in Finland, first aired in 1997 with the title The 13th Rider. An innocent romp about a group of Finnish equestrians, the name was later changed to A Legend to Ride, possibly so that it wouldn’t be confused with the medieval action flick The 13th Warrior with Antonio Banderas. This was probably a smart move on the distributor’s part. Can you imagine the parent who made that mistake? “Sally, Daddy brought you home a nice movie about horsies from the video store.” Forty minutes later: “DADDY, WHY ARE THOSE MEN RUNNING THE NICE HORSIES THROUGH WITH BIG WOODEN STAKES??? WAAAAHHHHH”.  There is no horse-impaling in A Legend to Ride, but there is the super-sexy and slinky Leonor Varela. Every straight male in the world wanted to impale her with a six-inch stake and ride her like a horsie after she oozed sexuality all over the airwaves in the title role of ABC’sCleopatra miniseries. This dusky-skinned brunette goddess was worthy of a one-gun salute just from her cover picture on TV Guide. From there she went on to reach new heights of sexiness when she starred in Blade 2 as Nyssa Damaskinos, vampire daughter of the suckhead overlord himself. She and Wesley Snipes gave off good chemistry, both in their potential love interest and in the blindingly fast fight scenes. Wielding a pair of swords, she gave Blade a run for his blood money and proved herself the only vampire he could trust. She also did a fine job of filling out unbelievably tight leathers.