Movie Review - 'Centurion'

Centurion Starring Michael Fassbender, Dominic West, and Olga Kurylenko Directed by Neil Marshall Rated R

Almost without fail, a movie needs to have a interesting story to go anywhere. Short of that, a film had better have something incredibly intriguing in another way. Take Crank, for example: It's remarkably simple and there's no character development, but it's set up like a video game so the movie has some momentum. Still not great, but it's a good example. Neil Marshall's Centurion is plainly short on anything interesting once the setting is established. And there's clearly a lot more that could be done with it. While Marshall (The Descent) has found something that on the surface should be a compelling movie idea, he squanders a lot of hard work on the visuals, an authentic presentation of brutal times, and terrific casting with a story that doesn't even seem to have many consequences if things don't work out the way they're designed to. We're transported to AD 117 quickly and seamlessly, but as the story of a sole survivor of a raid on his Roman outpost in what is now northern England unfolds, it's obvious something's missing. "Even the land wants us dead," narrates Quintus Dias (Michael Fassbender) before his legion is attacked on a cold winter night by the marauding Picts, and it is the land that might be the most appealing player in the entire film. Credit Marshall for showing the harsh conditions as a tactical obstacle rather than just a setting, but once the other pieces are all in place, it's just the occasional fracass that keeps Centurion afloat. The plot is bare bones. Quintus Dias, fleeing the Picts, meets up with another group of Roman soldiers searching for their kidnapped general, kidnapped by the same barbarians. At the same time, the Picts are in hot pursuit of Quintus Dias, emphasis on the hot: Leading the charge is Etain, played by recent Bond girl Olga Kurylenko. Historically, these battles occurred, approximately. The region's right, the dates might be wrong, but the long history of the Roman Empire is filled with this sort of thing, so accuracy, which is hard to gauge, also isn't that important. Michael Fassbender is about to be something. He's a great actor and he seems to be in that part of his career where the studios are trying to see where he fits best. He played a thumbnail sketch of Errol Flynn in Inglourious Basterds, was fantastic in Hunger a couple years ago, and passed the time in Jonah Hex, a more difficult accomplishment than it might sound. He will be seen next summer as Magneto before he's Magneto in the X-Men prequel, which might be the one that unlocks the door. You can see, even with very little of consequence to say and an unwaveringly narrow course of action to undertake, how much Fassbender invests in his character. Movie stars should watch this guy, both because he's a prime example of how to work even when you're supporting average stuff and because he'll be breathing down their necks sooner than later. Marshall loves female characters, an peculiar fixation for an action director. The Descent was an entirely female cast until the brief denouement, Doomsday leaned largely on Rhona Mitra, and here, he has two totally different shades of women who are key elements to the film. Kurylenko's Etain is described as little more than an animal and that's how the actress plays her. She's forceful with no dialogue and livens up every action scene. Meanwhile, there's Imogen Poots, about whom we wrote flatteringly in a far different capacity in Solitary Man. She's a late arrival in this film, only a couple of scenes, but fighting against little else, she really stands out in limited duty. And you might want to add her name to Fassbender's as someone to keep your eye on. In fact, I'll guarantee it: Her big break is not far away at all. And despite so many potential positives, Marshall is not able to put a cohesive, consistent, substantive movie together. He's a skilled director, but the writing in this film, in terms of both dialogue and general storytelling, just doesn't fit with everything else.Centurion can currently be seen On Demand; it will be released theatrically on August 27th.

Comments

[Vince]

Although I'm still kinda-sorta interested in this, I feel that this is another Neil Marshall disappointment. The Descent is one of the best horror films I've ever seen (I'm serious), but Doomsday was an absolute mess of a film and this seems again like a good concept with failed execution. Still, I'll give it a chance, just because Marshall has so much goodwill stored up from Descent that I'll see just about anything he makes now.

[Vince]

Oh and another point about Fassbender and Imogen Poots, the former will be Mr. Rochester in the upcoming Jane Eyre film (starring Mia "too lazy to spell her last name correctly" a.k.a. Alice from that Tim Burton debacle from this year) while the latter is apparently in the running to be the love interest (read: not Mary Jane) in the new Spider-Man reboot.

[LP]

rona mitra doomsday btw, but nice read

[LP]

oh and if imogen gets the spiderman part ill be happy,

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