Ironclad: A bit of a revisionist take on the Siege of Rochester in England in 1215, as King John (Paul Giamatti) attempted to kill some of the barons responsible for the Magna Carta, including William of Albany (Brian Cox) who, with a Knight Templar (played by James Purefoy), recruits a band of warriors to hold Rochester castle against King John and his army of foreign mercenaries. The rebel forces in Rochester number less than fifty and are besieged by the King’s forces and siege engines for two months, with the result a foregone conclusion to history (minus the bits they obviously re-write, such as the fates of some of those involved including Albany and the ending of the siege itself). Think of it like “The Magnificent Seven”, but with brigands instead of Charlie Bronson and Jimmy Coburn. The supporting cast is better than the film deserves, including Derek Jacobi, Charles Dance, MacKenzie Crook, and Jason Flemyng, with another random American (other than Giamatti), Kate Mara, thrown in as the love interest. Violent, unnecessarily gory (LOTS of severed limbs, a person taking a cannonball to the face, blood fountaining out of bodies, bodies launched by catapault against castle walls), but with decent production values (they did build their own replica of the keep to destroy so they‘ve got that going for them) . But it’s overlong (just over 2 hours) and Giamatti is a bit of scenery chewer as John. This is director Jonathan English’s third feature length film, and while it is better than other recent medieval efforts I‘ve seen (like, say, “Season of the Witch“), it’s still not all that. But poor James Purefoy, he just can’t seem to get a theatrical release. Woodchuck sez, “Meh.”
No comments:
Post a Comment