Centurion

Neil Marshall has never been one to shy away from gore in his films. Dog Soldiers, The Descent and Doomsday were equally bloody affairs, gloriously splattered in gruesomely visible entrails and crimson coloured bodily fluids. As expected, his newest project, an epic war thriller entitled Centurion, appropriately follows suit with this ever-present theme of maniacal bloodshed.

Throughout the movie we watch constant stabbings, beheadings, never-ending amputations, eye-gouging, throat-slitting, severed limbs flying everywhere, broken bones and bodily mutilations all at the sharp ends of swords, spears, hatchets and arrows. At one point - five minutes into the film to be precise - a man gets stabbed in the groin while taking a piss. Now that's just rude!

As you would assume, the movie takes place in ye olde violent times; 117 AD in fact. We're in Scotland, and Roman centurion Quintus Dias (Michael Fassbender) is the sole survivor of an ambush on a highly guarded fort by a fearsome tribe known as the Picts. He is captured, but promptly escapes with some help from a Roman legion led by Titus Flavius Virilus (Dominic West), whom Quintus decides to tag along with.

The armoured legion is soon attacked and little are left standing as Titus is captured by the tribe. Are you noticing a pattern here? Along with a small group of Romans, Quintus invades the tribe's huts to rescue Titus, during which the tribe chieftain’s young son is killed.

Hell-bent on revenge, a tongueless female warrior called Etain (Olga Kurylenko) furiously chases after our miniscule band of Roman soldiers through the woods with other tribe members. As much as our protagonists desperately try to hide, the tribe is always right behind them.

Centurion ended up being quite a surprise for me, as I was expecting a laborious and annoyingly generic period war film with no real sense of excitement. Turns out it's a fairly entertaining and excessively brutal tale that's reasonably fun for almost all of its running time. Make no mistake, this is no Gladiator or 300, but it's enjoyable nonetheless.

The action sequences are nicely shot, with Marshall's energetic direction thankfully not resorting to tedious rapidity, meaning that we can actually tell what the hell is going on. Swords clang against each other and armed horse riders swing axes into Roman foreheads, which only becomes repetitive towards the end.

The script is filled aplenty with half-witty banter between our main protagonists, which is very reminiscent of Marshall's directorial debut, 2002's Dog Soldiers. It makes for a dandy, slightly humorous break from the high drama and gut-wrenching violence of the constant action scenes. Although containing the occasional cliché, it's a reasonably satisfying script.

However, one of the film's definite flaws is that the sword wielding characters are substantially underdeveloped. Their personalities aren't that strong and thus don't have enough of an impact, which may cause you to simply forget about them soon after the end credits roll. Fully fleshed out, truly memorable characters would be exceedingly preferable to the bland, rough, tough warriors we get here.

Then again, the cast does a fine job with the characters they're given. Fassbender is an exquisite leading man, one who emits the right amount of emotion when necessary as well as kicking some tribal ass. His character, on the other hand, doesn't feel like our hero until about an hour into the movie, with our only clue that he's the main character being that he's the narrator.

Noel Clarke, Dave Legeno, Axelle Carolyn, David Morrissey, JJ Feild and Riz Ahmed all have largely forgettable roles, so much so that I genuinely can't remember which character is which. Who really stood out for me though is Dominic West as Titus, certainly the best performance in the film. West is a fascinating character actor and I for one very much admired him as the stubborn and unflinching leader.

There's also Kurylenko as Etain, our menacing, bloodthirsty villain. What's interesting is that her character doesn't have a single line throughout the entire film, what with her tongue having been previously cut out by a Roman, but she still manages to be one scary bitch. She's pretty awesome in the film and makes for a decent and powerful antagonist.

Marshall brings the thrills and kills, but the movie is lacking in suspense. For instance, a scene where our heroes are hiding under the floorboards of a hut while Etain searches around atop obviously calls for much tension, but this just doesn't happen. Etain quickly buggers off, leaving me scratching my head, wondering why Marshall didn't take advantage of this situation. It's puzzling, no?

Nevertheless, Centurion is still a profoundly fun, blood-infested movie with a fine cast and nifty direction. It's certainly not a great film, just one above mediocre that I would recommend for giving a go. That is, unless you've got a weak stomach, in which case I recommend watching The Little Mermaid instead.

7/10