I remember reading the source book "The Eagle of the Ninth" a few years ago and really enjoying it, fanciful historical fiction that it was, so I was pleasantly surprised to see it made into a movie and a good one at that.
Eschewing the flash and show of your more typical sword and sandal epic, this movie is a gritty affair, short on dialogue, big on strong silences, filmed in natural light and in a variety of normally grey, wet weather conditions. Given that it's set in my native Scotland and directed by a Scot, Kevin McDonald, I can safely say he got that part right.
The story itself is straightforward enough, concerning a young Roman Marcus Aquilas (Channing Tatum) and his struggle to restore his family honour after his centurion dad led the talismanic Roman Eagle, as well as all his men, into an expedition into the savage North of Britain, never to return. Heroically discharged from front-line duty, Marcus is paired up with a young Celtic slave and decides to attempt to retrace his father's footsteps and recover the Eagle, at the same time solving the mystery of the disappearance of the Ninth Legion.
With an atmospheric soundtrack based on Celtic themes, sympathetically realistic landscape photography and committed physical acting by the leads in particular, this was an enjoyable if sometimes dour feature, centring on themes of heroism, loyalty and honour. The American accents grate as they always do in features like this, but Tatum and Jamie Bell convince as initially distrusting allies and while I could have perhaps done with a few more action set-pieces, plus the climactic battle between the remnants of the Ninth and the pursuing natives could have been made more of, this was an entertaining and watchable film with the director cleverly making up for the implausibility of the plot with a down to earth approach which helped to establish some necessary credibility along the way.
Eschewing the flash and show of your more typical sword and sandal epic, this movie is a gritty affair, short on dialogue, big on strong silences, filmed in natural light and in a variety of normally grey, wet weather conditions. Given that it's set in my native Scotland and directed by a Scot, Kevin McDonald, I can safely say he got that part right.
The story itself is straightforward enough, concerning a young Roman Marcus Aquilas (Channing Tatum) and his struggle to restore his family honour after his centurion dad led the talismanic Roman Eagle, as well as all his men, into an expedition into the savage North of Britain, never to return. Heroically discharged from front-line duty, Marcus is paired up with a young Celtic slave and decides to attempt to retrace his father's footsteps and recover the Eagle, at the same time solving the mystery of the disappearance of the Ninth Legion.
With an atmospheric soundtrack based on Celtic themes, sympathetically realistic landscape photography and committed physical acting by the leads in particular, this was an enjoyable if sometimes dour feature, centring on themes of heroism, loyalty and honour. The American accents grate as they always do in features like this, but Tatum and Jamie Bell convince as initially distrusting allies and while I could have perhaps done with a few more action set-pieces, plus the climactic battle between the remnants of the Ninth and the pursuing natives could have been made more of, this was an entertaining and watchable film with the director cleverly making up for the implausibility of the plot with a down to earth approach which helped to establish some necessary credibility along the way.