Ironclad (2011–121 mins) Paul Giamatti, Jason Flemyng and Brian Cox,  James Purefoy

It’s 13th Century England… The tyrannical King John (Giamatti) has just been forced to sign the Magna Carta by nobles/barons of the land and the people…ensuring rights for the people. Of course being the evil S.O.B he is King John plans to go back on his word. He enlists the help of a rebel army with promises that he will not then invade the viking lands, to take back his kingdom. He then begins to sack castles in the land and kill the barons who once stood united against him for the cause of justice. That is, until a noble (Cox) puts together his own little rag-tag army of 20 or so, including a knight-templar (Purefoy) and his own allies. They then hunker down at Rochester Castle and hold out hope that their Alamo-like stand can rouse the country against the king, and bide them enough time until allies from overseas can come and help them reclaim their lands for peace and justice.

I remember seeing this trailer a month or two ago and thought it looked decent. It had this sort of “Brave heart” look to it with the added attraction of Giamatti doing his screaming thing well. Giamatti has a great ability to be one of the better actors when he screams. He’s up there with Samuel L Jackson and Tom Hanks as people I love to watch them act when they are screaming and yelling, their approach to it is just amazing. You think I am crazy but think about each of those 3 actors and you cannot help but laugh or enjoy thinking of some of their roles in which they are yelling at the top of their lungs. So I had some interest in seeing this on DVD when it came out, which I thought would be around Christmas, but as it turns out, this movie went straight to DVD, which was a bit surprising. And then I saw it. I don’t say that to mean it’s bad. In fact I kinda enjoyed this medieval take on the Alamo. However, it’s brutal, quite brutal. It’s got some fight scenes in which heads are split open and bones stick out of wounds as people are still pounding on them. Limbs being split off before your eyes is not the best way to be embraced by mainstream movie goers.

Everyone seems to do a decent job and the movie never feels too long. Giamatti, as I stated above, does his screaming psycho King thing well and Cox is great as a motivating baron trying to rally the troops to defend the one last safe bastion of hope against the tyrant King John. Purefoy is a great Knight-Templar but at times becomes a bit too brooding to be taken too seriously, yet he seems to be made for this type of Knight role, wielding the sword like an old pro at times. We just need a little more inspiration from him, and that dialog never truly exists in the film. Yet a good historical type epic, which is quite a bit brutal so it might lend itself more to a guys type movie b/c I don’t know if many women (GF’s and spouses especially) will want to sit through 2 hours of blood and guts.

Verdict–>  It’s not great it’s not bad, but guys who like Medieval historical movies will enjoy this “Remember the Medieval Alamo” take. It’s a guys movie and I wouldn’t recommend getting it for a date night or family movie watching. But worth the dollar for a guys beer and pizza movie.

Trackback URI | Comments RSS