Review of Centurion (2010) by Leah C — 30 Apr 2011

With this bleak and brutal behind-enemy-lines actioner I was hoping for something of a return to form for director Neil Marshall following the deeply disappointing facepalm-a-thon that was Doomsday. Alas, it suffers from many of the same problems - flat characters, plot holes and irritating movie-isms that take you right out of the experience. The locations are the film's strongest attribute with the bitter and merciless conditions of ancient Scotland perfectly captured. The gruff and growling collection of Brit hardnuts that make up the cast also do the trick, even if the characters themselves are uninteresting and the action is nicely icky, though the digital blood fails to convince. Unfortunately none of these positives really help that much. The story is dull, the characters range from meh to ludicrous (Imogen Poots' impossibly attractive "witch", with whom Michael Fassbender's hero strikes up a groan-worthy tacked on romance) and the omnipresent movie-isms/nitpicks I mentioned are hard to get over, even with a suspension of disbelief as well tested as mine. Take Olga Kurylenko's villain for example - a Pict tracker/warrior woman who wears lipstick and eye shadow (!), can go toe to toe with hardened Roman soldiers and whose tracking skills are so phenomenally good she can only be superhuman.

I have no hesitation in saying that Centurion is better than Doomsday but I still can't really recommend it. As a brainless gorefest I suppose it should satisfy but was that really Neil Marshall's intention? Did he really set out to make a boring, unadventurous, by-the-numbers action flick that's to be enjoyed simply because it's violent and gory? I doubt it. Perhaps he should stick with horror?