Review of Solomon Kane (2009) by Archibald T — 22 Mar 2011

Solomon Kane boldly marches toward the beat of his own greed as he, with a band of mercenaries, battle to obtain a treasure being secured inside a fortress. Solomon is a brutal mercenary. He is an evil man who has done evil things and he does not care whether he'll be damned for his crimes. Making his way to the throne of the castle, the treasure awaits and so does a demon sent from the devil himself to collect Solomon's soul. It is his crimes that have led him to this moment, but Solomon does not feel he is ready so he leaps out of the window and joins a English monastery where he stays for a year to redeem himself.

The monastery, however, does not want him to stay for fear it might bring evil knocking on their door any moment. So Solomon is sent packing and heads out into nowhere. He comes across a family of puritans who help him after he was beaten and robbed. What the robbers tried to do was get Solomon to fight back, but Solomon can not do that now since he's converted to being a man of peace and if he were to harm another human being his soul would be put back on the chopping block for all eternity.

The family that allows him to tag along as they head to America is a nice one. They see a man who has changed for the better and even though he was once an evil man redemption still has it's place for the taking. The family does, of course, get ambushed by a group being controlled by an evil sorcerer named Malachi. The daughter is taken away and after the youngest son is killed it sets Solomon off by kick their ass. When the father of the family, who is near death, breathes his last words to Solomon they are to tell him that redemption can be Solomon's if he saves the daughter which begins Solomon's quest for redemption.

The production values in this film from the sets, to the costumes, make-up, special effects are amazing! I could not keep my eyes from watching this film. There are so many great scenes like, for example, Solomon gets crucified after being capture by Malachi's men and after hearing the daughter's voice he rips the nails out and falls to the ground in a slow motion type of fashion. I thought that scene was really beautiful and also, probably the most creepy scene, is when Solomon stumbles upon a deserted church where a priest tries to feed him to a bunch of undead people who he keeps under the church for safe keeping until Malachi is defeated because these people have been turned into the undead, like a spell cast upon them.

Overall, you get witches, sword play, evil sorcerer's and an interesting back story to the main character who I hope we'll see again in the future.