Review of The Last Duel (2021) by Leonvitali — 24 Oct 2021

"... a woman can be loved by two men ..." and therefore we can summarize the film, which, based on the doubt of a rape, more precisely, on the doubt of more or less voluntary consensuality, gives us a clearer fresco of the French society of the fourteenth century, with extreme and marked historical realism; Ridley Scott paints for us, with the expert hand of those who have worked in the film industry for decades, a precious innovative look at the historical genre, enhanced, perhaps at times too strongly, by the epic mise-en-scène.

Jean de Carrouges and Jacques Le Gris are initially on good terms under the royal power of Charles VI, known as "The Crazy": when de Carrouges finds himself traveling away from home for economic business, Le Gris takes advantage of the beautiful Marguerite de Thibouville, who being without any company (since her mother-in-law also deprived her of her lady-in-law, given a daily trip of the same), she finds no escape or help in the face of the brute force of Le Gris, who manages to enter his home as one of the drakes of A Clockwork Orange, by deception.

The film therefore consists of three different acts, aimed at carrying out the insinuating function of doubt and also at clarifying, where it deems it appropriate, which version is most reflected in the truth: the same episode, from its origins to the act.

real, is analyzed from the highly subjective points of view of all three characters, who find themselves in the same story but contemplating different narrative instances. So what will the viewer believe? In this lies the effectiveness of the writers: Matt Damon, Ben Affleck and Nicole Holofcener, reunited together, decide to give even more spice and salt to a story that is already historically fascinating, thus composing a very meticulous puzzle, in which the jokes, according to the various truths, find considerable differences; we therefore play, in the most intelligent way possible, with the spectator, who finds himself immersed in the story as a real character, aimed at seeking the truth of the whole story.

Scott's direction, once again underlined by historical perfectionism, manages, also thanks to the director of photography Dariusz Volski, to perfectly recreate the internal dynamics, going to dwell on the faces, which express both truth and lies, going to emphasize with the careful use of lights, the various facets of the characters, and managing, in the final duel, to tell as clearly as possible what happens, without resorting to the pedantic and annoying mechanism of the usual hand-held camera, which in the fighting, perhaps gives dynamism, but also useless total confusion to the viewer.

Well designed and made costumes, capable of becoming characters themselves, given their extreme accuracy. Appreciable but not very memorable music. Actors in a state of grace, from the acid and dark Harriet Walter, who at times reminds us of the Bene Gesserit of Dune di Villeneuve, passing through Adam Driver, who gives us a spectacular and mysterious man, brutal but at the same time learned, reaching Matt Damon, an amazing knight, capable of silencing an entire army corps for his impromptu investiture, but also capable of doing justice to a man as repressed as unjustly victim of an anti-meritocratic system, led in a mocking and equally perfect manner by Ben Affleck, who with his annoying smile and his laugh in the great orgies of the time, shows us his talent once again.