Writer: Lorraine DCosta

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Watch this if you liked: “Gladiator”, “300”, “Robin Hood”

"Centurion" is a pre-chainsaw extravaganza where the Romans talk like Agent 007 and the Picts have better military backgrounds than the American generals who invaded Vietnam and Afghanistan.

"Centurion" is a movie about Romans getting slaughtered by the Picts in the harsh northern regions of Britannia, where history tells us the entire Ninth Legion disappeared around A.D. 117. British director Neil Marshall's newest film, "Centurion" treats arterial sprays like "Sex and the City" treats shoes. The first moments of action in the movie are a spear-through the testicles and an arrow knocking a head into a bell. It sets the mood of this film - just ridiculous, over-the-top violence.

The cinematography is grainy and distinctive and the performers - Dominic West, Michael Fassbender and Olga Kurylenko - all look fabulous wielding weapons and destroying things. Although it looks like the director intended to make a movie that was more explicitly brutal and more terrifying than "Robin Hood", it ended up being a straightforward blood fest in the lines of old Viking movies. The only good scene in the movie is a terrifically staged ambush-with-rolling-fireballs with distasteful music in the background.

Michael Fassbender as Centurion Quintus Dias who escapes the Picts - he's your typical hero. He has heart, loyalty and the knack for not dying. Dominic West plays the beloved General Titus Flavius Virilus. Olga Kurylenko is Etain the villain who will stop at nothing to kill the remaining Roman soldiers. But she has every reason to be angry - her parents were killed right in front of her, she was raped and her tongue cut out so she couldn't tell her tale. So throughout the movie instead of feeling pity for the Romans, the reviewer wanted her to kill all the Romans and anyone who helped them. Imogen Poots plays Arianne an unlikely love interest, a witch whose tribal identity doesn't stop her from succumbing to the irresistible integrity, bravery and charm of Centurion Quintus Dias. But whether her character was necessary half way through the movie is a question to ask.

"Centurion" is a like a cat and mouse game. The mouse has been raped, almost all of its friends have been killed, and its little mouse home has been burned to the ground. The cat did it. Now here's where Centurion makes one of its many mistakes with the audience. The audience is stuck on the side of the cat. The audience is supposed to root for the cat in this mess. The Picts are trying to defend their way of life. The Romans are trying to crush them and take over the world. Doesn't the audience want the Picts to win here? Don't they want someone who has their tongue removed to get her revenge? Well, not in this movie. They are supposed to feel sorry for the poor Roman army.

But the movie raises so many questions like why is the audience made to follow the Romans in this story, why not the Picts. Is the audience supposed to care who lived and who died? Are they supposed to care that anyone gets a happily ever after? If so, then the ending failed. Definitely not a movie that deserves a second look.

Cinema Online, 05 January 2011