The Last Legion dir. by Doug Lefler (review)

REVIEWS103 documentation make KingArthur's Enchantresses a book to recommend especially for students but also for all ofus amateurs and professionals intrigued by feminine characters whose performance ofmagic tests cultural concepts ofgender. SUE ELLEN HOLBROOK Southern Connecticut State University The Last Legion, DOUG lefler, dir., An MGM/Weinstein Co./Dino De Laurentiis Production. Screenplay by Jez Butterworth. (US release) 2007. Shelved for two years, and then released earlier this Summer to tepid reviews in Canada, The Last Legion quietly snuck into US theaters on 16 August 2007 with little advance publicity—and no pre-release screenings for the critics. What therefore sounds, for all intents and purposes, to be another pseudo-historical film turkey in rhe making, surprisingly, turns out to be not half bad. Make no mistake, The Last Legion is hardly adefining moment in the continuing catalogue ofcinema arthuriana, but we have had much worse. The film opens in 476 A.D. with the coronation ofthe last Roman emperor, the twelve-year old Romulus Augustus Caesar (Thomas Sangster). But, within hours, Romulus is driven from his throne by invading Goths who capture Rome and set their leader Odoacer (Peter Mullan) on the throne in an alliance with the Eastern emperor in Constantinople!. Abandoned by the ever politic Roman senate, Romulus finds that his protectors are few: Ambrosinus (Ben Kingsley), a Briton, who has been his teacher;Aurelius (Colin Firth), a general with asmall troop ofstill loyal men; and Mira (Aishwarya Rai), a dagger-and-sword-wieldingwarrior maiden from Indiawho previously served the ambassador of the Byzantine emperor. When Odoacer exiles Ambrosinus and Romulus to the fortress prison on Capri under the guard of the always snarling Wulfilla (Kevin McKidd), Aurelius and company set out to rescue him, finding in the bargain Excalibur, the sword ofJulius Caesar forged for him in Britannia and secreted away on Capri by Tiberius Caesar before his death. With the balance ofthe empire under the control ofthe Goths, Aurelius, having rescued Romulus and Ambrosinus, sets out for Britannia to find the last legion, the ninth, in the hopes ofrallying them to Romulus's cause. The Britannia they find is ruled by a cruel masked tyrant, Vortgyn (Harry Van Gorkum), who is intent upon finding Excalibursince whoever wields the sword rules Britannialegitimately. To his dismay, Aurelius finds that the ninth legionnaires have assimilated with the Celtic population, becoming farmers and tradespeople who are relucrant to fight Vortgyn. Aurelius rallies the few legionnaires still mindful oftheir oath to their emperor and prepares to fightVortgyn's thousand-strong army. At the last minute, the remaining legionnaires arrive to save the day. Ambrosinus, who has defeated Vortgyn, reveals that his real name is Merlin. Romulus tosses Excalibur away—it conveniently lands pommel up lodged in a stone—declaring an end to violence and tyranny in all Britannia. Subsequently, Romulus, who changes his name to Pendragon, is reared by Aurelius and Mira, and The Last Legion ends several years later with the slightly wizened Merlin rehashing the events ofthe film for a young boy who is, of course, named Arthur. 104ARTHURIANA The Last Legion seems in the final analysis like a Saturday matinee serial or an episode of The Wonderful WorldofDisney from the 1950s or the 1960s. It is first and foremost a boys' adventure book on film. Fight scenes are fairly tame (in part because the film was obviously made as cheaply as possible—location shots were done in Tunisia and Slovakia), and villains do little more than snarl and roar. Firth makes a poor dashing general—his screen persona is too tied to that ofeighteenth-century beau or twentieth-century reluctant husband. Eventually, the sword-wielding Mira resorts to a more gender-prescribed role as wife and mother. Kingsley has a certain world-weariness and stoicism (at one point he even quotes Seneca to Aurelius) that seem appropriate to Merlin, and Sangster's Romulus is earnest and bright eyed. If the film has a further debt, it is not so much to any recognizable version of the Arthuriad—the screenplay is loosely based on the 2003 novel ofthe same name by Valerio Massimo Manfredi—as it is to the Star Wars franchise with Romulus as a very...

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