Review: The Last Duel

Image courtesy of Walt Disney Studios.

 

Those expressing some element of surprise that Ridley Scott's "The Last Duel" is being described as a "feminist" film have seemingly forgotten the director's "Thelma and Louise," "Alien" and, to a lesser extent, "G.I. Jane." Scott is often thought of as the director of muscular — and masculine — big budget studio enterprises such as "Gladiator," "Blade Runner," "Kingdom of Heaven" and "Black Hawk Down," but his work has on occasion considered — thoughtfully, I might add — feminist themes.

"The Last Duel" is no different. And bad haircuts aside — and in all honesty, they're pretty bad — the film, which features the first co-screenwriting credit between Matt Damon and Ben Affleck since "Good Will Hunting" along with an assist by indie director Nicole Holofcener, is a surprisingly tense and well made period piece.

To simplify its description, the true story tells the tale of Sir Jean de Carrouges (Damon) and Jacques Le Gris (Adam Driver), two 14th century squires and old friends whose relationship goes sour for a number of reasons. For starters, de Carrouges saves Le Gris' life, but later comes to resent him after their foppish, degenerate liege Pierre d'Aloncon (Affleck, with a blonde goatee and haircut that makes him look like the leader of a one-hit wonder band from the late 1990s) holds Les Gris in favor over the more accomplished, mullet-wearing de Carrouges.

The first sign of bad blood is when de Carrouges takes as his wife Marguerite (Jodie Comer), the daughter of a wealthy man who has fallen in bad favor with the king, and Le Gris is given a piece of land that de Carrouges believed was to be his as part of his wife's dowry. Things get worse when d'Aloncon, who hates the icy de Carrouges, makes Le Gris the captain of the parcel of land where de Carrouge's father had previously held the position and de Carrouges expected to follow in his footsteps.

But things really go south after de Carrouges and Le Gris attempt to patch things up, and Le Gris becomes attracted to Marguerite. He later shows up at de Carrouges' abode while the man of the castle is away on business and sexually assaults Marguerite. She, in turn, accuses him of the crime, which leads to a planned duel between the two men. The catch is, as all the faux-pious men in the film decree, that God will decide who is telling the truth (Le Gris denies the rape), and therefore Marguerite could face a torturous death should her husband lose the duel.

For a movie set during medieval times, "The Last Duel" is oddly timely, as women's rights are still being challenged in our modern era. One priest, who attempts to find ways for Le Gris' crime to be considered something other than an assault, tells Le Gris that a rape is not a crime against a woman, but rather her husband, since his wife is considered his property. During the trial involved in the case, Marguerite is, of course, subjected to all the usual torment from her misogynist interrogators - they ask if she receives pleasure from her husband during sex, and tell the pregnant Marguerite that a baby cannot be born from an incident that causes pleasure, suggesting she enjoyed Le Gris' assault, thereby not making it a rape.

The film is told in three chapters, all of which are titled "The Truth According To (Insert Character's Name)," and this "Rashomon"-style approach is an interesting one indeed. In de Carrouges' telling of the story, he sees himself as the hero who has been wronged by a friend and who is protecting his wife, whereas Le Gris sees himself as a lover who was given signs of attraction by Marguerite that he followed to fruition. In describing the rape to d'Aloncon, he says that Marguerite put up the "expected opposition" to his advances, as if women saying "no" is really a way of saying "yes."

When we get to "The Truth According to Marguerite," the words "the truth" linger slightly longer on the screen. In her version of the story, both of the men are beasts, de Carrouges a cold, self-important man whose only reason for engaging in the duel is his wounded pride and longstanding sense of injustice at the hands of d'Aloncon and Le Gris. Not surprisingly, Le Gris comes off as a rapist who believes that no woman on earth could possibly not want to have sex with him. Both men see themselves as just in their roles in the affair, but Marguerite would likely be better off if the two end up killing each other in the duel.

Speaking of which, the titular bout is a brutal sequence that will likely leave one flinching. In terms of sheer brutality — and execution — it's a heart stopper. At 83 years of age, Ridley Scott proves that he still has it as a maker of big budget spectacles — he even has a second film, "House of Gucci," getting released later this year — and his latest is a tale well told with concepts that are resonant in our current political climate. "The Last Duel" was a pleasant, if that's the word for a film about such dark occurrences, surprise and one of Scott's better films of recent years.