Rating summary

Movie		3.0
Video		4.5
Audio		4.5
Extras		2.0
Overall		3.0

Centurion Blu-ray Movie Review

Sword ‘n’ Sandal, Hack ‘n’ Slash

Reviewed by Casey Broadwater November 5, 2010

Centurion belongs to that category of films where the characters, without a trace of irony, shout stuff like “Hold the lines!” and “We live united, or die divided!” It’s the sort of movie where the men are all grizzled, battle-hardened badasses and the women—without exception—are drop dead gorgeous. Warriors trudge single-file up snow-covered, Lord of the Rings-style mountainsides, then descend into the valley to fight with courage and die with honor. Limbs are lopped off, heads are cleaved, and CGI blood spurts dramatically into the air. The body count spirals dizzyingly and yet there’s a sense of heroic nobility in the violence. You know the type. The associated sub-genres are many—the sword ‘n’ sandal adventure, the historical epic, the brothers in arms war story—but this kind of film might generally be called Male Fantasy Fulfillment. It’s the province of the Mel Gibsons and Russell Crowes of the world, and it’s perhaps best exemplified by Braveheart, The Patriot, Apocalypto, and Gladiator. There’s a little bit of all four movies in Centurion, a lesser entry in that genre that might also be called “dad films.”

Uh oh...

The setting is Britannia circa A.D. 117, as Roman legions push deep into what is now the Scottish Highlands, attempting to wrestle control of the region from the native Picts, woad-adorned guerilla warriors who are understandably pissed off about the invasion and just want to protect their homeland. (Prepare for some undercooked allusions to the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.) After a Pictish raid wipes out a Roman outpost on the frontier, governor Agricola (Paul Freeman) dispatches the legendary Ninth Legion, led by jovial General Titus Virilus (The Wire’s Dominic West), with orders to destroy the enemy entirely. On their way to the front, the legion rescues centurion Quintus Dias (Michael Fassbender), the sole survivor of the overrun garrison, but that’s the last of their good luck. The Ninth soon stumbles into a fireball-laden trap set by Etain (sultry erstwhile Bond girl Olga Kurylenko), a vengeful Pictish “she-wolf” who had her tongue cut out by the Romans as a child. Now, of course, she’s out for blood. The legion takes some serious casualties, General Titus is kidnapped and whisked away to the camp of Gorlacon (Ulrich Thomsen), the chief of the Picts, and the remaining six soldiers, under Quintus’ command, stage a last-ditch rescue attempt.

This is a rag-tag and, given the nature of the Roman Empire, unsurprisingly multi-ethnic crew—their scant numbers include a Greek, an African marathon runner, and an Arab cook—and they’ll do anything to rescue their beloved general, who has earned their trust by fighting right alongside them. Ah, soldierly camaraderie! The film quickly enters “men on a mission” mode before ultimately becoming a desperately trying to evade the enemy chase movie, a la Apocalypto. Throughout, you can expect almost ceaseless violence, the rough and tumble battle scenes hitting hard and often, complete with gory displays of ax wounds, severed limbs, and decapitations, ketchup-red digital blood spraying everywhere. (The only splashes of color in a film that, like most war epics, has a gritty, almost entirely desaturated palette.) The breakneck rush is periodically broken by quiet scenes that are meant to flesh out the characters, but these seem merely perfunctory, and the dialogue—“I made a promise to a general to get his soldiers home. That is my task. That is my duty.”—is a stale compilation of vaguely noble-sounding war movie chestnuts. These guys are much better at grunting than monologizing, and bound to such dopey lines, the actors have little with which to work. Still, there are a few decent turns. Michael Fassbender shows some of the stoic, unwavering dignity that he displayed in Hunger, and the equally restrained Olga Kurylenko—she plays a mute after all—smolders with internal rage, a smoky-eyed, dead sexy battle maiden bent on revenge.

The film is directed by Neil Marshall, who previously gave us the cult werewolf classic Dog Soldiers and the subterranean slasher Descent, which did for spelunking—and this is an overused comparison, I know—what Jaws did for going to the beach. Here, he’s working on a larger scale than he ever has before, and while there are some impressive all-out action sequences in Centurion, the hack ‘n’ slash violence quickly becomes rote, especially since it’s really not backed up by much of a story. The chilly, near-desolate frontier of the Roman Empire—“the asshole of the world,” as one character puts it—is evocative, and Marshall nails the grimy period details, but the film fails to involve us mentally or emotionally. When Quintus Dias eventually meets and falls for a bonnie flaxen-haired Pict—played by the lovely, but unfortunately named Imogen Poots—it seems less like a genuine turn of events than an oh, yeah, I guess we need a love interest in here somewhere concession. The only thematic supplement to the non-stop carnage is the not-so-thinly veiled subtext about what happens to the armies of imperialist empires when they go a-marchin’ where they’re not wanted. “This is a new kind of war,” says Dias, “a war without honor, a war without end.” Yeah, Quintus, we hear you.

Centurion Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Magnolia Home Entertainment brings Centurion to Blu-ray with an excellent 1080p/AVC-encoded transfer, frame close to the film's original 2.39:1 aspect ratio. Even more so than most war movies, the visual aesthetic here is gritty and stylized, with a bluish, desaturated cast that hangs over much of the film and a look defined by tight contrast and deep black levels, sometimes to the point of intentionally crushing shadow detail. The image is appropriately cold—with few exceptions, like the warm glow of the arm wrestling scene in the Roman soldiers' mess hall—and you'll feel chilly just watching it. Occasionally, bright red blood, blue streaks of woad, and intense orange fire break the otherwise bleak monotony of life on the outskirts of civilization. While the picture isn't the sharpest you'll see on Blu-ray this year, overall clarity is more than satisfying, and you'll see fine detail in nearly every frame, from the fibrous texture of Gorlacon's animal-skin coat to the accents of the metal Roman armor and the craggy surfaces of the highland rocks and heather. I spotted no encode issues—compression related or otherwise—and it doesn't appear that there's been any tampering with the film's sometimes-coarse grain structure. A strong presentation from Magnolia, all around.

Centurion Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Magnolia deviates from their usual 5.1 mixes to deliver a full-on DTS-HD Master Audio 7.1 surround track that brings Centurion thunderously to life. Given the film's nearly non-stop state of spear-chucking, ax-wielding violence, you can expect clamorous action scenes that utilize every inch of the soundfield and sweep the spectrum of the your home theater system's dynamic range, from rumbling LFE-heavy fireballs to the high end clatter and clang of swordplay. You'll get a lot of hectic battle ambience, but there are also some effective—and not overly showy—cross channel movements, mostly in the form of axes and spears zipping through the rear speakers and into the unsuspecting chests of unlucky warriors. The music packs plenty of punch as well, and it all comes together—along with balanced, easy-to-understand dialogue from the center channel—for a loud, active mix that suits Centurion well. The track may not have the sonic subtlety and sheer aggressiveness of some of the top-tier action films in the Blu-ray library, but for a fairly low budgeted historical epic—around $12 million—it definitely holds its own.

Centurion Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

Audio Commentary
An engaging, informative track from writer/director Neil Marshall, DP Sam McCurdy, production designer Simon Bowles, and special make-up effects designer Paul Hyett.

Blood, Fire & Fury: Behind the Scenes of Centurion (SD, 26:24)
A decent making-of documentary, broken into four sections: The Lost Legion, Getting Down & Dirty, Guts & Gore, and Fireballs, Stunts & Mayhem.

Deleted Scenes (SD, 7:58)
Includes six deleted scenes with optional director's commentary.

Interviews (SD, 25:41)
Extensive interviews with Neil Marshall, producer Robert Jones, and actors Michael Fassbender, Dominic West, Olga Kurylenko, and Noel Clarke.

Behind the Scenes Footage (SD, 11:14)

Outtakes (SD, 6:14)

Production Design Photo Galleries (SD, 4:15)

HDNet: A Look at Centurion (1080i, 4:49)
An HDNet promo for the film, with an overview and quick interviews with Marshall and Fassbender.

Also from Magnolia Home Entertainment Blu-ray (1080p, 7:07)
Includes trailers for Monsters, The Oxford Murders, Barry Munday, and I'm Still Here, along with a promo for HDNet.

Centurion Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Neil Marshall's Centurion delivers relentlessly gory, Roman-era battle violence, but little else, as its skin of visceral action is hung on a skeletal story that doesn't have much dramatic meat on its bones. If you're just looking for a bloody good time, you might want to give the film a go, but don't expect to be moved by the highlands adventures of Quintus Dias. Regardless, Centurion looks and sounds fantastic on Blu-ray, so you're at least insured the spectacle of stellar A/V performance. Worth a rental—and possibly a purchase—if you're up for a grittier take on the sword 'n' sandal genre.