Sword of Vengeance

It starts off slow and moves on at the same pace throughout. After 10 minutes, I realized that it wasn't going to speed up.

But that's OK, because this movie is about the hero. He is, quite literally, all that matters. The hero is right out of feudal Japan, with his honor-bound "only vengeance matters" ethics, and his short clipped way of speaking with an accent that doesn't belong in Scotland. His fighting style is completely out of place and would be laughably ineffective in real life. Good thing he learned to hold his sword backwards, otherwise he'd have killed all the baddies twice as fast and the movie might have been tempted to run at a normal pace..

No other characters matter. There is a "love interest" that doesn't really make any deep connection and only exists to give the hero exactly ONE dynamic character lesson, a trio of bad guys that have exactly ONE motive each, and a plethora of other characters that might as well be nameless as they don't do much else except perform all the basic necessary menial tasks involved in making a hero look heroic without trying too hard.

There is no accuracy in terms of dress, speech, military action, governmental oversight, etc. These things don't matter, only the hero matters. He looks cool and is a total awesome dude. The movie has to rock because the hero does. Right?

In addition, it was filmed in the "bleak style" that is so prevalent among stylized films. This means they removed most of the color. I have never understood this particular method of filming. Can the world not be bleak in its own right?

And lastly, the soundtrack spends most of its time being out of place. Sometimes it sounds like something out of a sci-fi film (mostly when the hero is spinning his sword around, complete with whirly sound effects), sometimes it sounds like moody atmospheric mush (mostly when the hero is looking stoic and heroic), and usually moves itself into the typical drum-heavy orchestral epic sounding stuff (mostly when the hero is killing lots of people while holding his sword backwards). There is no reference, or even an implied reference, to any sort of traditional gaelic or celtic musical form, melody or instrument.

This is getting long, so I'll cut it off here with a final comment:

This movie is so empty of substance that it's like a skeleton of ideas that are designed to be easily fit into any genre. Take this hero and stick him into a sci-fi feature battling the evil space barons that killed his family. You don't even have to change the soundtrack. Next throw it all into a pirate feature. It will work just fine, just need to tweak the costumes a little bit.

This movie is bland and devoid of any real character. Very forgettable.

The basic problem - what you expect ?. You know the recipe and the ingredients. You know the basic lines of story and the characters. And you know that nothing is real high or memorable. The basic problem of this film- the desire to be more than gives its possibilities. The recipe is clear and nothing surprising can be. History as pretext, dark landscapes, dark hero, fights and fights, few drops of love story. Seems enough. But the desire to say all seems the not very inspired option.

"Tell your father the Gods can no longer wait."

Don't you like slow-motion scenes during bloody fights with a sword such as in "300"? You thoroughly enjoy a colorful film? And you expect a masterful story with clever twists? Then "Sword of Vengeance" won't appeal to you. Firstly this medieval spectacle movie is painfully slow. And not because of the constant use of slow motion, but also because of the terribly slow dialogs. The first minutes you think it's a gimmick made up by one of the crew members because he's such a fervent fan of the movie "300". Until you notice that almost the entire movie is in slow motion, ad nauseam. Had they limited themselves in using that film technique and inserted less breaks throughout the dialogs, then this film would be finished after 30 minutes. In addition, the whole film is grayish and dreary. The entire film is soaked in mud with a desolate landscape in the background. Red is the only striking color in this generally gray film, and this by the frequent spilled blood.

The whole story is set in medieval England after the Battle of Hastings. Saxon England was defeated by William the Conqueror and is being suppressed by this merciless ruler in a rather barbaric way. In the north the English population is being exploited, murdered and humiliated by Earl Durant and his sons Lord Artus and Romain . As the introduction tells us there are mass killings, called The Harrowing, happening everyday and the locals are living in appalling conditions. Until one day a stranger appears and slaughters a few of Durant's men. This warrior, called Shadow Walker, is a sort of "Conan" but less muscular and proud owner of a for that time fashionable hairstyle. Eventually he appears to be on a personal quest and he manages to gather some villagers around him to take revenge on Durant.

The biggest flaw of this film is perhaps the simplistic and linear storyline. In terms of content there's nothing much to see and don't expect cunningly elaborated developments or characters. The emphasis is on the confrontation which means considerable swinging around with iron swords and other medieval weapons. It's a concatenation of splashing mud, blood and spit (in slow motion of course). One can safely compared it to a game like "Ryse: Son of Rome". Brutal, gray and bloody with saber-rattling as a central theme. A not so original film, probably appreciated by the fans of this sub-genre. It's therefore unnecessary to discuss about acting performance as this was elaborated to the barest minimum. Tough body language is mixed with sometimes rather idiotic sounding dialogs. Stanley Weber looks like an unshakable battering ram who rushes straight to his goal and mercilessly makes sure that every opponent bites the dust. A kind of conqueror in his own personal territory. Annabelle Wallis as Anna (recently acting in the movie Annabelle) is part of the tribe that captures Shadow Walker. Afterwards they choose to stand next to him. She tries to play a temperamental and stubborn woman, but still looks a little too soft for that. The rest of the cast is just side issue. No memorable performances there."Sword of Vengeance" is not a bad medieval action movie, but the end result is still a sort of go-for-it-without-thinking film.

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This is a perfect example of style over substance. Visually it's incredibly good, but the absence of a story, let alone a script is baffling. How the hell are we (the viewer) supposed to make head nor tail of it, when both the actors, and the director haven't got a scooby doo. Can we blame it on the editor!!! 🤔

From the creator of "Hammer of the Gods", starring Stanley Weber ("Borgia") and Annabelle Wallis ("Annabelle"), the subjects of a ruthless tyrant's oppression discover an unlikely freedom fighter whose code of honor demands bloody retribution.

WellGoUSA has made a name for themselves bringing some of today's best martial arts movies to American audiences. This time they took a slightly different approach and are releasing a story of early England.

And in it, we have a great use of color, making the battlefield look hazy and depressing. The film as a whole is heavy on style, has great production design and some impressive sets. Some of the style is conveyed through slow-motion walking we probably did not need, and which may add a few minutes to the run time.

There is an interesting score, very electronic and not at all what you might expect from a film set one thousand years ago. Those women warriors? Not sure that is remotely accurate in a historical sense. And, as much as equality is a good thing, it does not trump reality...

And then, sadly, there is not much of a plot or character development, meaning it has very little that will be memorable. The film still deserves a slightly better than average rating simple because it looks so darn good, but it has little of real meat to offer people. Audiences will likely consider this a dud: all gunpowder and no bang.