Review: Ridley Scott's THE LAST DUEL is a Brutal and Incredible Film
Matt Damon and Ben Affleck haven’t written a script since they teamed up to write the 1997 film Good Will Hunting to help launch their careers. Well, it worked, and the both won Oscars for the work they did on their screenplay. I expected to see the two talents write a lot more movies together over the years, but it just didn’t happen. All these years later, they finally got together again to write a movie and that movie is medieval-set period film The Last Duel.
Damon and Affleck wrote the script with Nicole Holofcener and legendary director Ridley Scott jumped on board to helm the film. There’s a great and talented creative team here working together, and I’ve been looking forward to seeing what they’ve done with this story.
The story deals with heavy subject matter involving a rape that takes place and the story is told from different perspectives. The husband, the man accused of the rape, and the victim. With the story set in medieval times, as you might expect, the society had a very different view of how the world worked and it’s quite laughable.
It’s interesting to see the different points of view on the events that took place. There are slight variations to each story and then when you see the truth of it all, we really see how the other characters see themselves. The whole thing is quite horrific.
The film is based on a true story and it follows Jean de Carrouges, a respected knight known for his bravery and skill on the battlefield. Jacques Le Gris is a squire whose intelligence and eloquence makes him one of the most admired nobles in court. When Le Gris viciously assaults Carrouges' wife, she steps forward to accuse her attacker, an act of bravery and defiance that puts her life in jeopardy. The ensuing trial by combat, a grueling duel to the death, places the fate of all three in God's hands.
The Last Duel stars Matt Damon as Jean de Carrouges, Adam Driver as Jacques Le Gris, Jodie Comer as Marguerite de Carrouges, and Ben Affleck as Pierre d'Alençon, who all give the wonderful performances that we expect from them. These are different characters than anything they’ve really played before and they disappeared into their roles. They were all perfect for the roles they were cast in.
The whole story leads to a duel to the death between Damon’s Jean de Carrouges and Driver’s Jacques Le Grisand, and whoever wins is the one that is telling the truth. They believed God would bless the person telling the truth and grant them the strength to win.
Ridley Scott has always been good at directing epic battle sequences and the fight between these two men was insanely intense! There is clearly one person you want to see win, but this fight has you guessing who will actually win all the way to the end. That is unless, you already know the story. Regardless, even if you know who wins, the fight sequence will have you on the edge of your seat.
The actual duel is absolutely brutal! Good grief! What a horribly insane thing to be a part of! There have been a lot of medieval duels portrayed in films over the years, but nothing like this. Scott really wanted the audience to feel how uncomfortable and painful this kind of experience was, and he succeeded. He puts you right into the action and, wow! It’s complete madness!
The creative team of The Last Duel delivered a fantastic movie that film buffs are going enjoy.