Producers: Ridley Scott, Kevin J. Walsh, Jennifer Fox, Nicole Holofcener, Matt Damon and Ben Affleck Director: Ridley Scott Screenplay: Nicole Holofcener, Ben Affleck and Matt Damon Cast: Matt Damon, Adam Driver, Jodie Comer, Ben Affleck, Harriet Walter, Marton Csokas, Nathaniel Parker, Adam Nagiatis, Alex Lawther, Željko Ivanek, Clive Russell, Bosco Hogan and Clare Dunne Distributor: Twentieth Century Studios
Grade: B+
Ridley Scott’s historically-based medieval epic, based on the 2004 non-fiction book by Eric Jager, might be flippantly referred to as a “he sayeth, she sayeth” tale for the “me too” era—though as structured here, “he sayeth, he sayeth, she sayeth” would be more accurate.
Set in the fourteenth century, it’s about the last confirmed case of trial by combat in France, at least the region controlled by the king. That rarely-used mode of trial, limited to members of the feudal nobility engaged in a dispute, involved a violent duel between knights in which the decision was left to God, the infallible judge of guilt: the victor was decreed to have been telling the truth, while the dead man’s body was publicly hanged in disgrace as a perjurer. By the fourteenth century such trials were extremely rare: most cases between noblemen were settled out of court, as it were, even if a duel was allowed to begin with a few harmless thrusts.
In 1378, however, a war-hardened knight named Jean de Carrouges demanded trial by combat in a suit before King Charles VI against a squire, Jacques Le Gris, whom he charged with raping his young wife Marguerite. Jean’s allegation had been rejected by his (and Le Gris’) feudal overlord Count Pierre d’Alençon, and so he took the case before the court of the king at Paris and demanded trial by combat to decide the matter—which the court, after being unable to reach a decision itself, assented to. Jean’s fate would fall upon Marguerite as well, since in the event he was vanquished, she would be executed for her false accusation against Le Gris.
The case, and its bloody denouement in the field, are sketchily documented in a variety of contemporary and near-contemporary sources, but Jager’s book expanded on the scant details, and the screenplay by Matt Damon and Ben Affleck (their first joint effort since “Good Will Hunting”), collaborating with writer-director Nicole Holofcener, seizes on his work to construct an intriguing triptych of differing perspectives on the events. First we see them as experienced by Jean (played by Damon), then from the POV of Le Gris (Adam Driver), and finally as Marguerite (Jodie Comer) recalls them. The three episodes, the first two written by Damon and Affleck and the third by Holofcener, are clearly reflective of the influence of Kurosawa’s “Rashomon” (and its American remake “The Outrage”), and are bookended by the duel, in which the combatants, following the account in Jager (which, when contrasted with the contemporary ones, was substantially embellished), attack first with lances on horseback and then, after dismounting after several passes, with swords, axes and knives.
That long culminating battle showcases director Ridley Scott’s skill in action choreography; working together with the actors, cinematographer Dariusz Wolski, production designer Arthur Max, editor Claire Simpson and composer Harry Gregson-Williams, he fashions an exciting blur of violence that captures the sense of cruel public spectacle such a contest represented to medieval spectators. Elsewhere, the film offers some well-staged combat sequences that capture the grim reality of the ongoing Hundred Years’ War.
But even the final duel is an exception in a film that’s essentially an intimate personal drama set against a backdrop of the pervasively subservient station women occupied in medieval society, treated, whatever their status in society, more as property by the patriarchy than independent human beings. That’s made evident in the contrast between the film’s first two chapters, told from the perspectives of each man portraying himself in the most self-justifying way he can muster and the other in the worst possible light while treating Marguerite as an object important only with reference to his pride, and the final part of the triptych, where she is finally able to depict both as she saw them—both in a far less complimentary light. From her perspective Jean sees the rape primarily as yet another insult to himself from a man he once considered a friend, while Le Gris, even in his own mind, imagines it as merely a defensible expression of his manly rights, an understandable impulse that can be expiated by simple absolution from the church. He actually comes to believe in his essential innocence.
The image of the ecclesial establishment as complicit in the social patriarchy—Le Gris’ rejection of a suggestion that because he holds minor orders he should claim benefit of clergy to get the case transferred to a church court, where it will simply die, because doing so would still leave a stain on his reputation—is symbolized by the repeated appearance of a half-finished Notre Dame in the establishing shots of Paris, an image with obvious contemporary resonance. And the depiction of today’s “City of Lights” as a dreary, muddy place is but one aspect of the picture’s overall portrayal of fourteenth-century France as somber and depressing.
The only real contrast to that is the grossly decadent lifestyle of libertines like Le Gris and, to an even greater extent, Pierre d’Alençon, whom Affleck plays with the insouciance of a man who recognizes no restrictions. The character’s casual cynicism will click with viewers, as will the brief but eye-catching appearances of Alex Lawther as Charles VI, the teen monarch with a penchant for odd reactions at the most inappropriate moments, and Harriet Walter, as Jean’s mother, whose sour attitude arises from long experience of how the world works, mitigated only by concern for her son.
The cast is filled out with other actors who offer strikingly effective cameos–Nathaniel Parker, Marton Csokas, Željko Ivanek, Clive Russell, Adam Nagaitis, Bosco Hogan, Clare Dunn—and all wear the period-proper costumes of Janty Yates as if they always did. But the burden falls on the three stars, and all cannily reflect the different images of their characters deployed in the three episodes—Damon the craggy, gruff veteran who can be either considerate or furious, Driver who at one point might appear charming and at another arrogant and mercenary, and Comer, who can seem compliant and recessive at one moment but obdurate and defiant elsewhere. The challenge facing each of them is to reflect the various personas the characters carry within them, and they all manage to do so convincingly.
“The Last Duel” will be a challenging film for some viewers, not only because of its deliberate pace but because despite the fact that by the close its makers’ conclusions about where the truth of the case lay, the tripartite structure leaves a residue of ambiguity that today’s mainstream audience is rarely receptive to. (Another picture to which it might be compared is “The Return of Martin Guerre,” in which a woman’s possible deception is also an issue.) And in spite of its effective action elements, it’s really a cerebral exercise, which some will find frustrating—as they might its uncommon concern for the minutiae of medieval mores and legalities.
But in the end it’s the rare Hollywood spectacle that, with its relevance to modern socio-political issues, engages the brain rather than just appealing to a desire for visceral excitement.