THE EAGLE takes a children's adventure story and dumbs it down: the book was a thoughtful yarn about empire, honour and loyalty; the film is a predictable post-colonial action film. The plot - Roman soldier invalided out of the army goes on a mission into barbarian territory with his British slave in order to recover the Eagle standard lost by his father in battle years before - is retained but bowdlerised and misunderstood. The one amusing change is to have the Romans played by Americans and the Briton by Brits (with the exception of a wasted Tahar Rahim). The other changes range from the silly (a very modern conflict between slave and master) to the ahistorical (the testudo was for sieges, not skirmishes) and idiotic (ordering men to break formation in the face of chariots is suicidal). Add to this the transformation of Celtic warriors into Amerindian braves (complete with mohawks and tomahawks), the appearance of a sneering aristocrat straight from central casting (predictably humiliated later), Mark Strong in a bad wig and a climactic battle shot in such frustratingly over-edited close-up as to be impenetrable. A wasted opportunity.
Review of The Eagle
