In the tradition of Conan the Barbarian, 300 and Gladiator, I give you Centurion

Centurion (2010)
Dir: Neil Marshall
Stars: Michael Fassbender, Dominic West and Olga Kurylenko

This entry might be my most abbreviated because the nature of Centurion is so straight forward: you’re either in, or you’re out!  Do you like Roman movies?  Do you like Scottish topography and scenery?  Do you like sword and sandal epics with PLENTY of bloody gore to fit the battle scenes?  Then look no further than Centurion!  All I will tell you about the story is that it’s a “behind enemy lines” kind of deal.  Way back in Emperor Hadrian’s time, there’s a Roman garrison on the northern border of the empire, in what we call Britain.  There, a legion has decided to finally take out these guerrilla enemies to the north called the Picts.  When the Roman legion moves north to knock out the Picts, they don’t do so well – and about seven of them are left behind the lines to rescue their legion’s general!   RUH ROH….  Part of the reason I liked the movie so much was because it stars Dominic West of The Wire fame and Olga Kurylenko who was in the second Bond movie with Daniel Craig: they both really showed me something in this film.

http://trailers.apple.com/trailers/independent/centurion/

The trailer does a very, very capable job of presenting this story and what the audience member is getting into with this picture.  Despite the poster image Apple has, this movie is not animated – be advised, please…  In fact, let me make ultra-super-duper-uber clear, this is a RATED R FEATURE!  Put your children in bed and seal the door when this movie is on, because the battle scenes are slightly intense…

Note 1: Marshall directed another “suspense/thriller” (or if you call it what it is, a HORROR film) called The Descent, in which several women on a girls-only vacation go spelunking in the Carolina hills only to be surprised by what they find in the caves.  The movie has creatures, which are scary, but also deals with real-life phobias, like clausterphobia…  If this sounds good to you, believe me it is (and horror is not my preferred genre as you’ve no doubt guessed by now).

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