Ironclad Review

Ironclad
1215. Having been forced to sign Magna Carta, King John (Giamatti) imports Danish mercenaries to punish the barons who humiliated him. William de Albany (Cox) recruits Templar Thomas Marshall (Purefoy) and a band of rebels to defend the strategically important Rochester Castle against the King.

by Kim Newman |
Published on
Release Date:

04 Mar 2011

Running Time:

120 minutes

Certificate:

15

Original Title:

Ironclad

This blokey mediaeval mini-epic picks up the chronicle where Ridley Scott dropped it at the end of his Robin Hood, and plunges into the juicy politicking of the Barons’ War as a vindictive monarch tries to take back England from upstarts who have made him grant unheard-of liberties to the people. Then, it defaults to borrowing from the classic action movie template: whiskery Baron Brian de Cox, modelling a fetching chainmail cardigan, and noble Templar knight Sir James of Purefoy, who even has a heroic horse, trot about muddy stretches of the country recruiting old friends. Archer Mackenzie Crook, criminal Jamie Foreman, whoremonger Jason Flemyng and a few others sign up to defend Rochester Castle; according to Wikipedia, several hundred rebels held out during the siege, but Ironclad slims down the number to a traditional Magnificent Seven.

Having perfected dour sword-swinging in Solomon Kane, Purefoy solidifies his manly rep as the near-mystically empowered warrior monk — it’s plain from the first sight of the winsome lady of the castle (Kate Mara) that his vow of chastity will be broken by the end of Act Two — and Marshall sets about defending Rochester in much the same way Patrick Swayze ran a bar in Road House. Writer-director Jonathan English, previously best-known for the SyFy Channel ‘original’ Minotaur, saddles a solid cast with too many duff lines (someone actually says, “It’s too quiet out there” just before a surprise attack), but it’s physically a convincing picture of brutal times. Paul Giamatti is a terrific villain, delivering angry speeches about the divine right of kings with fist-waving and beard-chewing while his Danish sidekick (Vladimir Kulich) shoulders a hefty axe in preparation for video-nasty levels of highly educational violence. According to King John, it’s not enough that a rebel has his hands and feet chopped off — they then have to be splatted against a castle wall with a ballista.

Though it’s a clanking armour exploitation movie not a History Channel production, some useful facts are embedded in the script. Should you ever be called upon to besiege a Norman castle, there’s a trick with burning pigs which will come in handy.

Like all sieges, this offers moments of choppy terror and excitement followed by dull sit-it-out-and-starve spots. Straddled between uproarious schoolboy tosh and serious historical movie, this still offers enough dismemberments, royal tantrums and portcullis-rammings to make for a lively Saturday night out.
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