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Visitors Review

Cole Smithey 2012-05-25 00:36:59

Character study, history lesson, and bloody war story, "Ironclad" adds up to more than the sum of its violent parts if only just barely.

Stephen Whitty 2012-05-24 04:44:44

The problem is that the movie is only swords and stage blood. The suits of armor are all empty.

Sam Adams 2012-05-24 00:12:46

Unfortunately, a narrative needs characters as well as plot, and that's where Ironclad falls off its horse.

2012-05-23 14:11:23

"You fought bravely"

This review is from: Ironclad (DVD) It doesn't get any better than IRONCLAD for the legions of battle-movie lovers out there. A no-holds-barred masterpiece of blood and gore makeup contrasted by bleak, grey backgrounds. Tremendous, evocative performances are delivered by Paul Giamatti, Brian Cox, James Purefoy, Kate Mara and many more. In fact, the filmmakers manage to create genuine character development and engaging romantic drama between all the ultra-violent sequences. Quite an accomplishment for a film also featuring tongues cut, limbs hacked, heads chopped and bashed and, without giving this one away, get ready when Purefoy yells, "Behind you! Clear!" What happens next is just stupefying.The only bad thing about IRONCLAD is the ridiculous tagline some marketing genius put on the dvd cover - "Heavy Metal Goes Medieval." Terrible! What does that even mean? No matter . . . Nothing can spoil this award-worthy, expertly choreographed exhibition of ancient brutality.

2012-05-23 14:42:06

Had potentional but poor direction not lack of money ruined it for me!

I get why people like this movie-given the budget the action when it occurs has a well done realistic POV grittiness-something rarely seen in movies anymore. I also understand why people dislike it-this movie is obviously is not a documentary and it may be offensive to Danish history. However, I dislike this film for another reason: the dire direction, the lack of editing and the poor pacing.This movie is 2 hours but there is 19 minutes collectively of action at the start and 16 minutes towards the end. It would be generous to say there is an additional 25 minutes of screen time that advance the plot, enhance the characters and make the story somewhat interesting. Where the poor directing and pacing comes in is during the 60 minutes of this movie where nothing happens. At the simplest explanation: the good guys of 20 or so men sit in the castle while waiting for the 1,000 bad guys to attack again. Why the bad guys are waiting when it is obvious another 2 or 3 attacks will win the keep is never explained. To sum up how boring the middle of the movie is there is a scene where the good guys are starving while fortified in the castle during the course of the winter months. The bad guys are feasting away merrily every night in front of the castle. The Templar decides to steal their food on a solo stealth mission. For 20 minutes nothing exciting or plot propelling has happened on screen so you would think we are due for some action or intrigue. Nope. Instead we only see 3 bad guys chasing the Templar from a safe distance back into the castle after he steals two sacks of food. Next scene we are back to doing nothing plus now everyone is eating and being merry.What really pissed me off is that this movie is advertised as a Dark Ages version of Magnificent Seven or 13 Samurai. It is not. There is just the one Templar Knight who is too introspective to be relatable on any level above slinging a sword around. The merrymen that accompany him are thinly drawn characters; honorable thieves and ready to brawl bar men who commit their lives, fight clumsily, but don't promote any of the warrior's philosophy that made the 13 Samurai so good. Even 300 had a clear battlefield philosophy which was exemplified thru the character's interactions and circumstances. Here we see our good guys sitting around doing nothing for most of the movie. There is a super silly scene around the 80 minute mark where our supposedly skillful Templar mounts his horse and blindly charges a cluster of armed men in a very tight space. The horse is bombarded and the Templar clumsily falls to the ground at the feet of the arm men who are about to gore the hell out of him. Before that happens the horse regains its balance magically finds space to escape and drags our not so graceful hero to safety. The sheer absurdity of this made me want to press the DVD eject button but regretfully I was committed to seeing this joke of a movie to the end. In all earnest, stronger direction and not more money would have made this movie an instant classic like Braveheart was.

a 2012-05-23 08:39:55

slightly inaccurate slasher war movie

The movie takes part during the Baron War in England, marking the moment in time when the king became the King of Men rather than The King of servants. King John was trying to destroy anyone who forced him to sign Magna Carta - the treaty establishing the freedom of people under the Crown.One of the first episodes of the brewing new war was the siege of Rochester - a key castle between the South-East coast - where the French were expected to land - and London. The movie can be somehow described as a European version of samurai war movies, esp. 13 Assassins - where a very small group of skilled warriors holds off a much bigger army.Rochester was defended by a few Templiers - a famed warrior monk Order - against a part of King John's army. It was a long, brutal combat where neither side would back off.And Ironclad portrays this very well, especially the feeling of the epoch - I would say - reconstruction of life in the 13th century was almost flawless. The fight scenes are extended and the camera doesn't jerk off or lose focus and fade like in The Gladiator, and you stay right in the battle as it rages.Having said all this, the movie has a number of historical inaccuracies, but they fall well within the script. I would argue that Paul Giamatti was a good fit for the role of the king, as King John was a much more complicated person with a much longer history than just a cruel barbarian as shown in the film, but still, he did a decent job.There were a few melancholic failures during romantic scenes, and I couldn't figure out the threats King John used to control Danish mercenaries, but this didn't really ruin anything.This is definitely a good movie to see, if you don't focus on minor flaws, and don't expect it to be historically accurate.

Dave 2012-05-20 23:29:53

Worth seeing

If you liked King Arthur, 13th Warrior or Robin Hood then you'll want to see this movie. Great casting including Paul Giamatti. Story is well paced but a little predictable. Action scenes are well done but a little gory. But sometimes gory is good. Excellent sets and cinematography!

Ray Bennett 2012-05-20 10:51:31

Medieval history lesson with lots of shattered bodies and splattered limbs.

2012-05-20 16:27:46

Ironclad was awesome!

I don't watch very many movies anymore, but I really wanted to see this one. And I wasn't dissappointed! This movie was awesome! Really good graphic special effects in the fight scenes and plenty of awesome action! I'm no expert in movies these days, but I can honestly say that Ironclad was one of the best movies I have seen in a long time. It had a great story and really good acting by everyone in it.I was really impressed with the actor that played King John. He was top notch in his performance. I was really impressed with this movie and I think everyone should see it. You won't be disappointed!Five stars! Nay, ten stars!

Jeff Shannon 2012-05-19 22:08:00

Through it all, Paul Giamatti spits bilious fury as a ruthless king with a mile-wide mean streak and an army of Danish mercenaries. What's not to like?

Mark Salisbury 2012-05-18 03:55:59

A ripping yarn capably told, this cinematic history lesson may not be wholly factually sound, but scores brownie points for unflinching brutality and ruthless realism.

Nigel Floyd 2012-05-17 20:25:55

One has to admire the spirit of this independent production, which aims for the sweeping spectacle of 'El Cid', but it falls way short of its epic ambitions.

2012-05-17 04:05:55

Ironclad [Blu-ray]

This review is from: Ironclad [Blu-ray] (Blu-ray) Good acting, nice background sets. This movie give you a good sense of the cruelty and mentality of Medieval warfare. For a historically documented event, there was a both good and bad interpretation. Despite the historical errors (too few defenders, no town, no Cathedral, too long an implied seige, Templars, affairs, who won), there was also good historical detail. The castle looked good, the castle keep mining, the 40 pigs, cutting off hands and feet, etc... Anyway, the botton line is simple, if you like this period of history, and don't get hyper mad at dramatic license, then this is a GREAT movie. I loved the acting of King John.

Marshall Fine 2012-05-17 00:16:26

The script is so sodden and the action so agitated and fragmented that Ironclad simply seems like so much swordplay silliness.

Cath Clarke 2012-05-15 10:54:43

Historically accurate? It's not certain everyone involved is even on the same script.

Leofwine_draca 2012-05-14 23:43:29

Bloody, brutal, brilliant

Director Jonathan English delivers a capture-the-castle story ofmedieval warfare in IRONCLAD, an under-the-radar British flick thatfulfils every expectation. This small scale siege flick pays homage toTHE MAGNIFICENT SEVEN and doesn't offer up much that we haven't seenbefore, but it unveils a hard-hitting story of brutality and heroism insuch a way that you'll be glued to your seat. The last similar film wehad to this was Neil Marshall's Romans-vs-Picts chase movie CENTURION,but Ironclad is even better, with less shaky cameras and bettereffects.Heading the cast is James Purefoy, by now an old hand in historicalfilms and having perfected his glowering look in SOLOMON KANE.Supporting him are a disparate bunch, incorporating seasoned veterans(Brian Cox, Derek Jacobi, Charles Dance), entertaining Britishcharacter actors (Mackenzie Crook and Jason Flemyng) and some otherne'er-do-wells. Against him is vitriol-spewing King John, played byPaul Giamatti, who chews and spits to his heart's content.The story is slim and bolstered by a slew of outstanding battlesequences which focus on the blood and grime of the era. Enemies arehacked to pieces, limbs are lopped and torture abounds in these brutaltimes, so don't go in expecting kid-friendly fare. The decent castlifts the level of the script above that of the B-movie, making this acut above the rest, and the true-life story is one that's worthtelling. If only they made more films like IRONCLAD!

2012-05-14 03:38:58

Fantastic battle scenes and weak everything else

When it comes to medieval period pieces, it doesn't take much for them to get my attention, which is one reason I looked forward to Ironclad. Featuring a great cast on paper with James Purefoy, Paul Giamatti, Charles Dance, Jason Flemyng, and Brian Cox among others; combined with the fact that the film was rumored to be a gorefest, this was something I looked forward to quite a bit. Alas, Ironclad delivers on the gore and battle/action sequence departments in spades, but in terms of everything else it pretty much falls flat. Brutal and tyrannical King John (Giamatti) goes against the recently formed Magna Carta and proceeds to wreck havoc upon the populace, eventually leading to Rochester Castle, as a rag-tag group consisting of a Knights Templar warrior (Purefoy) and others (Cox, Flemyng, and a few others) stands in his way. In between all this are a handful of ultraviolent and ultra bloody battle scenes where limbs and heads often fly, as well as some excellent makeup effects to boot. Other than that though, the fairly pedestrian script, inane dialogue with an equally inane love story sub-plot between Purefoy and Kate Mara's character, and stiff acting from practically everyone (save Giamatti who actually seems to be having a bit of fun with the material) really make Ironclad a disappointing endeavor. Still, the battle scenes make it worth checking out at least if you have two hours to kill, but other than that there really isn't a whole lot here to make it all that worthwhile.

2012-05-13 17:11:54

Potent Small Scale 'Braveheart'

One of the better Medieval period-films I've seen. Accurate to the point of being disgusting - and I'm more the pleased for it. Bloody, savage and brutal. No singing, no ridiculous troupes of dancing fools, no Renaissance Faires. This is what it was like: Gray, dingy and grim for the vast majority of people.I'm always amazed at the folks who populate these reenactment camps - happily deceiving themselves by completely ignoring the truth. I want to see a Medieval Festival where urine and feces are randomly dropped onto people - to see streets of mud filled with the same. I want to know that the people there have no dental hygiene as we know it - not even a tooth brush. So how bad do you want to hug someone now? I want to smell headache-inducing amounts of perfume in an attempt to cover up rank body odor. I want to know the dry foodstuffs are infested with mites and grubs, and that the wet foods may or may not be rancid and/or infected with bacterial viruses. Clothes and bodies infested with fleas, skin covered in acne pustules, and a general brutality against the weak.That's partly why I enjoyed 'Ironclad' - it didn't paint a rosy picture. The other reason: Ever since the cancellation of my much-lamented 'Rome', I've been hoping to see James Purefoy again. The guy is serious kick-ass. If there really were a comet-striking-the-earth-event, Purefoy is the dude I'd want to be around. I honestly see him clawing his way to the top of any primitive heap. Particularly enjoyed the story, a good one for once, about the righteousness of the Knights Templar. They've taken a pretty mean beating in the media these past few years - character assassination seven-hundred years after they were betrayed and destroyed. To quote Wikipedia regarding the Chinon Parchments, "It is currently the Catholic Church position that the medieval persecution of the Knights Templar was unjust; that there was nothing inherently wrong with the Order or its Rule; and that Pope Clement was pressured into his actions by the magnitude of the public scandal and the dominating influence of King Philip IV".So 'Ironclad' gives us a look at a true Templar - a holy knight of stout spirit and strong arm; a moral warrior with the clarity that comes from purity of vision. And I'm genuinely gratified to the filmmakers for this honest perspective. And, yes, I get the irony of this story sitting dead-center in the continual revisionist histories of King John.The rest of the ragtag band of warriors reads like an all-star cast of every period film made in the last twenty-years: Brian Cox, Jayson Fleming, Mackenzie Crook, Jamie Foreman, John Pierce Jones, Derek Jacobi and the always enjoyable Charles Dance. Each were superlative in their deliveries; much appreciated and enjoyed. Now to the weaker elements.I honestly cannot see Paul Giamatti as anything other than a strong character actor - I can't - and I've really tried. I like the man! But productions like this proves, at least in my mind, that he's seriously overrated. It's great that a 'regular guy' like him gets to step up and play the big parts (President John Adams comes to mind) but he's just too dang goofy to be believable. And as sincere as his energetic performance was in 'Ironclad', he seemed diminutive in the role. I enjoy his bad guy performances so much more when they're fitted to him - not the other way around. If you get a chance to see 'Shoot 'Em Up', you'll understand what I mean. As a medieval King Of England, he's just not suited.One aspect of his performance that I found intriguing: In the film, both introduction and curtain call for his character, has John standing and staring into shallow water. I wonder why? Reflective introspection?And I still don't get how Kate Mara continually finds herself work. I have nothing against her personally, but she just doesn't connote a leading actress presence. Screened nearly a half-dozen productions with her as both lead and supporting actor - everything screams 'average'. Nothing pops, nothing sizzles. She's reminiscent of watching a kid sister in the school play.Overall, an excellent film done on a small budget. Another $20 million and we would've gotten a larger, more authentic Rochester stage, fuller armies and a bigger splash. But I'm pleased with what they were able to achieve with what they had; filmmakers maximizing their resources is always appreciated.

Iqbali_Noodlepaste 2012-05-13 06:51:29

low rent CONAN rip off

For old school gents, I saw this this afternoon and thought it wasawesome. This movie is probably the most supremely awesome thing I'veever seen committed to film, and as a fan of B movies, thats sayingsomething.Highlights - We watched the entire movie and laughed the entire movie.Though, Imust say we learned some things: 1. The highway to hell isindeed a rainbow. 2. The Burger-King King got his start in this movie3. Cheap happy-meal style toys are also movie props 4. In space, youjust have to throw a rock to fly a chariot; but if the rope attached tothe rock is cut, then you spin wildly outof control 5. Some islands inthe Greek isles are only available in one color 6. You let an old hagdrink your blood and she will be a beautiful sorceress who willdissolve when she dies At the end, my son agreed that it was the worstmovie he ever saw, AND it was also one of the funniest because of allthe cringe-worthy fight scenes and dialogue. 7. dialogue from the herothat is not just portentious, but delivered in a way reminiscent of anearly illiterate guy reading his lines from 6 high cuecards....low-budget to the point that they couldn't afford horses, soour heroes run everywhere....reusing the drooling goblin costumes fromthe previous movies as both the wise sage and the Level 3 Boss...a herothat cant sheathe his own sword, and so the director opts for havinghim PUT IT BEHIND HIS BACK AND RUN OFF CAMERA. Go into this knowingwhat you're going to see and willing to appreciate it in those terms,and you will enjoy it as much as we did. Try to watch it as a seriousmovie-goer, however, and you'll probably want to have your headexamined afterwards.

Bangell99 2012-05-12 16:56:30

Ignore the Predictable Plot, Ignore the Stupid Tactics, Enjoy the Butchery

Ironclad is a film about brutal medieval violence. That's all; the plotis merely there to facilitate the brutal action. This is a movie whereyou should switch off your brain and enjoy some great fighting andnasty gore, with a very likable cast to boot.Very few things in this movie make much sense. Everything theantagonist does is done either to give our heroic defenders as much ofa fighting chance as possible so that they don't die within half anhour of the film, or to have things happen which look cool.This movie is a neat action flick, on a smaller scale than you mightlike, but executed very well. However, it doesn't always stick to theplan: there are long sequences of sitting inside a keep, talking, ordiscussing the Magna Carta. It's as if the film forgets that it's onlyan action showcase.The cast is good, with James Purefoy reliable as ever in the main role.The supporting actors are also very likable. Kate Mara plays the sexyfemale to stare at, yet she doesn't reveal much, making her scenespointless.Overall, if you want some really good, gory action, watch this film.You may wish to fast forward through the boring scenes, though.