While Channing Tatum may not be an actor’s actor, he doesn’t detract from a film. He has charisma and the build that action stars require, and makes an admirable go of the sort of genre we don’t expect from him, as with The Eagle. This may just be the sort of thing Tatum is going for these days, considering that he is also in The Son of No Man this year, a heavy drama starring heavy hitters Al Pacino and Juliette Binoche. Kevin MacDonald has made some excellent films, The King of Scotland and documentary Touching the Void, but a man who’s courted Oscar before knows not to hire an action-pretty boy to lead a film that he hopes to be more than it is. Those were my expectations going in, which, on average, were met fairly regularly, and even surpassed on occasion.
While Channing Tatum may not be an actor’s actor, he doesn’t detract from a film. He has charisma and the build that action stars require, and makes an admirable go of the sort of genre we don’t expect from him, as with The Eagle. This may just be the sort of thing Tatum is going for these days, considering that he is also in The Son of No Man this year, a heavy drama starring heavy hitters Al Pacino and Juliette Binoche. Kevin MacDonald has made some excellent films, The King of Scotland and documentary Touching the Void, but a man who’s courted Oscar before knows not to hire an action-pretty boy to lead a film that he hopes to be more than it is. Those were my expectations going in, which, on average, were met fairly regularly, and even surpassed on occasion.
{{page_break}}I have two reservations going into movies treating this period of history–the first is, how to address the depiction of imperial conquest. Surely, we are past a point that we need to glorify everything that has been glorified in the past just because it’s in keeping with. Rome does not automatically equal awesome, and ancient history is not ‘ancient history,’ and therefore, untouchable. The Eagle made this dilemma a little easier for me, though it had me guessing at which side of the debate it would land on. Second, and very much related, is the treatment of war. War is either considered a human fact, or a human choice. Tatum’s character, Marcus Flavius Aquila, is born the son of a soldier, and sees that as his own destiny. For an empire to do what empires do, the military or equivalent force is a necessity, and as long as there are new generations of people that learn to uphold that force, it will continue. To me, nothing legitimizes the maintenance of a military agenda where purely economic interest is involved–I’m not going to argue with the past, or human nature–but to legitimize one force is to denounce the force that opposes it, which would be the antiquated view of all the tribes that defended their land and people from imperial conquest.
A film such as this needs to come down on either the side that lets history only be represented by the self-appointed victors, or who comes at the past objectively while exploring human motivation universally. I believe MacDonald felt that this was his responsibility and made strives towards an objective portrayal. The Eagle follows Aquila as he takes command of a fort in Southern Britain, “the end of the world” according to the Empire, literally holding the unknown North at bay with Hadrian’s Wall. Legend has it that the Legio IX Hispana disappeared in the British wilds north of this wall, without ever a sign of how they ended. Historians now dispute where exactly in the empire the legion saw its last battle, but the millenia-old mystery remains an interesting subject regardless. In The Eagle, Aquila’s father led the legion to it’s doom, losing the company standard (hint: it’s a bird of prey) and his honour in the process. At first, it seems that Aquila will attempt to regain this honour through his work at the isolated post, but a devastating injury sustained during some realistically restrained, but interesting battle sequences, earns him only an honourable discharge.
Viewer beware: expect long periods lacking violence and action. The Eagle is only that film when it needs to be.
Along with the excellent cast playing the Britains, Jamie Bell (Billy Elliot) gives the most compelling performance in the film as Esca, a slave who the recovering Aquila saves from the gladiator ring following the boy’s impressive display of bravery. With Esca in tow, the career soldier makes it his mission to finally solve the mystery of the missing legion, despite being warned of the insanity of travelling into such volatile territory. A shaggy Mark Strong appears and disappears from the narrative almost without consequence; when he shows up again, you have already forgotten that he was there in the first place. I'm not going to say he was underused, but I also expect to be impressed by Strong no matter how brief the role, and wasn't.
The film was earning a big “meh” in my books up until we meet the Painted People of the Seal mostly responsible for the demise of the missing Romans. Esca is the voice of the Britains, oppressed within the borders of Roman Britian, but gaining gravity and significance as the journey pushes northward–he is the mirror perspective to Aquila’s unwavering belief in Roman valour, reminding him of the reverse situation for the oppressed/beseiged people who only defend what is theirs. Not only that, but Aquila gets to experience that notion in reverse, as Esca becomes his intermediary, and finally, temporary master when they must switch roles to intermingle with the Painted Peoples, who reportedly have the sacred standard the Romans once lost. If you watch this film, watch it for the episode involving this fascinating tribe of Britains, and to see Tatum get smacked around, if that’s your thing.
The Eagle is based on Rosemary Sutcliff’s The Eagle of the Ninth, and from what I read about it, stays true to the young adult novel (often cited as more for adults) except on a few disposable notes. One of my main criticisms of the film Centurion, which also imagines this ancient mystery, was the knee-jerk romance element that felt forced and made lead Michael Fassbender sound like a drivelling fool, ruining what had been decent entertainment up until that point. The truest element of historical films focused on Roman war culture is fidelity between soldiers, and almost the complete absence of woman and home life. Frankly, this is not a problem; the principal setting of The Eagle are the most isolated and beset upon forts in the Roman Empire–life there wants for comfort on every level, including the warmth and love of a woman, and the order of the day–survival–would mean they certainly weren’t priorities. The Eagle still aims to redefine these ties that bind, in the central relationship between Aquila and Esca, which represent the idea that difference does not preclude equality. Their relationship is as complex as they come, though you almost expect an airborne high five to pass between them as the film concludes.
In addition to some painful dialogue, which you are saved from by periods of silence and/or subtitled speech, the climax of the film represents a strike against it in terms of its authenticity, but not in the historical sense. The question of authenticity involves the unlikely ability for a handful of out-of-practice Romans (Mark Strong and company) to re-stage the battle they lost twenty years before, alongside a seriously injured Aquila, and WIN against a larger, fiercer force. If the movie didn’t otherwise end in way that resisted the desire to uphold military conquest of the imperial order as just, I might have panned it. But since MacDonald was able to, for the most part, live up to its stabs at a discourse on equality and historical objectivity, I give it a pass. The film's realism will impress some, which means those in the market for fantasy (i.e., 300) should keep looking.
Overall Score: 6.05 – Okay. (6s are just okay. These movies usually have many flaws, didn’t try to do anything special, or were poorly executed. Some will still love 6s, but most prefer to just rent them. Watch more trailers and read more reviews before you decide.)
