{"id":336529,"date":"2011-03-24T22:45:28","date_gmt":"2011-03-24T22:45:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.ghanamma.net\/2011\/03\/24\/the-eagle-this-roman-romp-is-stupidus-maximus\/"},"modified":"2011-03-24T22:45:28","modified_gmt":"2011-03-24T22:45:28","slug":"the-eagle-this-roman-romp-is-stupidus-maximus","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2011\/03\/24\/the-eagle-this-roman-romp-is-stupidus-maximus\/","title":{"rendered":"The Eagle: This Roman romp is stupidus maximus!"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><div readability=\"144.677993204\">\n<!-- google_ad_section_start(name=s2) --><\/p>\n<p>\nBy<br \/>\n<a href=\"http:\/\/www.dailymail.co.uk\/home\/search.html?s=y&#038;authornamef=Chris+Tookey\" rel=\"nofollow\">Chris Tookey<\/a><br \/>Last updated at 10:45 PM on 24th March 2011<\/p>\n<p><span>Verdict:<\/span> Takes flight, but doesn&#8217;t soar<\/p>\n<p>\n<strong><br \/>\n<span><span><span title=\"The Eagle: This Roman romp is stupidus maximus!\n\"><\/span><\/span><\/span><br \/>\n<span><span title=\"Chris Tookey\"><\/span><\/span><br \/>\n<span><span title=\"2011-03-24T22:45+0000\"><\/span><\/span><br \/>\nRating: <img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"rating\" src=\"http:\/\/www.ghanamma.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/03\/3d17b90dg_showbiz_2.gif\" width=\"55\" height=\"9\" alt=\"2 Star Rating\" title=\"2 out of 5\" \/><\/strong>\n<\/p>\n<p>The Eagle is a traditional boys\u2019 own adventure, except the men wear mini-skirts and breastplates with sculpted abs. This looks like Ancient Rome as reinterpreted by the makers of Brokeback Mountain but with all the explicit gay sex taken out.<\/p>\n<p>Females are also rigorously excluded. I kept being reminded of the scene in Airplane when the pilot murmurs suggestively to a small boy: \u2018Joey, do you like movies about .\u2009.\u2009. gladiators?\u2019 <\/p>\n<p>On the surface, it\u2019s about a conversationally challenged young Roman soldier (played by dancing dude-turned-hunk of the moment Channing Tatum) striving to bring honour to the memory of his long-lost father, who led the Ninth Legion into Caledonia, alias Scotland, and never came back. Presumably, Dad died or became helplessly addicted to haggis.<\/p>\n<div readability=\"8\">\n<img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.ghanamma.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/03\/7c9b5d12695_468x305.jpg.jpg\" width=\"468\" height=\"305\" alt=\"Nice helmet, shame about the story: A plot has made way for battle scenes\" class=\"blkBorder\" \/><\/p>\n<p>Nice helmet, shame about the story: A plot has made way for battle scenes<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div readability=\"8\">\n<img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.ghanamma.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/03\/75168937793_233x423.jpg.jpg\" width=\"233\" height=\"423\" alt=\"Outshining the rest: Bell steals teh scene from B-movie beefcake and lead, Channing Tatum\" class=\"blkBorder\" \/><\/p>\n<p>Outshining the rest: Bell steals teh scene from B-movie beefcake and lead, Channing Tatum<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>So when our hero is invalided out of the army, then nursed back to health by Donald Sutherland as the uncle he never knew he had (doh!) and hears that the legion\u2019s talismanic golden eagle has been spotted north of Hadrian\u2019s Wall, off Tatum goes to recover the totem, accompanied only by his new slave, a bolshy Briton (that other dancing dude, Jamie Bell).<\/p>\n<p>Rosemary Sutcliff\u2019s well-loved story The Eagle Of The Ninth has been simplistically adapted by Jeremy Brock (Mrs Brown) and director Kevin Macdonald (State Of Play). <\/p>\n<p>The detail and lyricism of the book have gone, with the emphasis on the emerging bromance between the two leading men.<\/p>\n<p>The idea of having the dominant Romans use American accents, while the downtrodden Britons speak in either English accents or Gaelic works well. <\/p>\n<p>But the film\u2019s big asset is its look. I liked the rickety provincial coliseum redolent of a lower-division football stadium, and the not very well-defended Roman fort on the far edge of civilisation. <\/p>\n<p>When it travels north, Anthony Dod Mantle\u2019s cinematography becomes impressively elemental. <\/p>\n<p>The battle scenes are, as usual in modern films, shot too tightly and edited too chaotically for us to see what\u2019s going on \u2014 but they are visceral and remarkably explicit for a 12A movie. I\u2019d have thought it should be a 15. <\/p>\n<p>The Eagle gets low marks for originality. That\u2019s partly bad luck: a recent film called Centurion covered similar ground. But too much also seems derivative of earlier, more ambitious pictures. The battle scenes are reminiscent of Braveheart; the exotic Seal people of northern Scotland look uncannily like the Na\u2019vi in Avatar.<\/p>\n<p>And whereas Sutcliff\u2019s novel took us inside the mind of its hero, the film does not. That is partly down to one disastrous casting decision. Tatum (who last starred in the brainless G.I. Joe: The Rise Of Cobra) seems to have been employed with both eyes on the U.S. box office. He\u2019s B-movie beefcake, inexpressive and outclassed by Jamie Bell in every one of their scenes together.<\/p>\n<p>This Roman is a bore to be with, and he\u2019s also something of a fascist (with his straight-armed salutes, unquestioning loyalty to the state and willingness to\u00a0 murder small children). By the end, many in the audience will be hoping his slave will betray him \u2014 exactly the opposite of the director\u2019s intention.<\/p>\n<p>The film-makers also never develop a coherent attitude towards Rome. Issues such as imperialism, slavery and mercy are raised and then abruptly lowered, as though they\u2019re too difficult to discuss. <\/p>\n<p>Are Rome\u2019s\u00a0soldiers civilising forces or arrogant imperialists? The film seems to be marching inexorably towards the latter conclusion \u2014 only to make an abrupt about-turn at the end. <\/p>\n<p>At the end of two hours, our Roman hero seems just as dim-witted as when he started, and he even seems to have converted his new best friend to triumphalist imperialism. This doesn\u2019t convince as a happy ending.<\/p>\n<p><!-- google_ad_section_end(name=s2) --><\/p>\n<p>\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.ghanamma.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/03\/3d17b90dg_showbiz_2.gif\" \/><\/p>\n<p>See the original post here:<br \/>\n<a target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/www.dailymail.co.uk\/tvshowbiz\/reviews\/article-1369717\/The-Eagle-This-Roman-romp-stupidus-maximus.html?ITO=1490\" title=\"The Eagle: This Roman romp is stupidus maximus!\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">The Eagle: This Roman romp is stupidus maximus!<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p> By Chris Tookey Last updated at 10:45 PM on 24th March 2011 Verdict: Takes flight, but doesn&#8217;t soar Rating: The Eagle is a traditional boys\u2019 own adventure, except the men wear mini-skirts and breastplates with sculpted abs. This looks like Ancient Rome as reinterpreted by the makers of Brokeback Mountain but with all the explicit gay sex taken out. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-336529","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-business"},"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.0 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>The Eagle: This Roman romp is stupidus maximus! - Ghanamma.com<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2011\/03\/24\/the-eagle-this-roman-romp-is-stupidus-maximus\/\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:title\" content=\"The Eagle: This Roman romp is stupidus maximus! - Ghanamma.com\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:description\" content=\"By Chris Tookey Last updated at 10:45 PM on 24th March 2011 Verdict: Takes flight, but doesn&#039;t soar Rating: The Eagle is a traditional boys\u2019 own adventure, except the men wear mini-skirts and breastplates with sculpted abs. This looks like Ancient Rome as reinterpreted by the makers of Brokeback Mountain but with all the explicit gay sex taken out.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:image\" content=\"http:\/\/www.ghanamma.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/03\/3d17b90dg_showbiz_2.gif\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@ghanamma\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@ghanamma\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"3 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2011\/03\/24\/the-eagle-this-roman-romp-is-stupidus-maximus\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2011\/03\/24\/the-eagle-this-roman-romp-is-stupidus-maximus\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"\",\"@id\":\"\"},\"headline\":\"The Eagle: This Roman romp is stupidus maximus!\",\"datePublished\":\"2011-03-24T22:45:28+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2011\/03\/24\/the-eagle-this-roman-romp-is-stupidus-maximus\/\"},\"wordCount\":693,\"commentCount\":0,\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2011\/03\/24\/the-eagle-this-roman-romp-is-stupidus-maximus\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"http:\/\/www.ghanamma.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/03\/3d17b90dg_showbiz_2.gif\",\"articleSection\":[\"Business\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2011\/03\/24\/the-eagle-this-roman-romp-is-stupidus-maximus\/#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2011\/03\/24\/the-eagle-this-roman-romp-is-stupidus-maximus\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2011\/03\/24\/the-eagle-this-roman-romp-is-stupidus-maximus\/\",\"name\":\"The Eagle: This Roman romp is stupidus maximus! - Ghanamma.com\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2011\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2011\/03\/24\/the-eagle-this-roman-romp-is-stupidus-maximus\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2011\/03\/24\/the-eagle-this-roman-romp-is-stupidus-maximus\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"http:\/\/www.ghanamma.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/03\/3d17b90dg_showbiz_2.gif\",\"datePublished\":\"2011-03-24T22:45:28+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2011\/03\/24\/the-eagle-this-roman-romp-is-stupidus-maximus\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2011\/03\/24\/the-eagle-this-roman-romp-is-stupidus-maximus\/#primaryimage\",\"url\":\"http:\/\/www.ghanamma.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/03\/3d17b90dg_showbiz_2.gif\",\"contentUrl\":\"http:\/\/www.ghanamma.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/03\/3d17b90dg_showbiz_2.gif\"},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2011\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2011\/\",\"name\":\"Ghanamma.com\",\"description\":\"News In Ghana - Latest Ghana News Headlines\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2011\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":{\"@type\":\"PropertyValueSpecification\",\"valueRequired\":true,\"valueName\":\"search_term_string\"}}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"The Eagle: This Roman romp is stupidus maximus! - Ghanamma.com","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2011\/03\/24\/the-eagle-this-roman-romp-is-stupidus-maximus\/","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_title":"The Eagle: This Roman romp is stupidus maximus! - Ghanamma.com","twitter_description":"By Chris Tookey Last updated at 10:45 PM on 24th March 2011 Verdict: Takes flight, but doesn't soar Rating: The Eagle is a traditional boys\u2019 own adventure, except the men wear mini-skirts and breastplates with sculpted abs. 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