The Last Duel (Ridley Scott, 2021)

[Toland's Mitchell]

"Oh well, you know the truth is subjective, right? WAIT WAIT NO ... not this truth, this truth you can just take our word about." The whole point was undermined the minute the film starts.

Sure, the hand-tipping title card is a bit condescending in making sure that the audience knows which version of “the truth” is true, but it didn’t bother me as much as it seemed to bother Brian...

I watched Last Duel earlier this week, and don't recall there being a difference in the three characters' title cards. Thus I experienced the film in a Rashomon-type way, where I wasn't completely believing any of them. However, the film's #metoo references made the wife's perspective much more encouraging to believe, especially given how starkly contrasting it was from the other two. But if I missed a difference in her title card versus the other two, what was it? In any case, it wouldn't bring the entire film down for me because the film would still succeed on that front, in addition to being a finely-crafted Medieval drama with some thrilling action scenes to boot.

[Arrow]

"Oh well, you know the truth is subjective, right? WAIT WAIT NO ... not this truth, this truth you can just take our word about." The whole point was undermined the minute the film starts.

Sure, the hand-tipping title card is a bit condescending in making sure that the audience knows which version of “the truth” is true, but it didn’t bother me as much as it seemed to bother Brian...

I watched Last Duel earlier this week, and don't recall there being a difference in the three characters' title cards. Thus I experienced the film in a Rashomon-type way, where I wasn't completely believing any of them. However, the film's #metoo references made the wife's perspective much more encouraging to believe, especially given how starkly contrasting it was from the other two. But if I missed a difference in her title card versus the other two, what was it? In any case, it wouldn't bring the entire film down for me because the film would still succeed on that front, in addition to being a finely-crafted Medieval drama with some thrilling action scenes to boot.

When the title card faded the word “truth” or “the truth” lingered briefly.

[Never Cursed]

"Oh well, you know the truth is subjective, right? WAIT WAIT NO ... not this truth, this truth you can just take our word about." The whole point was undermined the minute the film starts.

Sure, the hand-tipping title card is a bit condescending in making sure that the audience knows which version of “the truth” is true, but it didn’t bother me as much as it seemed to bother Brian...

I watched Last Duel earlier this week, and don't recall there being a difference in the three characters' title cards. Thus I experienced the film in a Rashomon-type way, where I wasn't completely believing any of them. However, the film's #metoo references made the wife's perspective much more encouraging to believe, especially given how starkly contrasting it was from the other two. But if I missed a difference in her title card versus the other two, what was it? In any case, it wouldn't bring the entire film down for me because the film would still succeed on that front, in addition to being a finely-crafted Medieval drama with some thrilling action scenes to boot.

SpoilerShow

Yeah, in the "The Truth According to the Lady Marguerite" title card, the first two words fade much slower than the others, so that for a few seconds, the title card says "The Truth."

Again, a bit condescending, but it didn't bother me too much

[therewillbeblus]

Seems like a wink in the direction of the “Trust Women” sexual assault awareness mantra preceding the #metoo movement

[therewillbeblus]

I found myself wedged between Brian and Never Cursed on this one: I didn't like it, but it's not without interest. I was very surprised by how the first section moved at a glacial pace in attending to carefully-drawn interplay between men, allowing intimacy to exist in surface-level expressions that nonetheless spoke volumes to the invaluable affinity buried underneath fleeting moments of camaraderie. Driver in particular plays a character whose intentions and allegiances are far more enigmatic regarding their sincerity than the trailer suggested, though like Brian I didn't feel like any of this mattered by the film's denouement. The pitch didn't reflect the meaningless of the windup for me in any complementary relationship of undercutting-to-prove-a-point, but rather deflated its value entirely as separate entities. We aren't given enough time in the second or third acts to linger on the psychosocial states of these men trapped in their own overly-complex delusions of solipsism or narcissistic agendas, which would be more powerful to track and simultaneously negate against the understandably championed simplicity of merit in the female experience that has been oppressed upon.

If there's one clever structural choice, it's the almost-surely unintentional way the film capitalizes on demonstrating privilege via its use of running time, self-reflexively granting plenty of time and space to the dominant gender fleshing out their complicated stresses and relationships to the ideologies of platonic and romantic companionship, whilst contriving the female arc in the last act to something brief, straightforward, and undecorated. This film could have worked along several different strategies, if it had only implemented doses of consciousness to its principals in a more organized and skillful manner. As it stands, the themes didn't translate with the profundity that the writers clearly intended, so it's a frustrating failure born from missed opportunities, and consequently entirely forgettable by the time the credits end.

[MichaelB]

When the title card faded the word “truth” or “the truth” lingered briefly.

This was impossible to miss in a big cinema, but I daresay it's subtler on smaller screens.

[therewillbeblus]

I watched it on a small screen and it was not subtle in the least!

[John Cope]

Found this both fascinating and frustrating but well worth struggling with. Actually, in the end, I thought it was a kind of culmination of Ridley's filmmaking, quite possibly the unique sophisticated fulfillment of his conflicted style and sensibility.

At first I was wary of even approaching this, such is my response to late era Ridley. As someone for whom his work has meant much, following the course of his career and trying to remain appreciative has been an often fraught ordeal. What distinguished so much of his early work and what was so much of a formative influence for many of us was his distinctively heightened style. At a certain point though he seemed to start to try and moderate that some and the results were mixed. What was and is so great about the early work is that the detail put into creating the worlds of his films was a prominent, if not supreme element; the films would often surrender to that wash of hyper stylized detail and whatever the subject was would be expressed through that style and aesthetic. This was where I still think Ridly excelled; he understood exactly how to bring out evocative meaning through pronounced detail. But the later films (certainly most of the ones in this century) suggest in their implementation of his signature style that he has attempted a refinement which he may regard as a sophisticated development in which all the style and detail is still there but it's been put into the background as informing the world of the film rather than dominating it as its primary expressive medium. Again, I think the results of this development in his stye is very mixed and, frankly, mostly has produced a far less engaging cinema as the style which is he so adroit with is suppressed and subordinated to characters and story which are often not nearly remarkable or engaging enough. He has then flipped his entire technique and that doesn't get acknowledged nearly enough. It's also part of the reason that Exodus, regardless its own problems, is among the best of his recent work in that it frankly allows for a more expressionist style than most of the rest and is therefore at this point also an outlier. Exodus does, however, point to another element within his work which can be problematic and that is a development that goes alongside the aesthetic one. At some point along the way Ridley, who was never an idea man, seemed to become enamored of his own ideas and his own philosophy and started putting them more and more into the work. That would be great if it all wasn't so often so half baked and facile. Obviously opinions will differ on when this, his presiding mindset, is detrimental and when it is not but for me the indulgence of that has been very hit and miss, often within the same picture.

And that finally brings us back around to The Last Duel which I was kind of dreading a little for the reasons laid out above and which I felt I needed to make clear before I launch into this. Well, the film is not perfect certainly and is indeed littered with moments which are at odds with itself for its own effectiveness and in which Ridley seems to get in his own way. And yet this film finally accomplishes what I never expected to see and that's a fusion of his more transparent scrabbling aspirations and an actually sophisticated accomplishment and treatment of its subject; it is, in other words, perhaps the best we can hope for from him. Whether appropriately or not I was distracted throughout with how much credit I should give him for the accomplishment of the picture because there are so many times when it seems he may not full recognize what he has here and what is so very good about it. In the end though I guess it doesn't matter if there are club fisted and obvious moments communicating theme because for once they are details which are mostly appropriate as they serve to actually support the picture's finer observations and are then integral to them.

The Rashomon structure was another thing I wasn't initially sold on but part of the film's sophistication is in how it reveals itself as it unspools and you get a greater appreciation for exactly how much that does contribute to this. At first I thought it would all be better if this story was either told straight as another of Ridly's fairy tale constructions in which the simple purity of some characters could be set against those who are not (e.g the awesome shot of Comer at the center of the dining table with sparks from the fire shooting off behind her, which is held for way too short a time) or if this was really committed to its post-modern conceit of muddling truth through multiple perspectives (in which case we would not have gotten the final fade out to "the truth" over Comer's section). But as this goes on what I realized is that the subtle detailed shifts in the presentation really do add up to a lot and in this way they reflect and finally justify Ridley's entire contemporary approach of willfully suppressed subtle background detail; here now in the foreground is an example of the accomplishment of that. Beyond that what I liked is the very serious confrontation with the sensibilities of another era in which not just the abiding ethos was entirely different but in which we are ultimately forced to recognize just how much that would filter down and affect characters and their behavior and that the different perspectives reveal that too, complicating matters that much more. Much of what is best here actually is exactly the confrontation of modern sensibilities with foreign ones so that this is not some simplistic walk through culturally fashionable topicality but a serious consideration of its central ideas that takes in a lot, demands a lot from us in our engagement with it and challenges us throughout. Certainly we get that from Comer's superb performance which is not just some contemporary triumphalism grafted back onto history retroactively but similarly a full characterization of a resident of that era who is serious enough to be committed to what would be a very scary position to take (and here she joins the other believably strong women that populate Scott's cinema, those that have to find an iron will just to get by in a world that defies them).

Another thing that complicates the scenario is the way in which Driver's more educated and knowledgeable character is contrasted to Damon's far simpler character. At first, via Damon's perspective his own simplicity is presented as a virtue, the fairy tale purity I referred to above, but when we get into the later sections it's recognized as far more limiting and problematic even as he commits to defend the honor of his wife (or to defend the slight to himself and what is regarded as his own property); his nobility then is made worthy of scrutiny as is the presumed advancements of the more refined character represented by Driver. It is appropriate Comer's perspective extends beyond them both, encompassing them and her own experience, the only truth she can know.

In large part because we do get such a complex presentation the final duel is far more meaningful than it ever otherwise would be. And the depiction of it is excruciating and grueling, properly sickening rather than thrilling. The stakes far outweigh any easy sensationalist thrills. And here I have to make special mention of Damon who I think has gotten short shrift in terms of recognition in this. While both Comer and Driver are excellent they also have far more wide ranging characters to play. But Damon does a superb job with a difficult part, finding the revealing sides to a simple seeming man.

When I got to the end of this I truly felt something I rarely do: the sense that I was watching a modern classic, a film that would endure over the forthcoming years and a film that would stand up to scrutiny even after whatever prominent contemporary resonances may fade away. Certainly there is no question this should be a Best Picture nominee, though I somehow doubt that will happen. If it doesn't, perhaps it succeeded too well at what it set out to do, which would inevitably include a challenge to us to not be comfortable with our own easily held convictions.

[RIP Film]

I liked it too, surprised by the cool reception here. Scott certainly has his excesses and tiring habits, but on this one I wonder if it wouldn’t be better received if his name wasn’t attached. Given his pedigree It can feel like we’re judging what he is/isn’t doing rather than the film by itself. I’m guilty of this, and kept thinking the war scenes would have benefitted from more of a Lancelot du Lac approach rather than Kingdom of Heaven.

But it is the most memorable thing I’ve seen from him in some time, he’s crafted a sort of horror comedy that despite being medieval is actually relevant. Packaged as a “guy movie” it thoroughly lays into still common attitudes toward women, while offering no pat answers or inspiring resolutions. What we see is just ugly history, with the lingering question of how far we are beyond it.

Matt Damon turns in a subtly comedic performance that is surely under appreciated, with his bowser haircut and constant tantrums; his character is both worthy of pity and laughing at in almost every scene. Conversely Driver, who may be the most charismatic leading man of his generation, does not seem to care about how conflicted he may make some viewers. Offering sensitivity and all other approachable qualities but being utterly blind to external signals from Comer’s character. The writing here is astute with him falling in love with his own image of her that is divorced from any will she has. We know women in these times are viewed as property, but that perversion is all the more on display here under the pretense of “love”,

SpoilerShow

which Driver’s character maintains until his dying breath.

Speaking of, I really respect the last half hour. The duel is one of the most visceral fight scenes I’ve seen in years. Obviously it is well filmed and choreographed, but there is genuine unease that this is the form justice takes. The violence hangs over you like a cloud, and for as often as it is depicted on screen that’s a rare thing to feel these days.

[knives]

The lesser of the two recent Scott’s, but still loaded with interest and great performances. While the comparisons here to Rashomon is warranted it seems to me that it is using perspective to illustrate a different point entirely. Kurosawa is making something of a post modern point where the truth is an unknowable thing and while degrees of truth are possible he truth is an impossibility.

Scott and his collaborators seem to see things in a different way where while degrees of truth are only knowable truth dependent upon perspective is an objective knowable. The question of the film is was the lady raped. The film makes it primarily dependent on if the lady accepted the act as it was happening. Gris assumes that she was previously flirting with him and eventually succumbed to a passion of sorts. She maintains those were misunderstood signals of her being courteous and that she never accepted his rape. Her statements on herself must be accepted as the truth because she does know herself. Her perspective is the truth by Don of it being the perspective under question.