The Last Warrior (Skif)
Right from the off, Rustam Mosafir’s medieval action movie does things a little differently. I mean, starting with the villains of the film to snarling burly men punching each other’s faces off (yep), somehow, The Last Warrior balances the far-fetched with the entertaining just enough to make it watchable although well below the level it should be.
Lyutobor (Aneksey Faddeev), an ungrateful and loyal subject to his Lord, must rescue his wife and newborn son from kidnappers even when it is really undeserving of all the crap that gets sent his way. Joining his mission is a captured Scythian, Marten (Aleksandr Kuznetsov), who hails from filthy tribes possessing murderous bloodlusts. To make matters worse, Lyutobor is moreover accused of killing Lord Oleg (Andriy Tsurilo) by poisoning, so he must also run away from those he could rely on in the past.
The conflict between Lyutobor and Marten is interesting, exciting, and unpredictable. The movie doesn’t quite really come into its own until they unite, and even the faith that develops between the two of them is quite easily breakable. Mosafir is patient in a sense that he has to make this development believable and ensure that it has real impact on the subsequent flow of the film.
Unfortunately, it is one of very few well developed characters in the movie. A number of characters are trying to shout from the screen for attention yet the script tries to stifle them. In note particular, it is rather painful to see Lyutobor’s wife being treated like a device in the narrative.
Of course, this is not a movie for discussion. The Last Warrior is all about battle. Violence is nasty and is shown in its raw brutality every time and it only gets more grimmer with time. You will be shown how different parts of the human body can be broken, and a number of characters do this as a form of sport. Once again, sword fights are a whirlwind of action where pieces of metal are constantly digging against each other which are captivating. The heroes of today’s action dramas sustain so much injury that it hardly takes away the efficacy from the sequence of events.
In the zoo-like state of his character, Lyutobor has now become ‘the beast’, which is essentially a pillared man slowly growling like a bear. When these transformations occur, the cuts completely fail to do their work they are crude, exaggerated and mostly ridiculous. Close to sixty minutes into the film and any expectations you might have towards it die thanks to the scene with the bush people and their execution pit. After Mosafir presents his 8-bit approach on James McAvoy from the film Split, everything else becomes so difficult to believe even when there are efforts to ginger up the atmosphere.
It’s a pity though, because the combat and mundane interactions, which are a bit more realistic, muscle in from the sidelines. This film has a well defined story at its core and there are very few issues one has apart from the obvious one. This is one of those films though where a couple of parts destroy the entire experience.
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