I always enjoy Philip French’s film reviews in  The Observer, making new links for me which are rooted in his deep knowledge of the cinema. So I particularly enjoyed today’s review of The Eagle which he finds “a most enjoyable film” (apart from a concluding moment whose “facile note” is but a “minor flaw”). He judges The Eagle to be an “accomplished film” … with “an exceptionally fine battle scene” at the outset …  a “well-considered script” … for a film which is “superbly lit” .

… (the film) admirably embraces certain unfashionable virtues of what might be considered a Roman brand – duty, honour, filial piety …

The Eagle inevitably invites comparison with two recent movies that touch on the same subject of lost Romans in the gloaming on the barbarous banks of Clyde: the disastrous The Lost Legion and the passable Centurion. In every respect – the language, the characterisation, the staging of the action sequences and the historical resonance – The Eagle is superior.

• Source: The Eagle – review | Film | The Observer.
• More on the film The Eagle on this blog