SOLOMON KANE - Film review - Originally written 26th February 2010

Yes I know it’s been six months since you’ve had one of these from me but it has been six months since I’ve been to the flicks. What can I say, my son kinda put a bit of a stop to the film trips for a bit, and I know you’re probably all eagerly awaiting my verdict on Avatar (yes I am probably one of the only people in the country who’s not seen it yet) so don’t worry, I am getting to that one. But first there is this movie, one I have been eagerly anticipating since I heard it was being made.

For those not in the know, Solomon Kane is a character from the pen of one Robert E. Howard, better known as the creator of Conan the Barbarian. In this tale we first see Kane fighting in Africa and he is a brutal and sadistic killer revelling in murder and destruction, but after an encounter with the Devil’s Reaper who has come to claim his evil soul, the terrified Kane renounces violence and lives a secluded life in a monastery, carving religious scripture and symbols into his flesh to protect him from the forces of the Devil. After being cast out of the monastery due to the Abbots dreams Kane travels back to his ancestral home in Devon. He is taken in by a family travelling to the Americas to start a new life but they are attacked by a band of warriors who follow a sorcerer called Malachi and the young daughter is kidnapped. The girls dying father tells Solomon that his soul will be redeemed if he can save the girl from the clutches of Malachi. And so begins Solomon Kane’s quest to save his soul.

Lets get the negatives out of the way first.

Good, got that out of the way.

To be serious any negatives I have with the film are minor niggles. There are a couple of scenes where it looks as though they have been cut a little short. Kane is talking about what he was like before he renounced violence and before we’ve got into a discussion about his past we cut to the next scene and I got the feeling that there was probably a bit more to it but they left it on the cutting room floor for pacing reasons. It doesn’t really impact the story or the character development as that is all still there, it’s just perhaps not quite as deep as it could have been. There’re also a couple of stop-start moments in the second half of the film where it’s been rattling along and then suddenly seems to screech to a halt before getting back up to speed. To be fair this is a failing most action-adventure films have and I think it’s generally done so you aren’t piling big action scene after big action scene. So like I’ve said minor niggles.

Oh and yes the story is fairly straightforward and simple but then a simple story told well is far better than a complex story told badly. So there.

The positives far outweigh any negatives in this movie for me. For a start the film looks stunning even though for the majority of the film the skies are overcast and it’s either snowing or pouring with rain. Anyone seen Seven Samurai out there? Remember the rain-soaked final battle. Well that’s pretty much the look for large parts of the movie. And it looks great. What’s even better is there’s a decidedly ‘English’ feel to this. In no doubt is this aided by all the regional accents used by the predominantly British cast and with the lead character with a West Country accent the whole thing feels decidedly ‘un-Hollywood’, which makes a very pleasant change.

Apart from the aforementioned ‘stop-start’ moments the pacing of the film is generally very good. We open with a battle scene and then things slow down for about half an hour as we set things up then once Solomon’s quest begins he is fairly unrelenting and there is a nice mixture of reality and fantasy, much in the same way that Robert E. Howard wrote Solomon Kane short stories. This is England in the Seventeenth century but there are vampire-zombie things and black-eyed monsters haunting the land. The action is terrific having a nice hard edge and a fair amount of blood as the anti-hero literally cuts a swathe through the bad guys to save the girl. At the forefront of this is lead actor James Purefoy who has quite simply never been better and hopefully this marks the start of him as a proper leading man in movies. He’s a very good actor who also doesn’t look shabby in a swordfight and there are plenty of those to be had. Plus he’s 45 years old and looks superb for it.

Oh and according to ‘other’ reviews in magazines the end demon baddie is ‘slightly ropey CGI’. Not sure what film they were watching, maybe The Mummy Returns as it is not ‘slightly ropey’ at all. In fact I thought it was actually pretty damn good.

All in all this has set up a world that I really hope we are given the opportunity to come back to. The director, lead actor and producers have all mentioned that they would like this to be the first in a trilogy and I sincerely hope that they get the chance to make that as this is an awesome beginning. A tremendously entertaining movie with plenty of good action that keeps things moving at a fair pace and with terrific lead performance. This goes right to the top of my DVDs to buy pile.