The episodic, incoherent script patches together highlights from FIVE historical adventure novels spanning a 20-year period of the 17th century. This film takes for granted that we already know something of the era's Spanish political, literary, artistic and military history. Even Spaniards found this movie confusing, so what hope do we foreign viewers have? Mortensen is very good in the title role, though the Argentine Spanish of his youth occasionally creeps through the European accent he learned for the film. In fact, the whole cast is good, but they're trapped in a hopeless script that skips and jumps over plot points too fast while still somehow remaining plodding and dull.
The visual style works well, and I like the brutality of the battle scenes. (In English-language films, by comparison, war often comes off as a bit too clean and tidy.)
The Alatriste novels have a lot to offer, so ideally this should have been made as a TV miniseries.
The visual style works well, and I like the brutality of the battle scenes. (In English-language films, by comparison, war often comes off as a bit too clean and tidy.)
The Alatriste novels have a lot to offer, so ideally this should have been made as a TV miniseries.