Modern optics for a medieval woman. Not the first time we've seen that, and quite trite at this point. It's not even played for a joke (like it rarely is), and doesn't really have any function in the story beyond "she's like you!". Oh, yea, she *chops wood* so you know she's STRONK, like an ogre she wails away at the driest, lightest wood I've seen in my life, grunting due to her massive, bulging muscles. Because no one on set has ever chopped wood before, and purely associates it with "a man thing", that requires grunting and moaning. An advice for the creators: Pick something you have knowledge of, not something you have no knowledge of. While it would have been a cliché to show her sparring, it would have been the best way of selling the ending with only one short scene.
It's ironic. It seems to mock the notion that the main character could ever do anything physically demanding, except it's not. It's unironically trying to tell the audience that "she's not like other ladies", and that she's strong... ugh.
She's well-read (even dissecting corpses from an early age, apparently), has an african step-mother, has liberal ideals, but knowledge about another kingdom having wealthy? Preposterous! She's not traveled a day in her life (and apparently not read about the world either)! None of this has any relevance to the story.
Father is concerned as he exits the meeting - where he's told about his daughters status as sacrifice - and this is played as "mystery", despite any knowledge about the film prior to watching it will make the "mystery" void (and, also, the intro makes it void).
Token stepmom has an intuition because she's been granted meta-knowledge. She's told the marriage is transactional, and friendship is undesired. While this could have been fine - what beyond some spiritual "blue blood" could possibly be desired from *only* having a lady as a bride, any peasant bride would do - she only takes issue with the "I don't wanna be friends" part.
On the point of blue blood: Why? There doesn't seem to be anything in the way of explanation for why it must be a Lady who's married. Any woman/girl would do, surely? It makes no economic or diplomatic sense for the kingdom to sacrifice ladies of foreign realms instead of just forcing or buying handicapped peasants. Indeed, it would be much better aligned with the ideology of the creators to have that instead (unless I'm mistaken, and they think feudalism is good?). They even show how it's the blood of the royal family passed on by mixing blood that's the reason the dragon recognizes protagonist as "correct" sacrifice.
It also hilariously plays into the cliché it's trying to mock: every single one of the previous sacrifices are attractive women. Google's gemini had the pleasure of casting these women: They're "diverse"! Thank god! We've been lacking diverse sacrifices I say!
The regular cliché of "corsets are bad" comes up. Although, it's not even tight-lacing, so I have no clue why the creators thought the audience would be dumb enough to feel sorry.
After being thrown into the chasm, she swiftly recognizes that she's the sacrifice. What does she do with this information? Remove clothing that inhibits movement? Rush to find an exit? Draw out the blade in her dress? No. Walk slowly towards the dragon. Not sneaking, just... walk.
She runs from the dragon (slow-like), and happens upon a dead woman FLASHBACK! As if we needed a flashback? It's been 30 minutes, and it wasn't obvious that the woman was the one seen earlier. Thanks, movie, for expecting viewers to take multiple breaks from this movie before completion.
She's burnt on the leg, oh no! She's "clever" for being silent... oh my, so very rare. It is indeed a very novel idea that we have "run, hide, fight" instincts, women in this world generally *always* scream at the top of their lungs because they're dumb... She chooses to bandage her burn wound with cloth, very smart indeed. I hope they have magic to extract the cloth if it gets stuck (like burn wounds are renowned for).
Despite getting the wound because of unnecessary clothing, she still does not remove inhibiting clothing. This proves to be very clever, as soon after she nearly falls to her death because of this choice. Maybe she can remove some of that clothing now? No? Okay, then, "clever girl".
Dragon reveals this is a game to her, it's fine as a vehicle for the dragon to not just kill Elodie instantly every chance she gets (because Elodie would be very dead, many times if not). It also gives a reason for why the dragon cares to talk to Elodie at all.
The wound turns out to not have any effect on the story, really, but the glowing worms that heals it do. It's a good thing that these glowing worms that have the ability to heal mortal wounds aren't cultivated to progress humanity after all this is done. Silly liberal ideals... wait, wasn't that most of her character so far? Nvm.
FINALLY she removes some clothing. She's gonna ESCAPE! Thanks previous women who've survived this just to go back in and scratch a complete map of the caves for the next women. Kudos to whoever she was.
Yada, yada, yada. Girlboss. Yada, yada. Burn the whole city to the ground. Good! No real Targaryan lets a city of innocents remain alive. Happy end... Also, Elodie is now an elite soldier. Without the wood chopping scene I might have been confused by this.
Dialog is bad throughout. Doesn't make a lick of sense. Acting is generally fine, but a lot of dialog is pretty flat, and non-vocal communication is too clear and made that much more obvious through cinematography.
It doesn't seem to quite know what it's going for, and the characters' personalities can be ignored entirely for how much they impact the story.
A similar story, Ready or Not, is a much better use of your time. It also looks a lot better, at 1/10th the budget.
On that note, why does movies rely on CGI for scenes that are both cheaper and better looking when done with real life effects, or just not including them at all? Weird.
It's ironic. It seems to mock the notion that the main character could ever do anything physically demanding, except it's not. It's unironically trying to tell the audience that "she's not like other ladies", and that she's strong... ugh.
She's well-read (even dissecting corpses from an early age, apparently), has an african step-mother, has liberal ideals, but knowledge about another kingdom having wealthy? Preposterous! She's not traveled a day in her life (and apparently not read about the world either)! None of this has any relevance to the story.
Father is concerned as he exits the meeting - where he's told about his daughters status as sacrifice - and this is played as "mystery", despite any knowledge about the film prior to watching it will make the "mystery" void (and, also, the intro makes it void).
Token stepmom has an intuition because she's been granted meta-knowledge. She's told the marriage is transactional, and friendship is undesired. While this could have been fine - what beyond some spiritual "blue blood" could possibly be desired from *only* having a lady as a bride, any peasant bride would do - she only takes issue with the "I don't wanna be friends" part.
On the point of blue blood: Why? There doesn't seem to be anything in the way of explanation for why it must be a Lady who's married. Any woman/girl would do, surely? It makes no economic or diplomatic sense for the kingdom to sacrifice ladies of foreign realms instead of just forcing or buying handicapped peasants. Indeed, it would be much better aligned with the ideology of the creators to have that instead (unless I'm mistaken, and they think feudalism is good?). They even show how it's the blood of the royal family passed on by mixing blood that's the reason the dragon recognizes protagonist as "correct" sacrifice.
It also hilariously plays into the cliché it's trying to mock: every single one of the previous sacrifices are attractive women. Google's gemini had the pleasure of casting these women: They're "diverse"! Thank god! We've been lacking diverse sacrifices I say!
The regular cliché of "corsets are bad" comes up. Although, it's not even tight-lacing, so I have no clue why the creators thought the audience would be dumb enough to feel sorry.
After being thrown into the chasm, she swiftly recognizes that she's the sacrifice. What does she do with this information? Remove clothing that inhibits movement? Rush to find an exit? Draw out the blade in her dress? No. Walk slowly towards the dragon. Not sneaking, just... walk.
She runs from the dragon (slow-like), and happens upon a dead woman FLASHBACK! As if we needed a flashback? It's been 30 minutes, and it wasn't obvious that the woman was the one seen earlier. Thanks, movie, for expecting viewers to take multiple breaks from this movie before completion.
She's burnt on the leg, oh no! She's "clever" for being silent... oh my, so very rare. It is indeed a very novel idea that we have "run, hide, fight" instincts, women in this world generally *always* scream at the top of their lungs because they're dumb... She chooses to bandage her burn wound with cloth, very smart indeed. I hope they have magic to extract the cloth if it gets stuck (like burn wounds are renowned for).
Despite getting the wound because of unnecessary clothing, she still does not remove inhibiting clothing. This proves to be very clever, as soon after she nearly falls to her death because of this choice. Maybe she can remove some of that clothing now? No? Okay, then, "clever girl".
Dragon reveals this is a game to her, it's fine as a vehicle for the dragon to not just kill Elodie instantly every chance she gets (because Elodie would be very dead, many times if not). It also gives a reason for why the dragon cares to talk to Elodie at all.
The wound turns out to not have any effect on the story, really, but the glowing worms that heals it do. It's a good thing that these glowing worms that have the ability to heal mortal wounds aren't cultivated to progress humanity after all this is done. Silly liberal ideals... wait, wasn't that most of her character so far? Nvm.
FINALLY she removes some clothing. She's gonna ESCAPE! Thanks previous women who've survived this just to go back in and scratch a complete map of the caves for the next women. Kudos to whoever she was.
Yada, yada, yada. Girlboss. Yada, yada. Burn the whole city to the ground. Good! No real Targaryan lets a city of innocents remain alive. Happy end... Also, Elodie is now an elite soldier. Without the wood chopping scene I might have been confused by this.
Dialog is bad throughout. Doesn't make a lick of sense. Acting is generally fine, but a lot of dialog is pretty flat, and non-vocal communication is too clear and made that much more obvious through cinematography.
It doesn't seem to quite know what it's going for, and the characters' personalities can be ignored entirely for how much they impact the story.
A similar story, Ready or Not, is a much better use of your time. It also looks a lot better, at 1/10th the budget.
On that note, why does movies rely on CGI for scenes that are both cheaper and better looking when done with real life effects, or just not including them at all? Weird.
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