Pompeii (2014)

Today on Movie Russian Roulette, Alex gets to renew his vows of loathing towards Jon Snow.

fuck you and your vacant emo boy stare

Overview: Kit Harington of Game of Thrones fame stars as Milo, a vacant-eyed, mostly emotionless warrior. So he's really stretching his acting muscles on this one. Now I guess I know how normal people feel when I gush about my completely normal, debilitating mancrush on Benedict Cumberbatch and won't shut up about Sherlock.

but really who wouldn't be his Cumberbitch

Now that I have the Harington hate out of my system, this movie inexplicably focuses on Milo, who saw his Celt people be massacred by the Romans at age six and is now only known as "the Celt," a young phenom of gladitorial combat in a Roman province. Because reasons, he is brought to Pompeii, where he encounters Cassia, a Roman noblewoman who instantly wants his cock. (It does help that he has so many shirtless scenes if you can stand his dull, soulless eyes and open "duhhhhh" mouth.)

A Roman senator arrives with plans for the city, but wants Cassia's vag to seal the deal. Milo does generic rebel hero things and gets the girl, only to be killed when the volcano finally erupts and kills them all.

Notable moments/quotes: For no reason at all, the Roman soldiers spare only Milo out of the carnage of massacring all of the Celts. Clearly they've never read the Evil Overlord List.

Milo first appears wearing what's basically the male version of bikini chain mail. Now I feel like I might know how feminists feel when they play the average fantasy RPG.

and not a Russell Crowe in sight

The movie cockteases us at several points with several rumblings from the volcano, making us think the volcano is finally going to erupt (and not in the last like 10 minutes like they actually do), but each time the movie goes, "NAHH. People didn't come to a movie called Pompeii to see volcanic eruptions; they came to see our shitty love story!"

Milo's gladiator bromance partner Atticus (who is a black guy one fight from retirement, should be noted) and Milo have been brought to a fancy party. Their slavemaster is showing them off for noblewomen, and one has just asked to see Atticus "from behind."
Horny old lady: "Firm... but what of his weaponry?"
Gross, oily slavemaster: "Now that's an inspection you'll have to pay for."

At a few points, Milo's abilities with horses come into play; he's able to calm horses apparently by just looking at them. This makes no goddamned sense. The movie tries to play it off as being part of his Celt heritage, but they were wiped out when he was six. There's no way in hell he'd be able to remember much from that time, let alone all kinds of skills for dealing with horses.

At one point, Cassia and Milo have fled the city that they both want to escape for their own reasons on horseback. They basically stand there and let themselves get captured for no good reason other than the movie needs them to stay in Pompeii, although the movie obviously very desperately wants to forget what it's about and just be a Gladiator remake.

My thoughts: This movie feels about a decade too late in many respects. Obvious Gladiator comparisons aside, the later parts of the movie (when the volcano finally erupts) feature very iffy CGI and feel very video gamey, and not in a good way. Milo has to dodge obstacles on horseback to catch a speeding chariot, and then fight for his love's safety in a final boss fight. Oddly none of the falling debris seems to affect his foe, so it's just Milo charging after a speeding target. It's all very God of War esque, with the Roman/Greek (because the Romans were basically Greeks 2.0) themes and styles of brooding revenge, since conveniently the senator also led the campaign to slaughter his people. But again, that was big some time ago, so it feels like the flimmakers are trying to hop on a bandwagon far too late. Have I found the movie world's Ryse: Son of Rome?

decent production, crap story? sounds right

However, I can't savage the movie for everything. It does do some things right. In Milo's final gladiator match, the stage is set for a "reenactment" of Senator Corvus' victory over the Celt tribes. The gladiators, playing the Celts, are given crappy equipment and chained to a central pillar, limiting their mobility. Other soliders are given top-flight equipment and have full mobility, as they're playing the "heroic" Romans. From what I understand of my history, this sort of thing actually happened fairly frequently in Roman coliseums. There's even a Greek chorus (not totally fitting, but sure why not) that narrates the action for the crowd. I was actually starting to enjoy the movie, as the combat that followed was cheesy, but not without some merit. And then the movie decided to have a character give a thumbs up to signal the victorious gladiators be spared.

Gods damn it. No. No. That's the exact opposite of what happened historically. If you're going to flirt with historical accuracy, movie, don't start the foreplay nicely but then come out of the kitchen with champagne glasses filled with dollar store grape soda. In arena matches, a thumbs down meant the fighter be spared. Thumbs up was for death. Sure, this might have confused the average moviegoer, but just a little explanation would have made it clear. Little moments like that kept cropping up in the movie and breaking any immersion I had almost as badly as Harington's wooden, one-note acting that's somehow made him famous.

guy is apparently legit minor English nobility or something, so there's that

This movie has definite moments of what some would call "glorious cheese," but ultimately, it's not a disaster movie with Roman paint slapped over it that everyone expected. It tries to be a revenge flick, a love story, a political thriller, and a disaster movie (in the last 15 minutes at least) at the same time. It does not succeed. It has some fun moments, but the presence of Harington's dead gaze alone means I can't recommend this unless you have terrible taste in cinema mancrushes.

I give this movie a Nic Cage Punches Out A Woman While Wearing a Bear Costume out of five.