Stream It Or Skip It: ‘The Last Duel’ on Hulu and HBO Max, in Which Matt Damon, Adam Driver and Jodie Comer Get Medieval With #MeToo

With The Last Duel, now on Hulu, Ridley Scott gets medieval with the modern feminist movement – because it’s, you know, literally set in the 14th century. Ben Affleck and Matt Damon reunite as co-stars and co-writers, along with scripter Nicole Holofcener, for something that doesn’t even come close to resembling Good Will Hunting. It’s hard to take Affleck and Damon seriously in this film, partly because their hairstylists seem to be playing jokes on them – don’t call him Mullet Damon, please – but this fictionalized account of a real-life event does eventually veer into weighty territory. So yes, how about that, it’s a BOATS (Based On A True Story) movie that’s pretty far removed from the modern day – that’s how it goes in movies about trial by combat – but still manages to incorporate some anachronistic language, stopping just short of hashtags. So is it too #MeToo to be believable? Let’s find out.

THE LAST DUEL: STREAM IT OR SKIP IT?

The Gist: PARIS, 1386. Two men who are absolutely very much manly men, Sir Jean de Carrouges (Damon) and Jacques Le Gris (Adam Driver), don suits of armor and climb on their horses. They’ll start with a joust, then maybe move to swords or battle axes, and from there, let the day take them where it may. Now, 1370: the truth of Sir Jean will follow, a title card explains. It’s a simpler time, when Jean and Jacques were friends, saving each other’s lives in a big bloody clash that they and their French comrades ultimately end up losing, whoops. And yet, Jean and Jacques return as MEN to the Paris ’burbs where they own land and bow to a pompous surfer-blonde jackass known as Count Pierre d’Alencon (Affleck). Jump to 1377, and Jacques works as a debt collector for Pierre, shaking down Jean for the dough he owes. The plague has ravaged the land and left Jean a widower, and also in a tough financial spot, but he is a sincere fellow, straight as an arrow as the day is gray in crummy-ass semi-rural medieval France, and he will make it through.

Next, NORMANDY, 1380, where there’s another violent battle in which Jean fighteth and blood floweth. He gets paid to do this, you see. He returns and makes a business arrangement with local disgraced lord Sir Robert de Thibouville (Nathaniel Parker): Jean will marry Robert’s daughter, Marguerite (Jodie Comer). She’s ebullient and fair-haired, but Count Pierre’s hair is ultimately fairer. She and Jean wed and take to the bed to make him an heir. A bit later, there’s a scene where real burly men like Jean clamber up a path and a woman shoos geese out of their way. DO NOT GET STOMPED, YE GEESE. There’s a property dispute that pits Jean against Count Pierre and his lackey Jacques, souring the friendship. ONE YEAR LATER a subtitle sez, and I’ve lost track of quite when it is that we are watching things happen. Is it important? Is it PARIS, 1386 yet? Not quite. Jean makes peace with Jacques, sealed with a kiss from Marguerite, and the touching of their lips may be a moment, if the pause in the narrative thrust is any indication. Soon, Jean once again heads off to battle, and is officially knighted. SCOTLAND, 1385 the film tells us, and lo, do we feel oriented in a time and place, although it’s not that different from NORMANDY, 1380 or WHEREVER THEY WERE, 1377.

Jean returns from getting his ass kicked in SCOTLAND, 1385, where a man took a flaming arrow in the face, and soon thereafter it’s finally PARIS, 1386, but not the exciting duel part of PARIS, 1386 yet. Our protagonist comes home to find Marguerite distraught. Jacques forced his way into the house and forced himself upon her, she says. Jean is calm but angry, and pushes the accusation into court. This being the era of feudalism, Count Pierre is the judge, but Jean knew Jacques inevitable acquittal was coming, and had a plan. With no witnesses to the crime, it’s just a He Said, She Said situation, which means Jean may challenge Jacques to a duel to the death. “God will spare those who tell the truth,” Jean insists as he quite literally throws down his glove in front of the king.

Then comes part the second, and part the third, and thank god for sparing us for telling the truth that we are weary of setting placards floating at the bottom of the screen, for there will be no more. They aren’t necessary, as the previous events will be revisited from Jacques and Marguerite’s points of view, respectively. In the Jacques chapter, we learn that he’s very well-read, and also a lusty sort, up for many an orgy with Count Pierre. And it’s here that Jean’s countenance becomes more belligerent, prudish and square, the battle scar on his cheek suddenly on the wrong side of the handsome/ugly divide. This time, we bear witness to the forbidden encounter between Jacques and Marguerite, which he insists was basically just rough sex preceded by her “customary protest.” The church is on his side, of course. And not long thereafter, with a grandiose flourish of his cape, he picks up Jean’s glove.

What Movies Will It Remind You Of?: (Takes the most snooty and condescending tone possible) Time to go watch Rashomon, children.

Performance Worth Watching: One shouldn’t overlook Comer’s fiery and nuanced performance, which gives the film its vital emotional hook. But Affleck is the true scene thief, a wry and sarcastic presence who enlivens the proceedings with ridiculous line readings and an over-the-top funny personification of a most toxic form of masculinity. It seems like a small miracle that both of these performances exist in the same film, and that it also remains watchable.

Memorable Dialogue: Nicole nails the theme: “There is no ‘right.’ There is only the power of men.”

Sex and Skin: Potentially upsetting scenes of sexual assault; male and female nudity.

Our Take: I know – we haven’t yet covered Marguerite’s version of the truth, which is when The Last Duel truly finds its dramatic footing, deep into its 150-minute run time. It shifts from Jean’s bland and forthright account, to the flippant and arrogant Jacques POV, to Marguerite’s disturbing and horrific trauma. Her perspective is free of the dull drudgery of men and their business, their quibbles over patches of grass, in court or at war. She’s a kind, generous heart who runs the stables efficiently in Jean’s absence, clashes with Nicole (mothers-in-law, I tell ya!) and bravely squirms beneath Jean’s grunting missionary directives. She’s ambitious and patient and strong and vulnerable, and eventually is horrified to learn that if Jean loses the duel, she will be executed as punishment for false accusations. It would seem that her choices in this situation range from lousy to godawful, and culturally backwards as it might be to have her husband’s prowess with sword and shield determine her fate, it would certainly be helpful if Jean does not lose, and so of course we root for him, because a scene in which dear Marguerite gets burned at the stake is one we really would rather not see.

This is very much a Ridley Scott film – expensive, visually immersive, engrossing and well-paced, with intense, taut action sequences, enough so that the finale, the duel at last realized, will have you muttering, “That was pretty barbaric, even for 1386.” It’s troublesome, and thematically counterintuitive, that the violence is more believable than the on-the-nose manner in which the film handles discussion of the sexual assault; fortunately, both elements are equal in their lack of subtlety. And yet, Scott never quite evens out the tone, switching from clownish male gazes – scenes that seem to be doing little more than setting up a big showdown between The Mullet and, well, Adam Driver’s Locks – to the sober, harrowing drama of Marguerite’s chronology of events.

If you’re an apologist, you’d claim that such a disparity is precisely the point. It might be easier to accept such an argument if the Jacques chapter didn’t hew so closely to satire, and Marguerite’s to melodrama. I’m not sure I buy the retrofitting of 21st-century themes to medieval times, especially in the cruddy dialogue exchanges; the film treads heavy upon tell-me-something-I-don’t-already-know territory when it asserts that human culture hasn’t progressed nearly enough from an era when the grotesque violation of one’s wife was “a matter of property.” The screenplay is a based-on-fact account of one of the last-ever trials-by-combat in French history, and it bears a righteous sword – righteous enough, anyway, to be effective as an almost-metaphorical experience, even if it’s not always precise.

Our Call: STREAM IT. The Last Duel is highly watchable, with entertaining performances by its male stars counterbalanced by Comer’s spirited performance. It’s also a tonal hodgepodge, but that’s not enough to dissuade you from giving it a shot.

John Serba is a freelance writer and film critic based in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Read more of his work at johnserbaatlarge.com.