Scarlett - Diamond of Revenge

This movie is not that bad as some reviewers say. To start, the voice over of the main character (Duchess) is great, I like that always, gives a bit of background and story telling idea. The famous trick that the beginning scene is a teaser and then back to how it all started, makes you immediately curious. It's fast paced, maybe a bit too long though, never boring. Great performance of. Charlotte Kirk, perfectly casted. Less good in my opinion is the extreme violence showed, not functional and not to my taste. The humor is great, compensates this a bit, the story is not intended to be taken too seriously. The British accents are funny on themselves. All in all worth watching when you expectations are not too high.

Neil Marshall, a filmmaker I used to be a big fan of in the 2000s and early 2010s, is single-handedly ruining his career by making it his prerogative to show off his fiancée Charlotte Kirk in all his recent flicks. She's great eye candy indeed but has the charisma of a block of wood. Same applies to the rest of the cast she's working with. Marshall's desperately trying to pull off a Guy Ritchie here and fails big time. The voiceovers and quirky edits are all lacking the stamp of a seasoned filmmaker, much less their eleventh venture if I were to be precise.

Is this the same guy who astonished us with practical effects in Dog Soldiers and made us gasp for breath in The Descent? Neil, you gotta bounce back man. Don't go down the Rob Zombie path. Don't compromise on the filmmaking vision. Don't treat us to lazily made garbage like Duchess and deem it feminist just because the lead character is a woman. Also, was it unfair to expect some wry Brit humour at least? What a charmless affair!

Earlier this month, I had binge through all of Neil Marshall's filmography and it was a fun experience for the most part. Now, I just finished watching his latest movie, Duchess (2024) and it was very mediocre.

Positives for Duchess (2024): Charlotte Kirk gives a good performance as the titular character in this movie. There are spots to where the B-Action side of this movie can be fun. And finally, the action sequences in this movie are good.

Negatives for Duchess (2024): The movie's premise is all that interesting to begin with. There are some noticeably bad performances from the other actors. And finally, the movie's runtime is dragged out way too long.

Overall, Duchess (2024) is one of those movies where it depends on you go into this movie and what you are expecting from it, so I would recommend that you go check this movie out for yourself.

It's that all familiar style of movie with the names of characters popping out to introduce them with some silly narration completely unnecessarily, some "funny" violence and all the characters are some kind of criminals. Except the dialogues are weak, there is not enough action, and it lasts 2 hours.

It's not a total trainwreck, camera work, effects, even the acting is solid but the characters aren't particularly interesting at all. The main lady is attractive.

Some of the characters have a rather strong accent which some might find hard to understand.

I'm not a fan of this type of movie in the first place but even if you are this is one of the weaker ones for sure.

I read somewhere that this film can be compared to Quentin Tarantino's work, and why not - I immediately got a copy and started watching.

Everything is designed following the template of proven cult classics. The goal of every scene is to shock, to be brutal and comedic. They drink the blood of enemies, and the Colombian necktie is explicitly shown. But...

After the first minute, it becomes clear that this film is just an annoying copy, printed with a faint toner, based on all those films we love and respect. The action is forced. The dialogues are terrible - someone tried to make them good but failed. All the characters are similar - meant to be dangerous but are actually as desperate as the dialogues. The comedic writing of names next to characters who enter the story, after the fifteenth repetition, becomes boring and feels like someone is mocking you to your face.

I think one star is a harsh rating since the actors did at least try to show up for filming. So: two stars.