Boudica

Boudica: Queen of War (2023) is a historical film directed by Jesse V. Johnson and starring Olga Kurylenko as Boudica, the legendary Celtic warrior queen who led a rebellion against the Roman occupation of Britain in the first century AD. While the film has some potential, it ultimately falls short due to its uninspired direction, underwhelming action sequences, and a lack of historical accuracy.

One of the film's biggest problems is its direction. Johnson's lack of experience with large-scale action films is evident in the film's battle scenes, which are poorly choreographed and lack any sense of scale. The film's budget is also clearly limited, as evidenced by the use of cheap-looking sets and costumes.

Kurylenko is a talented actress, but she is not given enough to work with in this role. Her Boudica is a one-dimensional character who is defined by her anger and rage. The film does not explore her motivations in any depth, and her character arc is predictable and uninspired.

The film's historical accuracy is also questionable. The film takes liberties with the historical record, and there are several scenes that are simply not plausible. For example, the film depicts Boudica as having a magical sword that can fly through the air. This is a complete fabrication, and there is no evidence to support it.

Overall, Boudica: Queen of War (2023) is a disappointing attempt to bring the story of Boudica to life. The film is poorly directed, lacks scale, and is historically inaccurate. It is a missed opportunity to tell a truly epic story about one of history's most fascinating women.

Absolutely awful to the point that it approached the level of a comedic parody. It has damaged Kurylenko's career and probably neutered other hopefuls in the rather thin cast. I suppose some of the fault could be assigned to what was likely a very low budget. It looked like a school play really or a production on the stage at a renaissance faire.

The costumes and scene design were cheap, unimaginative and not even close to authentic. They looked like the costume design team had gone down to Jo Annes Fabrics at their local strip mall and dug around in the discount bin.

The editing only made the wooden acting and the strange script more awkward. This is a career killing film and laughably bad. 2 out of 5 stars!

This was pretty awful, couldn't even finish it. Kurylenko was not a good choice, she is way too old, small and unathletic to carry the character of a warrior queen. And her face fillers take you out of the time setting, what kind of "barbarian" has fish lips and fixed forehead, it's obviously a 21st century look. The barbarians are cheezy with eyeliner. There is that whole narrative in the story that they made very loud, of because you are a woman you get nothing plus punishment. Which is kind of an overplayed pandering in movies these days. Tired of all the modern virtues being shoved at every opportunity.

You cannot make a film about the iconic British warrior Queen with this lack of budget, production values, script, bad CGI or directorial talent.

The cast looked great on paper, Kurylenko was well cast, as were the two guys from Vikings, Nick Moran and dear old Rita Tushingham. However, I had major problems with the 'magical flying sword' and the ghost twins. I was fine with the 'sixth sense' reveal about the twins halfway through, but to constantly consult them on battle tactics was ludicrous.

Also Boudica did not die by the sword, she did of poisoning/ fell ill, but hey, don't let the truth get in the way of a good story.

Shame. I wonder what Ridley Scott would have done with this.

Maybe I can make a better film. Wow how can you spend so much money on a film and cast set and not have basic knowledge about Christianity in Britain which did not enter Britain for at least 500-600 years after Boudica died?

What a joke to therefore show Christians getting punished and her walking past them lmao.

Really it's disappointing to watch films like these they can really distort your vision of history which we use these as tools to help educate ourselves in entertainment.

You've then got various other parts showing life back then traders talking about 'imported cosmetics' which I don't trust as accurate way they spoke back then along with the rest of the film and type of English used it does inspire confidence for those deeply interested in British history.