Pompeii film review

I went to see this movie today at the Leeds/Bradford Odeon and as a Kit Harington fan, I was not disappointed.

IMDB says: A slave-turned-gladiator finds himself in a race against time to save his true love, who has been betrothed to a corrupt Roman Senator. As Mount Vesuvius erupts, he must fight to save his beloved as Pompeii crumbles around him.





Kit Harington (Jon Snow from TVs fabulous Game of Thrones) stars as Milo, the slave-turned-gladiator known as The Celt, who falls in love with Cassia (Emily Browning, Sucker Punch, Lemon Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events), who in turn has caught the eye of Senator Corvus (Keifer Sutherland, best known as Jack Bauer in TVs 24).

Cassia's parents Severus (Jared Harris, Lincoln, Natural Born Killers) and Aurelia (Carrie-Anne Moss, best known as Trinity in The Matrix) do not realise that their daughter has a history with the Senator they are trying to entice to invest or that she has an interest in the new slave, The Celt. 

Fellow slave Atticus (Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje, Thor: The Dark World, Lost) believes that once he wins in hand-to-hand combat in his final battle as a gladiator, he will be set free by the Romans as this is their law and what he has been promised, but Milo believes that they will never let a fit gladiator go.  Joe Pingue (Pacific Rim, Drive) is Graecus their Roman slave owner and Currie Graham (Hitchcock, Stargate) is Bellator, their keeper who must protect The Celt from at least two of his fellow slaves, The Weasel (played by Ron Kennell, Crime Spree, Bait) and one who wishes to avenge the death of his brother at The Celt's Hand in order to keep him alive for the contest.

Cassia's maid in the film is played by Jessica Lucas (Cloverfield, That Awkward Moment, or, where I recognised her from, Riley in the 2009-2010 TV series Melrose Place) and Sasha Roiz (Captain Sean Renard of TVs Grimm) pops up as Corvus' deadly right-hand man Proculus.

I am pretty sure that in this Paul W. S. Anderson (The Three Musketeers, Resident Evil) directed film, the budget was all spent on the special effects to convince viewers of the all-destroying power of Mount Vesuvius, as the plot is extremely thin and even the romance between the two leads lacks character development.  There is nice interplay between slaves Milo and Atticus, but the film is really all about the action.  This disaster movie has some convincing special effects and though you as a viewer know the outcome from the outset (history is handy like that), it is a thrilling ride.





Trivia from the movie:

Kit Harington said that he always wanted to do a complete body-transformation for a role. This was the primary reason for his accepting this role. Another reason was that it gave him his first shot at being a macho leading man, something he always wanted to do.

This is the second feature movie collaboration of Kit Harington and Carrie-Anne Moss within the span of two years and the first official teaser trailer of the movie was released on August 21, 2013, six months before the theatrical release in USA. Coincidentally, that's also actress Carrie-Anne Moss's birthday.

The peculiar form of hand shake Severus and Senator Corvus share is real and period accurate, recorded on old frescoes and statues.

Tagline: No warning.  No escape.                                                           6/10

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