So Matt Damon & Ben Affleck haven’t teamed up on a project since way back when they won the Academy Award for Good Will Hunting. Which just happens to be my favorite movie of all time. Even though I did have my reservations about their new collaboration, The Last Duel, I tried to be open-minded to see if these two boys from Boston could pull off a historical drama such as this.
First things first. There are some really good things about this movie. I think the cinematography and costume designs were amazing. The story was very intriguing and I was pleased that they weren’t afraid of getting blood all over the place. But the best thing about this movie, with a real stand-out performance, is Jodie Comer. Who, with the way this story is told, from three different points of view, totally saves this film from being just another movie.
On the other side of the coin, I had the toughest time with the fact that Damon, Affleck & Driver played their roles with barely-there English accents. They tried with some phrases/words to make it sound right, but would always go right back to their American accent, which I’m pretty sure didn’t exist way back in the 1300s. And because they told this story three times, we got to experience it longer than we needed to.
If you can get past the dialog issue and longer than needs to be run time, the film is not bad. And even though it’s got some two male Academy Award winners & nominee in the lead roles, it’s the lesser-known woman that outperforms them all.