Risen (2016)

Rome on the Screen

At first I wasn’t quite sure what to think about this movie. It definitely starts off very good, but after the fight scene, the movie started to become somewhat confusing. 

The movie is told through gospels and follows Clavius on his journey to find out what happened to Jesus and his Crucifixion. On this journey Clavius is forced to look within himself. And when he does, Clavius realizes that he cannot continue the Roman life and exemplifies this by taking off his ring. 

Clavius is clearly not a true roman because a true roman would never abandon Rome for anything. Clavius does not put Rome before anything else, but instead puts his personal feelings in the forefront. So I think it is pretty movie like for this happen, but I think the movie could have done better if they had Clavius exemplify all of the traits of a Roman man. From clementia to fortitudo to veritas, without these things a Roman man is nothing. 

My favorite scene was the battle scene between Clavius and his troops and the zealots. The scene accurately depicts the fighting style that Romans used and thus enhances the quality of the movie. You get to see the testudo formation that Rome was famous for. And to me that’s really freaking awesome. The testudo formation was a formation in which shields were used in the front and on top of all of the soldiers. This formation allowed for an impenetrable defense, which in turn led to a brilliant attack. This formation is only effective if the chemistry between the soldiers is off the charts. This is because one misstep or one slight drop in the shield can result in the entirety of the soldiers being killed. Henceforth, each soldier carries the life of every soldier in their hand. It’s honestly like watching poetry in motion as each soldier steps forward in unison. And then when the enemy throws a boulder on top of the shields, one soldier falls, but is immediately caught by another and brought back to his feet and the formation remains intact. Immediately after the formation turns offensive and people explode out and destroy anything in their path. 

Overall the movie was very interesting, but I do not think I would watch it again.