Black Death (2010)

Written by Dario Poloni
Directed by Christopher Smith

Set during the outbreak of the bubonic plague in England, the story centers on Ulric (Sean Bean), a brave knight dead set on surviving the plague by being generally nastier than it. When his band of soldiers must recruit Osmund (Eddie Redmayne), a young priest, he is neither impressed with, nor deterred by his young companion's thoughts or beliefs, even when they are in line with his own.

Ulric leads this band of men and a priest into an untouched forest village where the residents have never even heard of the plague, and good Christian men would be wise to travel softly. Combining the aura of The 13th Warrior with the grim brutality of Braveheart with the moral dilemmas of The Seventh Seal, Christopher Smith manages to make an epic, spooky, and intellectually satisfying film about one of the great plagues of mankind, without turning it into a Biblical fantasy.

Mind you, there are still supernatural considerations to make, for once they find the spared village, their faith is questioned, with the plague converting Christians and Pagans alike, all looking for some explanation, some answer to the questions of life.

Christopher Smith manages to balance the supernatural elements well against the issues of faith, leaving the objective audience member to decide for themselves whether the Bubonic plague was a punishment from God, or even a sentence from the Earth itself. Often, films like this will hammer home the obvious failings of an ignorant character, as hindsight is always 20/20, but this film does a good job of presenting both arguments as valid explanations.

The stark camerawork, haunting score, and mythological undertones will lull viewers into thinking this is a horror film, and while in one regard it is, the excitement is that it's actually an adventure film built around the theme of faith, set against the backdrop of the black plague. An interesting and haunting film, see it if only for the performance by Sean Bean, who steps over the corpse Boromir to establish himself as a serious sword-swinging bad ass.

Bring on your next film, Mr. Smith.

9.2/10