It is a tale nearly as old as time — but enough about the creative differences that have conspired to keep this ambitious Middle Eastern Western away from movie screens since it went into production four years ago. Looking at it now, and knowing what we know about the shooting conditions, it’s a miracle Desert Warrior exists at all, never mind some of the extraordinary images captured by director Rupert Wyatt and his cinematographer Guillermo Garza. In fact, it’s not immediately clear that it was ever a troubled production at all, but what starts with a very lean and entertaining B-movie gradually becomes something of a slog; after setting up a very simple, almost Sergio Leone-esque scenario — a bandit (Antony Mackie) and a bounty hunter (Sharlto Copley) — Wyatt’s film somehow becomes a stodgy, sprawling, feminist, pre-Islamic Ghandi.
One can only speculate, but it does feel that this two-hour cut is something of a compromise, and, if it is, it’s one that perfectly expresses what happens when too many people bring their concept of an action movie to the table. There are times when you can see unexpected flashes of inspiration, and there are echoes of John Ford’s Monument Valley in the location work. There’s even a little Kurosawa — from all the stages of his career — in the feudal set-up; while the decadent emperor Kisra (Ben Kingsley) holds court, his enemies are banished. This would seem to be the film Wyatt set out to make, and it would have been a good ’un.
And, for a time, it works. Mackie’s bandit is this film’s The Man With No Name, and we find him out in the desert with his camel when the story starts and a mysterious old man enters the frame. “Tell me who you are,” says the bandit. “In time,” says the stranger, who promises gold and a jewel-encrusted dagger in exchange for help. It turns out that he is the former King Numan (Ghassan Massoud), who has been deposed by Emperor Kisra and has escaped with his daughter, the Princess Hind (Aiysha Hart). If they return, Numan will be killed and Hind will be forced to become Kisra’s concubine, which is why the emperor sends the cruel mercenary Jalabzeen (Copley) to bring them back.
The bandit takes the pair into Shaybani territory, where he is treated with suspicion, to the extent that he is considered a traitor and condemned to die. Hind helps him escape, and this might be the exact point that the tension starts to dissipate. For one thing, Hind finds that Numan is gone in the morning, having returned to the city of his own volition. Needless to say, that doesn’t end well. Nevertheless, Hind decides that she must follow in his footsteps, enlisting the bandit as a traveling companion. “You will ride faster alone,” he tells her. “We will ride further together,” she says. (Yes, it’s that kind of script.)
So, here we are, and on her way back, Hind somehow becomes possessed of the kind of mystical messianic qualities that aren’t much seen outside of a Dune movie as her quest gathers support, galvanizing the put-upon castes of the region to come together while a traveling map of the country fills the screen. (Yes, it’s that kind of movie.) Before you know it, Desert Warrior has become a war movie, and quite a spectacular one at that, with elephants and wolves (awful CGI ones, mind) that seem to spring more from an all-hands meeting about what a film with a $150m budget could be missing than what it might actually need.
But to make the film Desert Warrior turns into at this point you need serious star power, and while the Arabic cast is especially strong, the leads needs need that extra bit of wattage that the film just doesn’t have. Even the usually reliable Kingsley can’t bring much more to the party, clearly just dropping in for a few days’ work to have a comfy, ’tache-twirlingly evil sit-down in the film’s much less interesting studio-set scenes. To make things worse, the film’s two most engaging characters — the bandit and Jalabzeen — become so consistently sidelined that it’s hard to get too excited when the inevitable showdown happens, simply because we haven’t spent enough time with either of them to care.
Anyway, it all sorts itself out, and the film sends you home with the helpful message that “there are many ways to fight a battle”. There are also many ways to sing a desert song, and it is in the film’s favor that, but for perhaps one single heat-hazy shot, it doesn’t even attempt to compare itself to Lawrence of Arabia. Tellingly, though, David Lean’s film still cost less than Desert Warrior in today’s money, and perhaps the lesson learned here is that the difference between a true cinematic masterpiece and a decent Sky TV pilot directed by Ridley Scott isn’t necessarily determined by the amount of cash you throw at it.
Title: Desert Warrior
Festival: Zurich (Gala Premieres)
Director: Rupert Wyatt
Screenwriter: Rupert Wyatt, Erica Beeney, David Self, Gary Ross
Cast: Anthony Mackie, Aiysha Hart, Sharlto Copley, Ghassan Massoud, Sami Bouajila, Géza Rohrig, Ben Kingsley
Sales: MBC Studios
Running time: 1 hr 54 mins
