**Movie Review: Damsel (2024)**

**Plot Overview:**
“Damsel” is a fantasy film that subverts the classic ‘damsel in distress’ trope. Set in a medieval world, it follows Elodie, played by Millie Bobby Brown, who is tricked into a marriage with a prince only to find out she’s to be sacrificed to a dragon as part of a centuries-old pact. The film takes a turn from fairy tale to survival as Elodie uses her wit and resources to escape her fate.

**Themes:**
The film explores themes of self-reliance, empowerment, and the subversion of traditional gender roles. It challenges the narrative of the passive female character, presenting a heroine who is capable and resourceful.

**Character Development:**
Elodie’s character arc is central to the film’s impact. She evolves from a young woman resigned to her fate to a fierce survivor, fighting not just for herself but for the future of her people. The supporting characters, including the prince and the queen, add depth to the story, each revealing their own motives and complexities.

**Director’s Style:**
Juan Carlos Fresnadillo directs with a clear vision, blending action with fantasy elements. His use of contrasting settings – from the snowy village to the opulent royal court – adds to the film’s visual appeal.

**Performances:**
Millie Bobby Brown delivers a strong performance, capturing Elodie’s transformation convincingly. The supporting cast, including Ray Winstone and Robin Wright, provide solid performances, though Angela Bassett’s talent is noted as underused.

**Technical Aspects:**
The film boasts impressive production design and costumes, creating a visually stunning medieval world. However, some reviews criticize the CGI as cheap-looking and the action sequences as repetitive.

**Strengths and Weaknesses:**
Strengths include the film’s strong lead performance, innovative plot, and beautiful set pieces. Weaknesses lie in the script and some performances that fail to engage, along with technical aspects that could have been executed better.

**Recommendation:**
“Damsel” is a film that offers a fresh take on the fantasy genre. While it has its flaws, the film’s strengths make it worth watching for those interested in a modern twist on classic fairy tales.

In conclusion, “Damsel” is a bold attempt to redefine a genre steeped in tradition. It’s a film that will resonate with audiences looking for strong female leads and a story that champions individual agency over destiny. Despite its shortcomings, “Damsel” is a commendable addition to the fantasy genre and is recommended for its unique perspective and engaging storyline.

Damsel suffers from the same issues that plague movies of this kind, and no, I’m not talking about the “woke agenda” or “muh diversity”. I’m talking about bad writing. Too much reverse “show, don’t tell” and too many contrived scenes and one-liners.

The CGI is good, the costumes and set designs are good, the overall plot is good, but the writing falters often.

I get that this is a PG-13 movie but teenage viewers aren’t this dumb. Give them better writing. Maybe if we treat the younger generation like they have some intelligence, they’ll start acting like it.

The end result is a movie that wastes its star power and the effort of all involved.

VAGUE SPOILERS AHEAD:

1. I get they were trying to do foreshadowing with the opening scene, but it ruined the “reveal”. The birds were a nice thrilling scene that fell flat by us already being shown the antagonist.
2. The “V” hallucination was just too silly. Elodie should have found the _evidance_ and had her own organic “Tis a lie!” reaction.
3. It would have been nice to see Elodie wield a sword at some point before they left their kingdom, even if it was just her toting one in her introduction scene “for wolves” or some excuse. Take some hints from Brave (2012)’s Merida in the future for crying out loud.
4. Sister’s reaction to stepmother’s concern felt forced.
5. Stepmother’s cut should have been a stab and she should have been in worse shape when she found Elodie. That scene also needed some work to make it less unbelievable. Like perhaps have Elodie make it back to the ship and find stepmother badly injured. Time skips are a thing that happens, y’know?
6. Father’s reasons could have been better written. Easily they could’ve had palace guards shadow him to imply he’d been threatened and then redone his rescue attempt. Why? Because he is never shown to be callous to the needs or feelings of his daughters. Their family being threatened would’ve made more sense than “well I thought the sacrifice was worth it for the good of ‘OUR’ people”. Why they had him say “my” is anyone’s guess.
7. Less stoic one-liners and less stoic “No! <*thrusts sword into ground*>” moments. We’ve seen it numerous times and it’s just utterly boring and contrived at this point.

Good movie. That’s it.
I don’t really understand why people expect masterpieces from every new movie release.

Damsel is fun, entertaining, special effects are really good, better than latest summer blockbusters with bigger budgets (despite what IGN says) and the plot delivers exactly what it sells. This is not an indie Oscar Winner movie and it doesn’t pretend to be neither.

Stop trying to look for art in everything, like there are Bethoveen masterpieces and Tomorrowland EDM music to just jump around there are also movies to admire with all your senses and movies to enjoy on a Sunday evening.

The movie is good and it doesn’t deserve to be bashed because people were looking for another Schindler’s List on it.

Good but not as smart as it thinks it is
Damsel really isn’t as subversive as it thinks it is and takes way too long to get going, wasting the first 30 minutes on a twist so obvious the trailer didn’t even bother to hide it. Once it actually gets to the central idea of cat and mouse between a Princess and a Dragon it’s a lot stronger, powering through on the momentum of the endless chase.

Despite a few big names in the supporting cast, Millie Bobby Brown really carries this. There’s some really clunky lines of dialogue here and she delivers them with enough conviction to make them work. Shohreh Aghdashloo voicing the Dragon is inspired casting that really helps it get going after the weak opening.

Juan Carlos Fresnadillo’s direction does a lot to help this Netflix original come closer to looking like a real movie compared to a lot of what’s come before. It essentially spends the entire run time alternating between some solid sets, locations and distractingly low quality CG with some good individual set pieces and ideas which remind you this is the director of 28 Weeks Later.

I totally DISAGREE with the first review by thorian93. Yes, it is a simple storyline. Typical if you must say but it is a story that is NOT complicated and hard to understand. The story is not tangled that you need to connect the dots from past, future and the now kind of movie. It’s simple but super. CGI is amazing especially the dragon. Eat your heart out thorian93! This is by far the best movie that I’ve watched this month of March.

Overall this film was just meh.
The cgi was good, but the writing pretty much ruined this film for me, it was just so boring and so predictable.
The dialogue felt very scripted and just did not convince, As others have pointed out as well, [SPOILER] our damsel runs around screaming for the first part of the film and then suddenly turns into a warrior.

Watch this if you don’t care about the dialogue or story and want a dragon, good cgi and pretty landscapes I guess.

Good movie. That’s it.
I don’t really understand why people expect masterpieces from every new movie release.

Damsel is fun, entertaining, special effects are really good, better than latest summer blockbusters with bigger budgets (despite what IGN says) and the plot delivers exactly what it sells. This is not an indie Oscar Winner movie and it doesn’t pretend to be neither.

Stop trying to look for art in everything, like there are Bethoveen masterpieces and Tomorrowland EDM music to just jump around there are also movies to admire with all your senses and movies to enjoy on a Sunday evening.

The movie is good and it doesn’t deserve to be bashed because people were looking for another Schindler’s List on it.

Millie B goes full Dambo
Yeah this was a fun old fantasy, subverting the usual tropes – kind of. A strong cast round out Millie’s establishing star power. Mind you the ham is almost panto level acting occasionally and script chat GTP generic, the movie could most certainly done with a bit more self awareness – hell it even had the OG princess bride in it hamming up the badness. Not a joke in sight other than some smarmy lines. The movie was quite uneven with scenes you’d have thought that cgi looks pretty good then scenes it most certainly did not. In the end however there were some good ideas and well executed scenes, and the movie galloped along – while there could have been more scope to highlight the more interesting dark side of the tale which would have made a distinct memorable movie, still a decent Netflix and chill.