A man goes on the run from the royal guards and makes love to four different women (!!).
Despite that, this film is very well made. It tries to look epic to Gone with the Wind proportions (at least at the beginning), but feels alive and intimate enough to not just feel like a costume drama. Strikingly photographed with great, memorable music.
Besides the bizarre element of the leading man, who is so physically unremarkable that he's a Finnish Shammi Kapoor, seducing four different women, the film also gratuitously sexualises some of them, especially the farm woman, who has the camera hold on her bare legs for an uncomfortable amount of time.
Despite this, the film has fun dance and action scenes, and stunts that remind me of Japanese period films, particularly 'The Osaka Castle Story'.
The leading man has an old sidekick/matchmaker who is whimsical without coming off like a John Ford Irishman.
Flawed, but entertaining and beautifully filmed. Hollywood Westerns could have learned something from Finnish period films.
Despite that, this film is very well made. It tries to look epic to Gone with the Wind proportions (at least at the beginning), but feels alive and intimate enough to not just feel like a costume drama. Strikingly photographed with great, memorable music.
Besides the bizarre element of the leading man, who is so physically unremarkable that he's a Finnish Shammi Kapoor, seducing four different women, the film also gratuitously sexualises some of them, especially the farm woman, who has the camera hold on her bare legs for an uncomfortable amount of time.
Despite this, the film has fun dance and action scenes, and stunts that remind me of Japanese period films, particularly 'The Osaka Castle Story'.
The leading man has an old sidekick/matchmaker who is whimsical without coming off like a John Ford Irishman.
Flawed, but entertaining and beautifully filmed. Hollywood Westerns could have learned something from Finnish period films.
