Director: Juan Carlos Fresnadillo
Writer: Dan Mazeau
Stars: Millie Bobby Brown, Ray Winstone, Angela Bassett
Synopsis: A dutiful damsel agrees to marry a handsome prince, only to find the royal family has recruited her as a sacrifice to repay an ancient debt.
Netflix’s Damsel is an example of a rite of passage for rising talent. It used to be that a young female star would take the reins of a romantic comedy to cement their status as a Hollywood starlet. Soon, when the rom-rom left the public eye like the radio star, the young-adult romantic drama became the next big thing. While the YA film may never go away, youthful actors have yet to set their sights on a new kind of launching platform.
That would be the costume dark fantasy action film, proving that girls can be just as kick-ass as the rest. The Kissing Booth’s Joey King did one for Hulu in the summer of 2022 called The Princess, a fairly entertaining film that proved King could hold her own. Now, Stranger Things megastar Millie Bobby Brown has her John McClane moment as a young woman who finds herself as the damsel in distress who only needs to rely on herself. The result is that Brown holds her own in some gnarly action sequences, but the rest of the film fails to live up to its potential as a fun action diversion.
Brown stars as Eloise, the daughter of a king (Ray Winstone) who oversees a dying kingdom in the farthest point north. His people are poor, without adequate shelter and food. Eloise’s mother died many years ago, and her father married Lady Bayford (Angela Bassett), whose bloodline is anything but royal, being the daughter of a rope maker. The noblewoman has a younger sister, Floria (The Peripheral’s Brooke Carter), whom Eloise schools on leadership qualities.
Soon, the King is approached by a wealthy royal family with more gold than Eloise has ever seen. They are looking for a young lady to marry Prince Henry (Nick Robinson), the son of Queen Isabelle (Robin Wright). From the trailer, you know what happens next. They marry and soon whisk Eloise away to an ancient ceremony on the cliffs of the highest point of the kingdom. There, the Queen takes a dagger and draws blood from both happy couples’ hands so his royal blood can mix with hers.
Oh, and then Henry tosses Eloise over a bridge as a ritual sacrifice.
Yeah, that took a turn. Damsel was directed by Juan Carlos Fresnadillo (28 Weeks Later) and written by Dan Mazeau (Fast X), who falls into the trap of what I call making a video game script. As soon as Brown’s Eloise is tossed off that bridge, her mission is to escape the caves where she was sacrificed to be killed by a fire-breathing dragon. The scenes are written and filmed in a way remarkably similar to narrative-driven gameplay on your Playstation or Xbox.
For instance, each time the titular character escapes, she finds writing on the wall that provides her with clues, warnings, and directions on how to escape. As soon as you get the feel of it, this takes away much of the suspense because you know what will happen as quickly as they start. You even have Eloise running into a few potential saviors who give her just enough information on the “mystery” of why she was betrayed, which was evident, and more escape instructions.
These special effects drenched pictures are reasonably good for a UHD television, producing a certain amount of addictive energy. However, almost all the characters are underwritten, from the villains to the main character. Again, all the departments of a video game are involved. Wright fares reasonably well, even though she is rather a one-note villain. Winstone hams it up as much as he can with nothing to do. Bassett’s only job is to act concerned, and she is over-the-top helpless, which is strange to watch from an actress known for portraying such strong female characters. Then you have Nick Robinson, who is so good in Love, Simon has nothing to do but argue with his mother, without any backbone to make the audience care.
Damsel is built for Millie Bobby Brown, who showcases her ability to helm a special effects-laden film, yet the production forgets to build around the star. Even the dragon (voiced by Shohreh Aghdashloo) has no emotion and feels like you are listening to AI-generated dialogue and responses that do not resonate with the viewer. Neither does the subtext of feminist empowerment themes, which never go beyond the shallow narrative, which plays more like a marketing ploy to mirror today’s socially conscious times than have anything significant to say about the matter.
While Damsel will undoubtedly entertain fans of Brown and those who like their films consumed on autopilot, Damsel fails to generate enough interest to justify your most valuable asset—your time.
