Desert Warrior
review by Bobby Blakey
These days Anthony Mackie is mostly associated with the Marvel Cinematic Universe as the new Captain America, but he has branched out into so many genres throughout his career. His latest film Desert Warrior takes him into a new kind of battle and co-stars Aiysha Hart, Ghassan Massoud, Sharlto Copley, and Sir Ben Kingsley from Rise of the Planet of the Apes director Rupert Wyatt. Could this film be the epic action spectacle it looks to be trying to deliver, or will it get buried in the sand?
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Desert Warrior follows Princess Hind who defies her fate, refusing to become a concubine to the ruthless Emperor Kisra in seventh-century Arabia. Fleeing into the desert with her father, she is hunted by a merciless army and forced to trust a legendary bandit with secrets of his own. Rising from fugitive to fearless warrior, Hind unites warring tribes for a final stand - the Battle of Dhi Qar, a clash that will change history forever.
I knew very little about this film going in other than watching one of the trailers. I was intrigued to see Mackie in this kind of role and with it dealing with a piece of history felt there was a lot to be able to pack in here for something massive. The film works on some level, but for the scope it seems to want to showcase it still feels pretty small most of the time. This isn’t always a bad thing but coupled with some pacing issues at times it never fully digs itself out of the sand dune but still manages to have some great moments.
Mackie is great here in both the action and persona whether he is right for the role is up for debate due to history, but he worked for me. Sharlto Copley brings a stoic hard performance that I really liked as the villain of sorts. His heartless mentality was engaging, but they never let him just cut loose. The biggest misstep for me was
Sir Ben Kingsley. He is great as always but given little to nothing to do or chew up the scenery with. It felt more like he was just here for a name and didn’t use him the way he could have really smashed this role. The cast are all good and do a good job with the material, but the story doesn’t offer all that much to step it up.
It is interesting and wastes no time diving right into the meat of it and the action in the opening sequence, but it slows down trying to build the lore and history and loses some of its interest. Thankfully the action and war elements they have here are well choreographed and fun to watch so it pulls it out of those lulls when they occur. I think had it gotten trimmed down here and there it could have worked a lot better with the simplicity of the story itself.
The film isn’t bad and I am sure there are plenty that will enjoy it, but outside of the action spectacles the film is pretty generic and fails to bring anything overly compelling to stand out.
Decide for yourself and check out Desert Warrior in theaters now from Vertical Entertainment.