Guilty pleasure time.
Director Le-Van Kiet’s fast-and-furiously paced action thriller is a snarky Me Too riff on fairy tales, with 21st century gal power cheekily re-writing a “woman’s role” during medieval times.
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| The Princess (Joey King, left) and her friend Linh (Veronica Ngo) prepare to fend off another wave of enraged mercenaries. |
Ben Lustig and Jake Thornton’s script blends back-story and character development with all manner of ferocious swordplay and hard-charging ass-kicking. Fight choreographer/coordinator Kefi Abrikh makes imaginative use of the mostly confined settings, with Kiet and editor Alex Fenn moving things right along.
The result is a thoroughly enjoyable 94-minute roller coaster ride: perfect for a rowdy movie night.
The film opens with a droll nod to once-upon-a-timing, as cinematographer Lorenzo Senatore’s camera slowly pans toward a tall castle tower, and then through a window to reveal the Princess — she’s never named — sleeping in this top-most chamber. But illusions of tranquility are shattered when she awakes with a start, her hands shackled in cuffs.
Worse yet, her locked room suddenly is invaded by two thuggish guards sent to “check on her.” Whatever the reason for her confinement, it ain’t good, and we get a sense of the Princess’ gritty determination when — fearing the worst from the guards — she deals with the cuffs. Painfully.
What follows is an eye-popping display of cool moves and adrenaline-fueled rage, which compensates for the woman’s diminutive stature. Exit two guards, one of them quite dramatically.
King is a modest 5-foot-4, but Kiet and Abrikh actually turn that into an advantage, as the subsequent melees and skirmishes become increasingly aggressive.
(I must admit, it’s a bit jarring to see King in such a role; I still remember her fondly as Beverly Cleary’s mischievous Ramona Quimby, in 2010’s Ramona and Beezus.)
As we soon learn via occasional flashbacks, her parents — the realm’s King (Ed Stoppard) and Queen (Alex Reid) — birthed only daughters: the Princess and her younger sister, Violet (Katelyn Rose Downey). Because of this absence of a male heir upon whom to eventually bestow the crown, the King agreed to let his daughter marry a neighboring noble, the opportunistic Julius (Dominic Cooper).
Ah, but Julius is a bloodthirsty, power-hungry sadist, which the Princess — a young woman who refuses to “know her place” — recognizes all too well. Tradition and family loyalty notwithstanding, she’s too headstrong and independent to tolerate such nonsense; she jilts Julius at the altar.
Not one to take such an insult quietly, Julius and his mercenary army subsequent invade the castle — killing many of the King’s forces along the way — and then imprison the Princess’ family in a lower dungeon. She’s locked in the aforementioned high tower chamber, pending a forced wedding.
Cooper makes the most of this villainous role; he chews his character’s often enraged dialogue with gusto. Julius is accompanied by his similarly lethal inamorata, Moira (Olga Kurylenko), skilled with a razor-tipped whip.
What follows evokes fond memories of 2011’s The Raid, but in reverse: Instead of a lone warrior battling his way — floor by floor — to the top of a 15-story apartment building, the Princess must fight her way down the tower, in an identical manner.
Ah, but — happily — this is a Castle With Benefits. The first is a rat’s nest of hidey-holes and secret passages, all of which the Princess knows intimately, having grown up exploring the place. Second, the King’s royal entourage includes a martial arts and sword master (Kristofer Kamiyasu, as Khai) and his equally skilled daughter, Linh (Veronica Ngo), who taught the Princess everything they know.
Every Princess should have such friends, right?
King, a veritable force of nature, is awesome; she throws everything into the role. The stunt doubling is seamless, so it’s easy to believe these are all King’s way-cool moves. I also love the occasional displays of ’tude: none better than one skirmish gone briefly awry, when she and a guard wind up in a heap at the bottom of some stairs, breath knocked out, their swords not quite within reach.
Kiet holds on this moment for a delectably long beat. King breaks into a feral smile; the guard smiles back. She chuckles; he laughs in reply. Then … whammo.
During another pause between slicing and dicing, the Princess’ taller and stronger opponent admits, “I underestimated you.”
“That’s okay,” she replies tartly. “I’m used to that.”
Ngo enjoys fan cred as Paige Tico, in the Star Wars universe; her résumé also includes plenty of martial arts mayhem, notably in 2016’s Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon: Sword of Destiny and 2020’s The Old Guard (and its upcoming sequel). When Linh joins the Princess at just the right moment — heck, she deserves some sort of help, against Julius’ seemingly inexhaustible supply of disposable mercenaries — they become a two-woman tornado.
Even Downey’s plucky Violet gets a moment to shine.
Everything builds to an all-stops-out climax, after which Kiet delivers the final hilarious punch line to a running gag involving a hopelessly overweight mercenary (who I believe is played by Todor Kirilov Georgiew; the credits are vague).
I immediately wanted to watch the movie again, which is rare.
Remember, though: This is a guilty pleasure … total stuff ’n’ nonsense.
But executed with panache.
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