Damsel opens with a king and his men getting picked off one by one while fighting a dragon. They fight until it is just the king left and he begs for mercy. The story follows a young woman, Elodie, who agrees to marry a prince from a faraway land. The land itself is beautiful. The new land is a stark difference from her barren cold impoverished home, with grassy hills, mountains, vineyards and joyous people. She meets her future mother-in-law, the Queen. The movie takes a turn after Elodie and the Prince get married. She now must go through a century old ceremony to become one of their people.
The movie starred Stranger Things star Millie Bobby Brown, Black Panther’s Angela Bassett, Wonder Woman’s Robin Wright, and additional talents. Millie Bobby Brown has a long history of working on dramatic and demanding projects. Brown was cast in Stranger Things as the character Eleven, or El coincidently, at age 11. She’s used to playing dramatic and emotional characters, and this movie was no different.
Millie Bobby Brown’s character Elodie is a determined young woman. She sees a problem and desires to fix it; she wants what’s best for the people in her kingdom. Most royalty wouldn’t glance at a subject, let alone hike in the cold to go out and chop it, then lug it back to her kingdom, free of charge or even recognition. In addition to her undying lust to support her people, she desires love in a marriage and has a dream to travel the world. However, when she is sold off to marry a prince for the money, as much as she’s hesitant, she knows it’s what’s best for her people and goes through with it.
Millie Bobby Brown is an amazing actor in the way she portrays pain and fear. She has a run-in with a dragon that is trying to murder her, and as a result, she is burned and bruised, most likely even concussed, and has many smaller injuries. Her acting made the audience stressed and made it feel as if they were in the movie. The cast’s acting gave the movie stakes, you grew attached, or hatred to certain characters.
There is even a scene where Elodie is crawling through a cave, the set was about the size of an air conditioning vent. Millie Bobby Brown actually has claustrophobia and when she thought about doing the scene, it would make her sick. She even went to the filmmakers to opt out. That was until she decided she doesn’t want the brain to stop her from what she needs to do. “I truly had to tell my brain, you know, you can’t prohibit me from doing something that I need to do.” The next time she went to do the scene, she had her fiance and her assistant holding onto her feet and legs so that she could feel someone and not feel as alone, and the whole time, the director was shouting encouraging, positive affirmations. During the scene, she is sobbing and crying and Millie says that was pretty much all real.
The incredibly convincing acting aside, this movie was beautifully done. They filmed the movie in studios and in Portugal. They chose a beautiful location for the far away kingdom. Many of the scenes in the kingdom were filmed in Batalha, Portuguese Wine Country and the castle in England, more specifically Ruby Castle, Country Durham.
Not just the location but the graphics were incredibly well executed. The budget for the movie was around $60-$70 million dollars. They redesigned the normal look of a dragon. This one looked like a mix between a griffin, dragon and a lion. A new take on an ancient description. The dragon looked as real as a computer-generated dragon can look. There were so many details on the scales and the arms. The dragon also, in addition to breathing fire, spat what looked like molten lava that flowed like liquid.
The costumes were gorgeous. From the elegant ball gowns and the knight’s armor, we are exposed to beautiful craftsmanship. The deterioration of Elodie’s costume throughout the movie was impressive, especially once you consider the fact that they most likely made the same costume over and over, breaking it apart piece by piece. The attention to detail and the research that must have gone into the making is admirable
This movie was incredibly well-made, and it deserves recognition. I heavily suggest that everyone give it a shot, I don’t think you would regret it.