Period/fantasy films offer opportunities to view the current world through a different lens. If you lived in a world of orcs, goblins, and magic, what role would you play in the greater hierarchy? If you existed at a time of dragons and unicorns, how would you view the roles of life and death in everyday existence? In the new project from writer Dan Mazeau (Fast X) and director Juan Carlos Fresnadillo (28 Weeks Later), the dramatic actioner Damsel, the proposed set and setting are used as the backdrop for an exploration of class, ethical leadership, and the value of a curious mind over avarice. When Damsel is as smart as it thinks it is, audiences are in for a treat; however, the predictability that courses through it and a strange inconsistency with certain elements reduce what should be a thrilling adventure into something more expected.
What follows, both in the summary and review, will seek to reveal only what’s publicly known, either through trailers or released photos, in order to offer readers as fresh an adventure as possible.
L-R: Millie Bobby Brown as Elodie and Brooke Carter as Floria in DAMSEL. Photo Credit: John Wilson/Netflix ©2023. Photo courtesy of Netflix.
In a faraway land resides various kingdoms, some prolific, some struggling to overcome. In one of the latter resides Elodie (Millie Bobby Brown) who does what she can to provide for the subjects her family cares for, especially in the current harsh cold weather set upon the land. Returning home with supplies to be divvied out, Elodie and her sister Floria (Brooke Carter) learn that their father, Lord Bayford (Ray Winstone), has agreed to give Elodie’s hand in marriage to Prince Henry (Nick Robinson), son of a wealthy family living on a distant island whose resources may help save their people. Doing her duty, Elodie agrees to the marriage and the family of four travel to meet Henry and his parents in person. But what is viewed as an everyday business exchange between leading families turns out to be something else as the customs of Henry’s people promise danger and threaten death when Elodie is suddenly offered as a sacrifice to a dragon (voiced by Shohreh Aghdashloo) living on the island.
L-R: Millie Bobby Brown as Elodie, Nick Robinson as Prince Henry, Robin Wright as Queen Isabelle, and Milo Twomey as King Roderick in DAMSEL. Photo Credit: Netflix ©2023. Photo courtesy of Netflix.
Damsel marks the third Brown film distributed by Netflix and another exciting entry into her catalogue of work. Like the Enola Holmes films before it, Damsel affords the actor the opportunity to balance brains and brawn to embody characters who are far from perfect, but equal in match to any male adolescent/young adult adventure tale. The script from Mazeau uses everything from Elodie’s direct character introduction to quiet interpersonal moments to craft an individual who, when thrust into the figurative belly of the beast, is able to reason her way into and through each problem as it presents itself. To a great degree, the story of Damsel and its characterization of Elodie can be expressed as a more modern telling (modern in that it’s released in 2024) of Theseus, the labyrinth, and the Minotaur. Therefore, in order for Elodie to have a chance at survival once tossed to the dragon, the script must spend time making sure that what we’re watching isn’t the birth of a survivor by way of luck, but someone who possesses within them a measure of intelligence already, who can utilize experience as a teacher, and who can improvise on the fly. Put through the lens of semi-modern cinema, Elodie is akin to a mix of Ready or Not’s Grace (Samara Weaving), The Princess’s titular Princess (Joey King), and Predator’s Dutch (Arnold Schwarzenegger), giving audiences a protagonist who we continually root for, not because they overcome obstacles, but due to the manner in which they use their environment in their attempts to do so. When one is facing a larger opponent with increased senses and the ability to exhale what’s essentially lava, intelligence rules the day. Thus the script by Mazaeu continually creates situations which raise tension through the continued rattling of Elodie via one trap or natural impediment after another. For her part, as evidenced through her roles in the Enola Holmes films, Brown is equal to the task, making audiences believe in her external and internal transformation, despite the short time frame.
Millie Bobby Brown as Elodie in DAMSEL. Photo Credit: John Wilson/Netflix ©2023. Photo courtesy of Netflix.
Then there’s the meatiness of the shared dilemma that the families of Elodie and Henry face: how does a leader care for their people? As mentioned, Elodie’s subject are struggling under the weight of problematic winter, the location that we first meet Elodie in being an open space with countless tree stumps around her, suggestive of a land unable to give much more than it already has. Thus, as was custom, a marriage between lords and ladies is much more of a business proposal, a means of raising funds, preventing war between countries, and several other non-love-related reasons. Elodie must come to terms with what it means to leave her home, her sister, her father, and stepmother (played by Angela Bassett (Malcom X; Gunpowder Milkshake)), as she plays the gamble as to whether this will help her people, how much of herself will she have to give in her new role as princess, and hoping that Henry will be a good person. As we meet Henry, we come to learn that their marriage is also intended to aid his people, Robinson’s (Love, Simon) performance helping to convey a certain solemnity that prevents the character from seeming a villain for what we know is to come. From the start of the film to its end, the entire script is an exploration on the responsibility leaders have for those they govern or seek to govern. One can easily take in Damsel without going too deeply into these aspects, but to ignore it in favor of the adventure/thriller would undermine your own ability to understand what Elodie experiences. There’s a time for war and a time for peace; understanding the difference is often the same as life and death, something which the script goes to interesting places to explore literally and figuratively.
Millie Bobby Brown as Elodie in DAMSEL. Photo Credit: John Wilson/Netflix ©2023. Photo courtesy of Netflix.
Despite this, there are some elements which reduce the film as a whole. Some of this is the presumed “Netflix Effect” wherein films just look made for streaming. Damsel doesn’t entirely fall into this category as the cinematography from Larry Fong (Kong: Skull Island; Watchmen) eschews typical fantasy lighting for natural looks, meaning that often what Elodie can see in the dragon’s mountain is what we see. This offers opportunities of beauty and terror, so either check your tv settings or watch this in the dark in order to properly see the film as intended. Rather, the problems emerge in sequences where there’s obvious CG as opposed to real locations, the obviousness of their lack of spatial logic or solidity something that distracts rather than enhance the fantasy. Adding to this, there’s a massive inconsistency in the bodies within the mountain. We’re led to believe that the sacrifices have been happening for centuries, yet some bodies are skeletons while others are not. One has a dark reason for understanding *one* of them being in a lesser state of decomposition, but the rest? Sure, Damsel is a film set in a “faraway land” at a time that’s centuries past when the dragon was first battled, and yet all of the land’s peoples still live like they’re in the Age of Westeros (plus, you know, dragons) and there’re plenty of narrative rules that are allowed to be flexible when one integrates beings like dragons into the mix, but the inconsistency as to what’s decomposed and what’s not simply for the sake of the narrative distracts from what is otherwise a harrowing adventure.
Millie Bobby Brown as Elodie in DAMSEL. Photo Credit: John Wilson/Netflix ©2023. Photo courtesy of Netflix.
There are other elements that I’d love to explore, such as the presentation of the Queen, played by Robin Wright (The Princess Bride), and her scene with Bassett which helps upend baggage regarding integrating families via marriage, the challenges that befall Elodie, and the brilliant choice to center so much of the film on the female perspective. To dig into these aspects would mean crossing into spoiler territory, and Damsel is a film that should be experienced without these things rattling in your mind. Though it can be viewed as a modern fairytale, a twist on the old Greek story or contemporary declaration on the state of class status, it’s fair to come to Damsel in search of distraction.
Whatever you seek, I hope you find it.
Available on Netflix March 8th, 2024.
For more information, head to the official Netflix Damsel webpage.
Final Score: 3.5 out of 5.
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