The Rising Hawk

The Rising Hawk

This historical novel of Ukrainian poet Ivan Franco ‘Zakhar Berkut’, written in 1883 is in fact based on the exploits of p.m. the life of a 90 year old warrior whose peaceful life was disrupted by Mongol invasions and forced him to lead an arm h order of such charectitious. It has recently been argued that such narrative so prevalent in Ukrainian culture could have been seen as a source of nationalistic pride despite lacking of evidence for central and eastern regions of the country as in the southern border spoke freely about the on going invasions. Given its epic scope the tale would seem to be prime material for some film adaptation.

Ukraine, which is not a country known for churning out films (generally just small scale dramas, rather than large budget action movies), gave itself in the hands of US Based CinemaDay production company in order to make The Rising Hawk, with most of the cast being Americans and British.

The plot takes place in the 13th century. Zakhar Berkut, played by Robert Patrick, and his wife Rada who is played by Alison Doody, have a family including sons Maksim, played by Alex MacNicoll, and Ivan, played by Rocky Meyer. MAX and IVAN lead a peaceful existence as hunters and gatherers in the Carpathian Mountains with their tribe.

They are left alone but that does not mean that trouble does not come looking for them. Burunda Khan, a Mongolian general portrayed by Tserenbold Tsegmid, has been marching his armies westward in search of lands to conquer and their village is next on the list.

With the realization that their village would be insufficient to repel a strong invading army, Zakhar orders his sons to go and solicit aid from Tugar, the leader of a nearby village. In the course of seeking to arrange some politics, Maksim meets Tugar’s daughter Myroslava with whom there is instant chemistry after she was rescued by him from a bear fight, the two young leaders are together.

Of someone, Tugar is arrogant and stubborn enough to underestimate the other village and the prospect of having a partner does not appeal to him. After a very captivating fight in which the hero of Maksim defeats Tugar’s best fighter both villages agree to come together in order to defend their territories.

Following the conflict, there is a lot of strategy and swordplay between the two respective armies. Of course, there is more than meets the eye, also, in the game of war. Several alliances are formed in The Rising Hawk and are either used or broken as different sides have their own reasons to put an end to the struggle.

Khan becomes obsessed with not only wiping out the Carpathians after the death of his son, but he wants to find Maksim and make him suffer before killing him. The tale is rooted in the exploits of Zakhar Berkut, The Rising Hawk’s leads see much of action from Mackym, and although actress Alex MacNicoll comes only in third place after Patrick and Flanagan, this film, she owns it and well indeed.

This film is too heavily inspired by Braveheart and 300, in case there was any doubt whatsoever, as one can tell, as story beats/plot points are as close as a call to the same pages as these other films. They kill off characters that should have been central to the film and betray the viewer’s expectations so much that one begins to believe they were directed by Mel Gibson and Randall Wallace in addition to a battle that quite literally takes place in a valley employing the same tactics witnessed in 300. Even the CGI for the film was poorly implemented.

There is a sequence where there is some bear fight against an absurdly gigantic bear which was not executed very well anyway. I understand that not every studio can have the luxury of being able to produce bear fight scenes as outstanding as those featured in The Revenant, but this one should have had more people working on it in order to make it better.

This may go against the sensibilities of some viewers that do not concur with the idea of Mongolian army being “other” especially because it can be perceived as a classical theme within films where heroic whites defend themselves from dastardly evil Asians, but it also is semi-historical, so this type of things gets a faux pass.

What The Rising Hawk lacks in creativity of the story points it absolutely makes up in the fight choreography. There is no doubt that most of the budget went into the fight training as the film knows how to shoot its swordplay scenes. The directing and the editing of the fights is fast, clear, tense and very enthralling.

The large scale CGI shots render large armies clashing rather well while the intimate and close up fighting sequences work perfectly. The last battle in particular is rather well done. A pity, a film like The Rising Hawk cannot survive only on action. Had this had a more cohesive script or action would have accompanied a distinctive plot, it would have served the audience better.

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