DAMSEL (NETFLIX) (2024)

SYNOPSIS: A dutiful damsel agrees to marry a handsome prince, only to find the royal family has recruited her as a sacrifice to repay an ancient debt. Thrown into a cave with a fire-breathing dragon, she must rely on her wits and will to survive. 

MOVIE REVIEW:

Millie Bobby Brown has went from battling a demogorgon in Stranger Things to solving crimes in Enola Holmes to hiding from a hungry dragon in Damsel. At the tender age of 20, Brown already has a far more successful career than her peers and we got to admit the young actress indeed has enough talent to command the screen even the story and technical aspects are clunky at best.

To please his father, Lord Bayford (Ray Winstone) and to save her people from poverty and hunger, Princess Elodie (Brown) agrees to an arranged marriage with the prince of Aurea, Prince Henry (Nick Robinson).

However the fairy tale marriage soon turns into a morbid affair when Princess Elodie is tossed into a mountain cave as a sacrificial human goat to a breathing fire, talking dragon (voiced by Shohreh Aghdashloo). It turned out that the Kingdom controlled by Queen Isabelle (Robin Wright) owed the dragon a huge debt and three virgins are require to be sacrifice annually to appease the creature.

Obviously we know Princess Elodie is going to survive the terrifying ordeal given the story written by Dan Mazeau is yet another female empowerment theme action movie. It’s no longer the damsel in distress scenario.

For the most part, Elodie works her magic like the female version of Aragon. Desperately swinging her sword at times, hurling herself over cliff and healing herself with glowing cave worms, we watches the newly crowned Princess or warrior in this case refusing to give herself up as a snack as she vows to escape the cave to civilisation.

As with Brave and Frozen, Elodie is yet another princess character worth rooting for and Brown certainly plays the part with much gusto and earnest. While Angela Bassett is wasted as the role of Elodie’s stepmother, Iranian actress Aghdashloo heartedly provides the creature with the right amount of menace it needs.

Damsel is mostly gear towards the young adult crowd and especially Brown’s fans who has grown tired of waiting for the next season of Stranger Things or the next instalment of Enola Holmes. The story is predictable, the CGI is passable on the small screen and the only thing worth watching is Brown’s compelling performance.

MOVIE RATING:

Review by Linus Tee