Movie Review: Gladiator Games

Gladiator Games (a.k.a Claang: The Game) 

Claang Art, WonderPhil Productions, Wonderphil Entertainment, Italy, USA, 2010. 

Each Cycle has four Ages: The Golden Age, Silver Age, Bronze Age and Iron Age. If the humans can regain their divine origin in the end of Iron Age, a new Golden Age will begin. 

In 1066 Duke William II of Normandy (Maurizio Corigliano) is preparing for the Battle of Hastings. The soldiers find holy Menhir stone circle. Soldiers catch a strange man Vidr (Maurizio Bazzano), who has a board game Claang with him. He tells the legend of Bronze Age Vanir hero Tyr (Francesco Chinchella). Vanir warriors fought for the rulership of communities in the gladiatorial games known as Claang. The winner gets a powerful Claang-medallion.

Duke William

Vidr introduces the Claang-symbol

Tyr and Elanor (Suzi Lorraine) lived on an island to avoid duels. Tyrant Sahr (Paolo Tonti) demands a Claang-duel with Tyr. Tyr must fight agains Bangor (Mirko Rilossi). Tyr is defeated and he is declared dead. Sahr now takes Eleanor to himself. Iron Age begins. 

Elanor

Tyr

Sahr

Sahr changes the game rules so that instead of single warriors now teams will fight. Now the game is kind of American football with swords and shields. Tyr is hidden in a village that still remembers the Golden Age. There he is healed and he learns new sword fighting skills. He meets a crippled warrior Biran (Paolo Pizzo) who knows the secrets of Sahr. Tyr starts training his own team. 

Tyr training

Tyr and Biran

Tyr's team

After hardships the team enters the Claang. When everything seems lost, Arena Master (Roberto Rossi) gives pep talk to Tyr's team. 

Arena Master

Battle of Hastings

The filming locations are beautiful and the equipment looks realistic. Some scenes are badly dubbed and the level of acting varies. Some actors are just hilariously bad. Considering the ultra low budget the battle scenes work surprisingly well. Many of the actors are medieval hobbyists so they know some old sword fighting techniques. Basically similar gladiator tournament theme was also used in Stefano Milla's inferior "Kingdom of Gladiators."

However the main focus of the film are not the fights but the talks about honour and principles and the progression of human civilization which makes it almost an art film. The directors influences were “Gladiator”, “Rollerball” and “The Seventh Seal.” The movie has many original ideas, but the low budget and the amateur makes the realization less than satisfactory. The ending feels a bit rushed and it is not clear how Tyr's team fared afterwards. Some scenes have quite good cinematography, but the shaky camera work is in many scenes distracting. CGI is bad but at least not overused. 

It is the kind of movie that was probably thrown together by group of friends with interest in medieval history. It is not a good movie but the obvious limitations make it difficult to be too harsh to it. 

DVD contains also Stefano Milla's short movie: Claang the Origin (Claang Art, 2005 Starring: Francesco Chinchella, Paolo Tonti, Mirko Rilossi, Maurizio Corigliano) Guy tells a story about Giants creating the world. The giants show their courage by fighting gladiator style (the fight is also used in Gladiator Games). 

Rating: Average (for a low budget indie film) or Bad (as a regular movie) 

Starring: Francesco Chinchella, Suzi Lorraine, Maurizio Corigliano, Paolo Tonti, Paolo Pizzo, Mirko Rilossi, Maurizio Bazzano, Lorenzo Tonetto, Yukai Ebisuno, Giulia Mazzacurati, Giovanni Tricomi, Per Andersson, Ilenia Ballabene, Giancarlo Barbadoro, Stefano Faloppa Beccani, Mauro Bellini, Maurizio Bestetti, Fabio Bonavena, Federico Maria Bonizzi, Beatrice Briganani, Andrea Cannio, Andrea Della Casa, Luca Colarelli, Andrea Convalle, Lorenzo Cullino, Marco Durighello, Lap Fanoli, Fulvio Fasano, Pierluigi Ferrero, Franz, Andrea Fratello, Raul Fregonese, Vito Galetta, Fabrizio Gallina, Francesco Ghini, Massimo Giacchero, Marco Giglioli, Il Gray, Daniele Imhoff, Andrea Lesmo, Lopez, Nicolo' Meliga, Enrico Morando, Andrea Moretti, Massimo Morini, Rosalba Nattero, Alma Noce, Aron Paradiso, Roberto Pecora, Ulisse Provolo, Davide Rocca, Gianluca Roggero, Michele Rossi ,Roberto Rossi, Giuseppe Rotunno, Walter Ruggio, Giuseppe Scrivano, Giovanni Vatteroni, Federica Vellani, Michele Zanellino, Zanna 

Director: Stefano Milla