Centurion
Short description
In Roman Britain in 117 AD, a soldier named Quintus Dias is the only man to survive an attack on his frontier outpost by the Picts. He joins the Ninth Legion, led by General Titus Flavius Virilus, which is sent north to put an end to the Pictish threat and their leader, Gorlacon. The campaign goes wrong, and the survivors find themselves hunted across hostile country by a Pictish warrior woman, Etain, and her trackers. Their goal becomes reaching Roman territory alive.
Neil Marshall wrote and directed this action drama, his fourth feature after Dog Soldiers, The Descent and Doomsday. Michael Fassbender plays Quintus Dias, with Olga Kurylenko as Etain, Dominic West as General Virilus, David Morrissey and Liam Cunningham as soldiers of the Ninth, and Imogen Poots as Arianne. The film was produced by Robert Jones, Christian Colson and Ivana MacKinnon for a budget of 12 million USD.
Centurion was released in 2010 and performed modestly at the box office, taking in about 7 million USD worldwide against its budget. On IMDb it holds a rating of 6.3 from over 85,000 votes, and on TMDB 6.2 from roughly 1,600 votes, while a critics' score of 5.5 from 114 reviews places it around the same level as the audience response.
What's left behind the scenes
- Over 200 liters of fake blood were used during the production of the film.
- This was Olga Kurylenko's first role (she played Etain), which required her to ride a horse, and the actress had very little time for riding lessons.
- During filming in Badenoch and Strathspey, Roman soldiers and Picts were portrayed by historical reenactment groups.
- The armor of the Roman centurions was made from fiberglass.
- The working title of the film was "The Ninth Legion".
- There is a belief that the Picts went entirely without clothes, but since the film was shot during winter in the Scottish hinterlands, it was decided to dress them after all.
- Filming took place under difficult weather conditions, and some members of the creative team suffered health problems. Noel Clarke, who played Macros, suffered frostbite, while JJ Field, who played Tex, suffered from hypothermia and was forced to quit smoking.
- During filming, 23 background actors sustained injuries.
- Quintus Dias's account (played by Michael Fassbender) of the Ninth Legion's defeat is based on surviving evidence of the Battle of the Teutoburg Forest in September 9 AD, when rebellious Germanic tribes under the command of Arminius (a tribal leader) slaughtered three Roman legions during a march through the forest. The Roman commander Quintilius Varus was killed, along with between 15,000 and 20,000 legionaries.
- Among the filming locations are Badenoch, Strathspey and Glenfeshie Estate in Kingussie, Scotland. Filming also took place in London, at Ealing Studios, and in the surroundings of Surrey, such as Alice Holt Forest.
- Filming took place from February 22 to April 2009.
- At one time, Michael Fassbender auditioned for a role in Neil Marshall's horror film 'Doomsday' (2008), but he didn't get the part. Nevertheless, Marshall remembered Fassbender and offered him a role in 'Centurion' a year later.
- Director and screenwriter Neil Marshall and cinematographer Sam McCurdy discussed the project for nearly two years before beginning production. Both were firmly convinced that the use of green screens was absolutely unacceptable and that the film had to be shot on location.
- Modified snowmobiles from the regular Norwegian army were used to transport actors and crew members to remote, snow-covered locations in the Scottish Highlands.
- The Picts in the film speak Scottish Celtic, or Gaelic (one of the Goidelic branch of Celtic languages, spoken by the Gaels, a Celtic people who traditionally lived in the Scottish Highlands and the Hebrides). No written evidence of the Pictish language has survived, but historians believe that Welsh is the closest of modern languages to it. Regardless, director and screenwriter Neil Marshall decided that audiences would find it confusing if a tribe in Scotland spoke Welsh.
Auditions in India
Casting calls in USA
Castingi w Polsce
Кастинги в Україні
