Adormidera

Malta, the late 1300s. Five soldiers are returning home from battle. Hungry and exhausted, they stumble upon a fort. What was meant to be a one-night stopover rapidly escalades into a whirlwind of intrigue and an epic sword fight for retribution. Will a beautiful woman change their destiny? Or are they doomed to die in their ever quest to protect their land against invaders?

“I was so mesmerised by the way she looked at me, I almost forgot I’d just killed a man”. Sadly, no, the writing doesn't get much better as this mediaeval adventure reminded me of one of those soft-focus "Robin Hood" adventures with Clannad and Michael Praed. The English title doesn't really do it many favours either as it's original title of "Adormidera" at least gives us a clue as to why we are watching. She (Lori MacFadyen) is a mysterious woman rescued from some nasty soldiers by "Tristan" (Andrei Claude) - and that doesn't best please the local baron (Henry Zammit Cordina) who has just seen his son slain and who is determined to capture her. Why? Well, watch and see, but actually that might prove more of a challenge than anything faced by our hunky champion. To be fair to Claude, he does look OK shirtless by flickering torchlight, but the remainder of this has something of the extremely low-budget college project to it. It's clearly a single camera job and the editing makes that uncomfortably obvious at times; the acting is pretty diabolical - especially Larissa Bonachi's shocking effort as her mother and though some effort has certainly been made on elements of the production design, the lighting and sound work rather sum up this disappointingly undercooked opportunity for swordplay and mysticism. Just wait for the sex scene - it's the ultimate example of shoot and protect!