Film review
Directed by Michael J. Bassett
Starring James Purefoy, Max Von Sydow, Pete Postlethwaite, Rachel Hurd-Wood, Jason Flemyng
Release date 19 February 2010 (UK)

Threatened by the Devil's Reaper and thrown out of the monastery in which he has taken refuge, former sea captain and pirate Solomon Kane finds his fate entangled with that of a Puritan family heading for the New World...

Solomon Kane is not a film for the faint-hearted. It's an entertaining swashbuckling tale that is unrelenting in its viciousness at times, with a terrific performance by James Purefoy as Robert E. Howard's antihero who desperately needs redemption.

There are no witty one-liners – in fact, the dialogue is probably the weakest area of the whole film, with great chunks of exposition delivered by sterling actors such as Pete Postlethwaite and Max von Sydow. There's also no romantic side: Meredith, the young Puritan girl whom Kane has to rescue to save his soul, might have a crush on Solomon, but there's never a hint that it's reciprocated.

Writer and director Michael J. Bassett has a great visual eye. The sequences in the early part of the film sell the idea of a land torn by internal strife, with unusual imagery such as the Black Death doctors burning a diseased body, and the fight scenes, while sometimes edited a little too tightly, have a visceral energy.

But the film belongs to Purefoy, whether he's the cocky captain at the start of the movie, the broken man crucified when he feels all hope is lost, or the Puritan avenger that he grows into by the end. Purefoy’s Kane isn’t the sort of clean-cut action hero that we put up with in last summer's crop of blockbusters. Instead, rather like Christian Bale's Dark Knight, you feel he's a man doing what he feels he must. And hopefully that means we'll get to see more of his adventures. Peter Quentin

VERDICT: 7/10
A pulp hero is given a great pulp treatment.