William Tell
⭐️ ⭐️ ⭐️
Rating: R
Run Time: 2 hours 13 minutes
Stars: Claes Bang, Ben Kingsley, Jonathan Pryce, Golshifteh Farahani
Co-Writer/Director: Nick Hamm
Reviewed at the Toronto International Film Festival
Well, we can’t say “They don’t make sprawling medieval war movies like they used to” anymore. A movie of meticulous vision, larger-then-life performances, and epic historical context, William Tell is a defiant throwback to a time when movie marquees boasted “a cast of thousands,” immersed audiences in chaotic, close-up widescreen Technicolor battle scenes and featured chiseled, virtuous heroes doing battle with smirking, thoroughly evil villains.
You may think you know the story of William Tell, the medieval archer who was so skilled he shot an apple off the top of his son’s head. But modern retellings of the folk tale seldom delve into the political forces that placed Tell and his boy in that precarious circumstance. Here, it’s all spelled out: The evil Austrians, led by one-eyed King Albert (Ben Kingsley, making a meal of the scenery with relish), are intent on conquering the peace-loving Swiss, who just want to go about their tranquil lives, milking their cows and feeding their chickens, protected by a wall of Alps — magnificently photographed here by cinematographer Jamie Ramsay (who shot the exquisite 2021 period drama Mothering Sunday).
For the moment, the king is content to extort exorbitant taxes from the Swiss, sending marauding soldiers to collect what little wealth the villagers have — or else. It is a particularly appalling “or else” that drives one Swiss farmer to kill the King’s envoy, setting into motion a series of events that leads to war-weary William Tell (piercing-eyed Danish star Claes Bang), recently returned from the Crusades, to take up arms against the Austrian oppressors. The resulting campaign has, from Tell’s perspective, its ups and downs. The nadir coming when a cruel tax collector (Jonah Hauer-King) commands him to shoot that apple off his boy’s head…or else.
William Tell is a most unexpected achievement from co-writer/director Nick Hamm, who helmed the almost-claustrophobic two-actor historical drama The Journey (2016) and 2022’s Gigi and Nate, the story of a young paraplegic man and his service monkey. Here, he blows through the walls of such intimate cinema, showing a particular knack for staging battle scenes: Even as the two armies collide, full-speed, into each other, screaming and brandishing their swords and maces, Hamm manages to clearly define who is who, and who’s winning. It’s a rare director’s feat — I’m guessing Hamm had Akira Kurosawa’s raging battles in Ran playing on a loop — and one that comes in handy when everyone is wearing similar armor and wielding nearly identical weapons.
Despite William Tell’s undeniable throwback qualities, a certain amount of contemporary sensibility is required: The women folk, for one thing, are absolutely as militant as the men, and they can swing a sword with the best of them. When the alliance of feuding Swiss clans seems close to collapsing, it is Tell’s no-nonsense wife (Golshifteh Farahani), a Muslim woman he brought back from the Middle East, who bellows some sense into them.
Perhaps the most notable (and somewhat disappointing) nod to modernity comes as an epilogue: Even as Tell and his Swiss compatriots celebrate their victory, a new villain appears on the horizon, unmistakably setting the scene for a hoped-for sequel.
What’s next? Sequels always try to outdo the original. Will our hero be forced to take aim at a grape on his kid’s noggin? Time — and box-office receipts — will Tell.
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