Historical? I think not.

Rating: 6/10 (12 February 2011)

I have seen a number of people on here writing reviews and REBUTTALS to people who have correctly stated some of the more inane historical inaccuracies evident in this movie. The most notable who rebutted was someone who mentioned the Battle of the Teutoberger Wald to explain the reality of the battle scene between the Picts and the Romans in a Scottish Forest.
Okay, let's begin with some of the more ridiculous aspects of this film. Firstly, the Ninth Legion, Legio IX Hispana did NOT disappear in some Scottish Forest in 117 A.D. Historical documents and Archaeological finds have proved that elements of this legion were stationed in Germania many years after they supposedly "vanished." Which means that they vanished because they left Britannia and moved to Germania.
What pains me about this film is the Director and writer claims to be the son of a History Professor yet for some strange reason he decided to take great care in outfitting the legionaries (yes, legionaries, legionnaires are French, not Roman) with Lorica Segmentata, Pteruges, Rectangular Scutums et al, but decided to have them carrying leaf bladed spears instead of the Pilum which Roman Heavy Infantry were renowned for.
Now, coming back to the Battle of the Teutoberger Wald for a moment, an entire roman legion, numbering anywhere between 4,800 to 5,500 men is ambushed and annihilated in less than a half hour? The ambush that Arminius launched against Varus in Germania resulted in battle over four long days to completely destroy those three legions and guess what, that 14 mile long single column NEVER existed. The Romans travelled along a PATH that allowed them to travel anywhere from 4 to 8 men WIDE at all times. There were many reasons those three legions were destroyed. Firstly, over the course of those four days they were fighting in thunderstorms constantly, secondly, Varus trusted Arminius so much and considered Germania to be a tame land that he did not send out scouts while on the march and finally, Arminius sent men along to LEAD Varus to a well-prepared area of AMBUSH. To the person that suggested someone might open some of the writings of Tacitus and other historians, I suggest strongly YOU might want to do likewise because I HAVE read them and also read them in the original Latin.
But, I digress.
It seems that the writers for "Centurion" missed the boat when it came to Roman Battle tactics. Firstly, if Romans were faced with something like rolling fireballs, they were more than skillfully trained to simply move OUT of the way, same as what they did in battles against Carthaginian elephants after Canae. They also might have used their scutums to form a wall and basically angle back so the thing rolled up and over them. Roman legionaries were drilled to be able to handle such tactics because such things are mentioned in the diaries of Julius Caesar.
Many of the defending Romans on the path were shown throwing away their shield in panic and trying to parry like some kind of regular swordsman against the Picts. Roman legionaries would never, ever, throw away a perfectly good shield so they could defend against an unshielded opponent, nor would they break formation in order to go at it like some gladiator in the arena. The strength of the Roman soldier was as a unit of fighting men, not singular combat and their centurion would be demanding they get back in formation as best they could. To see an example of this, watch ROME, Season 1, Episode 1 for a good example of how Romans fought.
However, with all of the historical inaccuracy in the movie, it was an entertaining tale and yes, the main protagonist did remind me way too much of Xena, the warrior princess, however, she, along with the blonde witch were simply used in the story to provide some enjoyable eye candy for the us of the masculine gender although both ladies portrayed their parts very well, I thought.
All, in all, I suggest that you get a copy of this movie on DVD and enjoy it for the entertaining story that it provides. But, one caveat, it is very gory and to be blunt, CORRECTLY so, Swords and spears and axes are not weapons of humane destruction.