Clash Of Empires (2011/aka The Malay
Chronicles: Bloodlines/Image Blu-ray)
Picture: B- Sound: B- Extras: D Film: B+
It is 120
AD, the world is ruled between the Roman and Chinese Empires. In order to prevent war and create peace
between two empires, a Roman prince is sent to marry a Chinese princess,
they are to meet upon a neutral island and be wed, but on the journey to the
island, the Roman lost most of their fleet in the storm, the Romans could only
find one guide to safely guild them to the appointed place. A self proclaimed, warrior, captain,
descendent from Alexander the Great named Merong. Together, Merong and prince brave the waters
infested with Malaysian pirates to rescue the princess in Clash Of Empires (aka The
Malay Chronicles: Bloodlines).
This movie was a mix of Roman, Chinese, and Malaysian cultures as a reluctant
Roman prince, reluctant Chinese princess, and an unknown infamous (wildly
reputed) captain meet up for better and worse.
The prince is reluctant in marrying a princess he's never seen, the
princess feels like her marriage is something that she was forced into, as for
the captain and his mysterious origins soon plays a part in this historic
event (not to mention he is getting paid a lot of gold), but was to be a wedding,
turned out to be a battle of epic proportions when pirates kidnaps the princess. Now, both the Roman and Chinese solders set
aside their differences to fight army of ruthless pirates.
Even though in history, both the Roman Empire
and Chinese Empires were some of the largest early civilizations, neither one
of them got big enough to become a threat to one another. The film was more about what would it be like
if Romans soldiers/legions ever fought an ancient Chinese army. The various costumes/uniforms were fair, but
looked more like fancy Halloween costumes, but they get points for shear number
of soldiers, and the key fight scenes seemed more like Muay Thai boxing. The big battle scenes could have been
done in a much better way as it seemed more like a battle
royal than armies fighting, there were no use of any military tactics; it
made it seemed like more a knock off of big movie battles slapped
together.
At least
this looks (1080p 1.78 X 1 digital High Definition image) and sounds (DTS-HD MA
(Master Audio) lossless 5.1 mix) good despite some stylized softness in the
image and some of the sound design not being as good as it could be in
parts. There are no extras.
- Ricky Chiang
