Day of the Falcon Blu-ray Review
There Will Be Blood in the Sand
Reviewed by Michael Reuben, March 25, 2013
Day of the Falcon, which was originally titled
Black
Gold for international markets, is a curious
and not entirely successful amalgam of the West and the Mideast. The standard marketing line is
that the film is one of the most expensive productions every produced and financed by Arab
interests and filmed in Arab locales—which is accurate but not complete. The producer and
primary creative force behind the project, Tarak Ben Ammar, is a native Tunisian, but he is also a
fillmmaking veteran with decades of experience that include overseeing the Tunisian shoots for
Raiders of the Lost Ark and
Monty Python's Life of Brian, producing TV mini-series on the lives
of Jesus and the disciples and producing films for Brian DePalma (
Femme Fatale) and Guiseppe
Tornatore (
Baarìa).
Ben Ammar has had his share of flops (notably, 2002's
Ballistic: Ecks vs. Sever), but anyone with
his longevity in film and TV has to have sharp commercial instincts. As much as Ben Ammar
may have aspired to create a film from the Arab point of view, he clearly wanted to appeal to a
broad international audience.
Day of the Falcon's source material was a novel by a Swiss author,
Hans Ruesch. The director was a Frenchman, Jean-Jacques Annaud. A Dutchman, Menno
Meyjes, wrote the screenplay from an adaptation by Annaud and fellow Frenchman Alain
Godard. When it came to casting, many of the extras and supporting players were local actors in
Ben Ammar's Tunisian homeland, where much of principal photography occurred. But the key
roles of the two opposing Arabian tribal leaders were played by a Spaniard and an Englishman,
the two Arab princes by Muslims born and raised in France and England, and the main female
roles by natives of Bombay and Ethiopia.
Now, I'm not suggesting a "political correctness" test in which
Day of the Falcon fails because
its staffing and casting were ethnically and nationally "inauthentic". My point is simply that the
film's producer assembled the project in the same way as any other major motion picture,
drawing from industry veterans and with an eye on the international box office. And that is
indicative of why something feels badly "off" about this ambitious enterprise, even though all the
money invested in the project ended up on the screen. For all the film's "made in the Muslim
world" credentials, it still feels like a Western take on Arabia, pouring the region's history into
the same mold for cinematic epics created by the likes of David Lean and Otto Preminger—and
the mold doesn't fit the material.
Ironically, one of the very subjects of
Day of the Falcon is how Westerners arrived in the
Arabian desert and failed to understand the world view of its inhabitants. How, then, should one
interpret a plot that elevates as a hero the prince who ultimately embraces that very Western
view? Notwithstanding its references to the Quran and its depictions of tribal life,
Day of the
Falcon plays as an account of how the discovery of oil dragged the Muslim world, kicking and
screaming, from savagery into civilization. Even within the film's own terms, that hardly sounds
like an Arab point of view.
Though the specific date isn't provided,
Day of the Falcon opens in the early 1920s, when, as we
are told in opening text, the peninsula now known as Saudi Arabia is split among feuding tribes.
Two great leaders meet to settle a war in which one has lost and another has prevailed. They are
Sultan Amar (Mark Strong) and Emir Nesib (a miscast Antonio Banderas), and they agree that
the patch of desert over which they have been fighting, known as the Yellow Belt, shall be a no
man's land claimed by neither. To secure the peace, Emir Nesib, the victor, insists that Sultan
Amar hand over his two young sons as hostages.
Years later, Sultan Amar's sons have grown into men under Emir Nesib's care. The elder
brother, Saleeh (Akin Gazi), is a traditional Arab prince interested in combat and falconry, while
the younger, Auda (Tahar Rahim, star of
The Prophet), is bespectacled, bookish and clumsy.
This being a traditional Hollywood movie with character arcs painted in capital letters for the
audience to see in advance, it is already obvious that Prince Auda will the one to magically
transform into a great leader by the end of the film.
Both princes are closely watched from her sequestered quarters by Emir Nesib's daughter,
Princess Leyla (Freida Pinto), with whom they played as children until she was whisked away at
an age when girls are deemed too old to continue associating with boys. Does anyone doubt on
which brother Princess Leyla's affections have settled?
The delicate balance between the two tribes—and, indeed, of the entire region—is upset by the
arrival of Thurkettle (Corey Johnson), an oilman from Texas, whose surveys indicate rich
deposits under the Yellow Belt. In violation of his agreement with Sultan Amar, Emir Nesib
permits Thurkettle to dig wells in the region that was supposed to remain untouched. Soon the
Emir's coffers are overflowing with oil wealth, and he is able to build schools, hospitals and
libraries, as well as acquire armored vehicles and advanced weaponry. Emir Nesib buys the
temporary loyalty of local tribesmen with baubles like Swiss watches, but neither his abrogation
of the agreement with Sultan Amar nor the presence of foreign infidels goes unnoticed. As the
region becomes increasingly dangerous and unsettled, Emir Nesib schemes how to use Amar's
sons against him, while, on the other side of the Yellow Belt, Amar plots his revenge.
Since we know the historical outcome, the defeat of those seeking to prevent the development of
the region's oil is inevitable. If
Day of the Falcon had fully represented those interests and truly
shown the world through their eyes, it might have succeeded better as drama. But one can sense
the dice being loaded, as those who oppose exploitation of the desert are routinely treated as
Luddites and fundamentalists. Only Sultan Amar is given speeches that approach the level of
quality (and Mark Strong lends the character the requisite gravitas) to suggest the legitimacy of
the concerns by indigenous people when powerful foreign interests offer a deal that seems too
good to be true. All the locals have to do is agree to a long-term and possibly permanent presence
by outsiders that will irreparably transform the country and the culture. Is that really so much to
ask? And who will control this new wealth, and how will it be used?
Change may be inevitable, but it should not be undertaken lightly, especially by leaders who feel
any sense of responsibility for their people, as Sultan Amar clearly does and Emil Nesib just as
clearly does not.
Day of the Falcon ultimately trivializes complex social and political issues by
suggesting that the solution was simply to replace a "bad" king (Emir Nesib) with a "good" one
(Prince Auda). Anyone with even a passing familiarity with the history of the region knows that
matters aren't so simple.
Still, if one can overlook the script's superficiality,
Day of the Falcon does offer gorgeous desert
scenery, several remarkable battle scenes and worthy performances from Strong, Rahim, Pinto
and, in a small but pivotal role late in the film, Liya Kebede as a freed slave who joins the army
led by Prince Auda and is perhaps intended as the film's nod to an independent Arab woman of
the future. The first third of the film is its most tedious portion, because it is dominated by
Banderas, who fails to inhabit his role. Not for an instant do you believe that his Emir Nesib is
anyone other than a Spanish actor in Arab garb, and a
comic actor at that. Banderas recites lines
as if he were expecting a laugh to follow, and he makes you wonder how this Emir could ever
have bested Mark Strong's Sultan Amar in battle. Now
there is a warrior.
