The Last Duel (2021)

Jodie Cormer and Matt Damon

 

Jodie Cormer as Lady Marguerite de Carrouges

Matt Damon as Sir Jean de Carrouges

Adam Driver as Jacques LeGris

Marguerite de Carrouges: My father told me my life would be blessed with good fortune. I'm married. I was a good wife. And then I was judged and shamed by my country. ~The Last Duel (2021)

I should know by now that when the mainstream media pans a film, making it fail in the box office, it means it is probably a film that I will like. That turned out to be true in the case of The Last Duel (2021), directed by Ridley Scott and starring Matt Damon, Jodie Cormer, and Adam Driver. I found the film mesmerizing and highly authentic; it reminded me of the duel in Ivanhoe which in turn inspired the duel in my novel The Night's Dark Shade. Based upon the book of the same name by Eric Jager, to which it is remarkably faithful, The Last Duel is inspired by a true event, that being the last (or next to the last) legally-sanctioned duel in France. The duel, in which two parties try to kill or maim each other, is based upon the belief that God will protect His own and that right will prevail. To us, such savagery appears to be tempting God and thus not necessarily a fail safe way of getting to the truth of a matter, such as who committed a certain crime, and who is lying, or not. As with many current films, The Last Duel is not a family film, containing a graphic rape scene, although not nearly as graphic as some I have had the misfortune to see in the past. In real life, according to the testimony of Marguerite de Carrouges, the rape was much worse since LeGris' henchman Louvel helped to restrain Marguerite so she could be more easily ravished. Anyway, young and/or sensitive souls should probably avoid the film. 

According to Slate:

Here’s what we know about the actual historical events from the medieval sources (chronicles, some of the actual litigation and other court records and legal documents, and a sort of legal memo from one of the lawyers involved, writing after the fact). In 1386, in Normandy, a knight and nobleman named Jean de Carrouges (played by Damon) accused the squire Jacques Le Gris (Driver), his frenemy, of having raped Carrouges’ wife while she had been left alone at Carrouges’ mother’s home. At the time, Carrouges had been in Paris seeking to collect money he appears to have been in rather great need of, especially after a recent failed military expedition. Le Gris denied the accusation, claiming that he had only ever seen Marguerite de Carrouges once in his life, and that he had several noble witnesses who could provide an alibi. He further claimed that Carrouges hated him because he had obtained lands and titles that once belonged to Carrouges’ father and father-in-law that Carrouges considered his by right; Le Gris charged that Carrouges had also tried to get his first wife to agree to make a false rape accusation. Carrouges demanded of King Charles VI that he be permitted to prove his claim was just, via trial by combat. They fought, Carrouges won, and he spent the 10 or so remaining years of his life as something of a celebrity among the companions of the king (who was by then subject to frequent and debilitating symptoms of mental illness). Carrouges was also a leader of several military expeditions abroad and very well rewarded for his services. (Read more.)

From the Los Angeles Times:

From a practical perspective, pulling back on the brutality of the moment was also essential for simply getting the audience to sit through the scene. By taking away the witness and some challenging details, like Le Gris stuffing his hat into Marguerite’s mouth, the filmmakers were able to more fully explore the notion that Le Gris believed his actions were just.

“In the book, Le Gris does say he was in love with her,” Holofcener says. “That’s the research we did and the legend of the story — he thought he was in love with her and did not rape her. And yet he raped her so brutally in history, in the truth, so badly there would be no doubt. He had a witness. She probably had strangle marks. I came in after Matt and Ben decided to do it this way, but they wanted to make it a little more gray. So in his deluded sense of pride, Le Gris could believe it was consensual. And clearly it wasn’t.” (Read more.) 

In the words of author Eric Jager in Lapham's Quarterly:

Despite the claims of naysayers and novelizers, Marguerite’s testimony suggests that she was almost certainly not mistaken about the identity of her attackers. That testimony takes up nearly a thousand words of Latin in the Parlement’s official summary of the case, preserved today at the Archives Nationales, on the Right Bank, in the Marais, a short walk from the old priory where the battle unfolded on that cold winter day.

Marguerite testified repeatedly under oath that on a certain day in January 1386—Thursday the eighteenth—she was attacked by the two men, Le Gris and Louvel. This happened, she said, in the morning hours at the modest château of her widowed mother-in-law, Nicole de Carrouges, on a remote Normandy estate known as Capomesnil, about twelve miles southwest of Lisieux. At the time of the attack, Jean de Carrouges was away on a trip to Paris from which he would return a few days later. Nicole, in whose care Jean had left his wife, was also absent for part of the day in question, having been called away on legal business to the nearby abbey town of Saint-Pierre. Marguerite claimed that Nicole took with her nearly all of the household servants, including a maidservant whom Jean had specifically instructed never to leave Marguerite’s side, thus leaving Marguerite “virtually alone.”

Marguerite also testified that Adam Louvel was the first to arrive at the château, and that he began his visit by urging her to ask her husband to extend the term of an outstanding loan for one hundred gold francs. Louvel then added a greeting from Jacques Le Gris, who he said “greatly admired her” and was eager to speak with her. Marguerite replied that she had no wish to speak with Le Gris, and that Louvel should stop his overtures at once.

At this point Le Gris himself suddenly entered the château’s hall (aulam, probably referring to the main chamber or “great hall” where guests were typically received). Greeting Marguerite, he declared that she was “the lady of all the land,” that he loved her the most and would do anything for her. When Marguerite told Le Gris that he must not speak to her in this way, he seized her by the hand, forced her to sit down beside him on a bench, and told her that he knew all about her husband’s recent money troubles, offering to pay her well. When Marguerite adamantly refused his offer, saying she had no wish for his money, the violence escalated.

The two men seized her by the arms and legs, she testified, and dragged her up a nearby stairway, while she struggled and shouted for help. Forced into an upstairs bedroom, she tried to escape by running through a door at the other end of the room but was blocked from doing so by Le Gris. The squire then threw her onto a bed but could not hold her down without help from Louvel, who rushed back into the room on Le Gris’ orders to help his friend subdue and finally rape Marguerite. She continued shouting for help, she says, until silenced by Le Gris’ hood. (Read more.) 

In the film, Jean de Carrouges is depicted as a rough, illiterate, professional soldier, ridiculed by the fashionable crowd, whereas LeGris is a well-educated and suave ladies' man, who can seduce any woman he desires. In his few fleeting encounters with Marguerite, LeGris flirts with her, showing her what life might have been had she, a learned and refined lady, married a rising star like himself, instead of her blundering husband. How deeply Marguerite is touched, or not, by LeGris' attentions, LeGris himself appears to be convinced that he has won her heart and that his further romantic overtures will be welcomed. He believes that any objections she makes are merely a superficial feminine response to salve her conscience. Perhaps his past experiences with ladies have taught him such a view. As for Marguerite, had she actually consented to an affair with LeGris, and kept it a secret, no one would have known, except God and her conscience. But because she refuses to comply with LeGris' desires, she is attacked by her would-be lover. Her honesty with her husband leads to public humiliation  and censure as well as to the near death of herself and of Jean. Truly virtue and faithfulness are not without a high price in her life.

I think that it was brilliant for the film to tell the story from three points of view, that of Jean de Carrouges, then LeGris, then Marguerite. The Hundred Years War is not depicted much outside of movies, plays and books about Agincourt or Jeanne d'Arc; it is refreshing and fascinating to glimpse what was going on in the court of Charles VI before he went totally insane. France is still strong but beginning to weaken. One can see the difference between the professional warriors like Jean de Carrouges and the courtiers such as LeGris who feast, party, drink and seduce women. Carrouges, who is trying to save France, is scorned, his wife is raped, while LeGris is treated like a prince. Meanwhile the war is not going well for the French.

The film makes Jean de Carrouges into a boorish thug, who cares more about his own honor than the injury done to his wife. The fact is, however, that it is Jean who risks his life to save his wife and he does save her. A proven warrior, in spite of his age and past injuries he overcomes the dandy LeGris. Marguerite makes some statements that are slightly anachronistic but overall her attitude towards her husband is as it probably was in real life: that of a modest, pious and obedient spouse. She holds the rosary in her hand as the men battle and she faces being roasted alive. One cannot help but see the intercession of the Virgin on behalf of one seeking her intercession.

Share