Some months ago, I was knee-deep in listening to the Gone Medieval (2021-present) podcast hosted by the English history platform History Hit. If you know that I am a practicing Catholic who reviews films, you might think this appropriate. It is a bit of a stereotype, but there is a perception of Catholicism as a religion more rooted in the thirteenth century than in modern times. I choose that period specifically because today’s film, Ironclad (2011), is set in England in 1215. Because the events contained therein take place in that country, it does not paint the rosiest of pictures of the Faith. This annoys me because, like thinking of the Church as outdated, there are so many misconceptions at work in this movie. I enjoy history as a lover of the subject, and there is plenty here that is at least in the ballpark of being accurate. At the same time, I wish they could get it all correct, spiritually speaking.
In the aftermath of King John (Paul Giamatti) placing his seal on Magna Carta, Ironclad presents an England already sliding back toward civil war. Furious that rebellious barons forced him to accept limits on his authority, John obtains papal support and recruits a force of Danish mercenaries led by the formidable Tiberius (Vladimir Kulich) to punish those who opposed him. Meanwhile, three Knights Templar returning from the Crusades travel toward Canterbury under Abbot Marcus (Marcus Hoyland). Among them is Thomas Marshal (James Purefoy), a battle-weary knight who has taken vows of silence and chastity and hopes to be released from the Order. The group takes shelter at the castle of Baron Darnay (David Melville), one of the men who supported Magna Carta, only for John and his mercenaries to arrive. The king has Baron Darnay hanged and, when Marcus protests, orders the abbot’s tongue cut out. Thomas fights his way free with the mortally wounded Marcus, but his fellow Templars are killed. After Marcus dies, Thomas breaks his silence and vows that the abbot’s sacrifice will not be meaningless. At Canterbury, Thomas meets Archbishop Stephen Langton (Charles Dance) and Baron William d’Aubigny (Brian Cox), a veteran warrior who has taken up the wool trade. The archbishop explains that King John is moving across England crushing the barons who resisted him and that Rochester Castle is strategically essential because it guards the route toward London. Although Thomas wants release from his vows, he agrees to join Baron d’Aubigny in defending the fortress. Baron d’Aubigny assembles a small company that includes his young squire Guy (Aneurin Barnard), Gil Becket (Jason Flemyng), Jedediah Coteral (Jamie Foreman), Daniel Marks (Mackenzie Crook), and Joseph Wulfstan (Rhys Parry Jones). When they reach Rochester, they discover that Danish soldiers have already infiltrated the castle. The rebels kill them and seize control in the name of the baronial cause, much to the irritation of the castle’s lord, Baron de Cornhill (Derek Jacobi). Baron de Cornhill’s much younger wife, Lady Isabel (Kate Mara), is immediately intrigued by Thomas, whose religious vows make her interest particularly inconvenient. King John soon arrives with Tiberius and a vastly larger army and demands the castle’s surrender. Baron d’Aubigny refuses, beginning a brutal siege in which the tiny garrison repeatedly frustrates the attackers. The defenders repel an initial assault, and when the Danes return with a siege tower, the men inside Rochester use a hastily constructed trebuchet to destroy it. Unable to take the walls by force, King John decides to starve the defenders into submission. Food dwindles as the siege drags into winter, while Archbishop Langton seeks help from Prince Louis of France (not pictured). Back at Rochester Castle, Thomas slips out at night, raids the enemy camp for provisions, and returns under pursuit, temporarily restoring both the garrison’s food supply and its morale. His personal resolve proves less secure. Lady Isabel, trapped in an unhappy arranged marriage, continues pursuing him, and Thomas eventually gives in to their attraction, violating his vow of chastity. Tiberius, under increasing pressure from King John to capture the castle, changes tactics. Danish soldiers scale the walls before dawn and open the gates from within. Guy raises the alarm, but the mercenaries pour into the courtyard and overwhelm the defenders. Baron d’Aubigny is wounded and captured while Thomas, wearing his Templar armor, charges into the fighting on horseback and buys enough time for the remaining defenders to retreat into the keep. King John makes an example of his prisoners. After forcing Baron d’Aubigny to watch other captives lose their hands, the king has Baron d’Aubigny’s hands cut off as well. Baron d’Aubigny remains defiant, so King John has him loaded onto a trebuchet and hurled against the castle walls. The sight destroys Baron de Cornhill’s remaining courage. Unable to surrender and unwilling to face what is coming, he hangs himself. John’s engineers then attack the keep itself by tunneling beneath it. Pigs are driven into the mine and burned, their fat helping fuel an intense fire that weakens the foundations until part of the keep collapses. The Danes storm the ruins, killing nearly everyone left inside. Thomas is knocked unconscious by falling debris, leaving Guy and Lady Isabel among the few survivors. Believing the defense lost, Guy goes out to fight and encounters Tiberius. The mercenary leader nearly kills him before Thomas recovers and intervenes. Thomas and Tiberius engage in a savage duel, and Thomas finally kills the mercenary. At that moment, horns announce the arrival of the combined rebel and French forces. With Prince Louis approaching, King John abandons the siege and retreats with what remains of his army. Archbishop Langton returns and tells Thomas that he is free of the Templar Order. Having survived the battle and broken the vows that once defined his life, Thomas leaves Rochester with Lady Isabel, while Guy remains behind long enough to tell the dead Baron d’Aubigny that they held the castle. An epilogue explains that King John dies during the following year and that Rochester Castle is rebuilt.
Like Magna Carta itself, the battered fortress survives as a reminder of the struggle Ironclad has just depicted. What also takes a beating in the film is the image of the Church. At the same time, there is no getting around the fact that Pope Innocent III, the pontiff at the time Magna Carta was sealed, did not approve of the agreement and annulled it shortly afterward. I do not want to lean on the tired excuse that it was simply a sign of the times that the pope would support a rightful ruler over the rights of the people. At the same time, the foundational document that is Magna Carta, which would later become an important influence on American ideas about law and liberty, was not as democratic or revolutionary in 1215 as its later reputation can make it seem. It primarily addressed the rights and grievances of the barons and other freemen rather than establishing anything resembling modern democracy. Still, the idea that a monarch could be bound by law was enormously consequential. What I am also confident in saying, at least as it is depicted in the movie, is that King John takes his papal sanction to redress this supposed affront to the English throne too far. This is a roundabout way of saying that what is shown on screen gets a little graphic in the violence department, to say the least. More specifically, what I did not care for was the back-and-forth between Lady Isabel and Thomas. Because she is attracted to him, she calls into question the need for his vows to God and the Templars. In doing so, her words largely miss the point of taking them in the first place. They are depicted as strictures that stifle a person’s freedom rather than promises freely undertaken before God as part of a vocation of service. Christian freedom is not simply the absence of commitments. A vow can instead be an exercise of freedom by which a person gives himself more completely to God. That spiritual dimension is largely absent from these proceedings.
Whether Thomas should forsake his vows is a moot point in Ironclad, too, when you consider that Abbot Marcus had intended from the beginning to seek his release from the Templars. Thus, the ending should come as no surprise to anyone watching the film. The treatment of Catholicism, along with the grotesque violence, makes this one to avoid.
