Watch The Duellists For Free

Wonderful character development!

Better than most people think

It's not great by any means, but it's a pretty good movie that didn't leave me filled with regret for investing time in it.

It's a movie as timely as it is provocative and amazingly, for much of its running time, it is weirdly funny.

Reading the other reviews, I tend to agree to what other IMDb users say. The film is indeed timeless. Average directors usually try to stick to the trendy cinematography tricks of the moment. Great directors tries to invent the next trendy tricks! Apart from a few very 70's- cliché zoom-ins, photography, transitions, and actor direction could easily stand with today's standards. One reviewer compared this movie to other UK's legendary director Stanly Kubrick timeless masterpiece : Barry Lindon. They both share the same main theme (honor during Napeleonian wars). They do have a lot in common, Barry Lindon was produced 2 years earlier than this film, so you easily believe that Scott "borrowed" a few "ideas" from his mentor. So, why just a 6 out of 10 then? Well, the script is poor and a bit boring. Blade Runner was inspired by a short novel, so was this movie, but unlike Blade Runner and Barry Lyndon, Duellists did not succeed in transcending its original medium. In a nutshell, an enjoyable film to watch, strong recommendation to all Ridley Scott's fans, but a very optional view for regular moviegoers.

While people often hail Ridley Scott as the maker of films like Gladiator, Blade Runner, and Alien, they rarely talk about his debut film ‪'The Duellists'‬ which can certainly be described as the single greatest achievement of Scott's highly decorated filmmaking career.The Duellists has the look and the feel of a big budget film despite being shot on a budget that can be described as moderate at best. The film thrives on Scott's remarkable ability to spot and adapt untouched stories of master storytellers like Joseph Conrad (in case The Duellists) and Philip K Dick (in case of Blade Runner).The Duellists basically tells the story of two Napoleonic officers who engage in a series of uncompleted duels that go on intermittently for years. In a nutshell, it is a tale of pride and honor, and, more importantly, obsession. Harvey Keitel and Keith Carradine play their respective parts to a tee, brilliantly complementing their contrasting roles.The movie's cinematography, editing and music are absolutely topnotch and provide the perfect foil for Scott's ingenious direction and Gerald Vaughan-Hughes' brilliant adaptation of Conrad's short story which bear a striking resemblance to Hugo's Les Miserables.The Duellists is a underrated masterpiece and certainly deserves more attention than it has received over the last 35 years or so. There is little doubt that it is the single greatest achievement of Ridley Scott's filmmaking career. The Duellists bears quite a few similarities with Stanley Kubrick's supremely masterful 'Barry Lyndon' -- another film that deals with duels and notorious soldiers -- and can be relished back-to-back with it. The Duellists is a film that a serious film- goer simply cannot afford to miss.For more on the world of cinema, please visit my film blog "A Potpourri of Vestiges".

Ridley Scott's The Duelists is quite possibly the best sword fighting film I've seen, and one of the best Napoleonic period pieces, despite having no battle scenes. Although it takes place amidst the Napoleonic wars, and although both the protagonists are soldiers, The Duelists is not a war movie. Rather, it is a character study of two men, and an irrepressible feud pursued across years and countries. It could perhaps be called a relationship film, but not in the usual sense. Whereas most relationship movies involve growing love and understanding, the relationship between Armand d'Hubert and Lieutenant Feraud is one antagonism and self-destruction.Despite being of the same age and profession, d'Hubert (Keith Carradine) and Feraud (Harvey Keitel) could not be more different. D'Hubert is charming, likable, and never takes things too seriously, preferring to take things in stride. Feraud on the other hand is borderline psychotic. He takes offense with incredible ease, and always demands satisfaction. When we first meet him, he has just impaled another man, supposedly over the honor of his unit. It turns out that the man he killed was the nephew of the mayor of a major city, and orders are given for his arrest. It is d'Hubert's great misfortune to be the one who delivers this news to Feraud, sparking their first duel. Over the next sixteen years, they will fight no less than four more, not counting one that was interrupted by Cossacks.Why does this go on? It is because Feraud will simply not give up his grudge. Long after he's forgotten the exact circumstances of their first meeting, he still holds a venomous hatred for d'Hubert, one that cannot be sated by any number of victories. He will not be satisfied until Armand is dead at his hands.As for d'Hubert, he has no wish to continue this feud. He just wants Feraud to leave him alone. Yet his sense of honor prevents him from declining Feraud's challenges, and at one point compels him to defend the life of his enemy. He eventually takes on a fatalistic attitude about the matter. And why should he not? After the first duel, a surgeon told him that there can be no duel if they are in different places, if they are of different rank, or if France is at war. Yet the two keeping crossing each other's paths during lulls in the fighting, when they hold the same rank.Even after Napoleon is exiled and pair enter semi-retirement at their estates, it still doesn't end, even though its cost them so much. Both bear many wounds from their duels, and cost Armand the woman he loved. It is, in the words a fortune teller seen midway through the film, "a quarrel pursued for its own sake." Keitel and Carradine do a wonderful job of bringing their characters to life. Keitel fully captures Feraud's obsession and burning anger, even when he is at rest you can see the hatred in his eyes. And Carradine carries himself through a range of acting styles. From the young debonair Lieutenant cracking jokes over dinner, to the exhausted, frostbitten major trudging across the Russian steppes, to the respected middle aged aristocrat, exasperated that he must do battle yet again, and so afraid of losing good life and wonderful family he has earned for himself.But acting alone isn't enough; in a movie called The Duelists one would expect some pretty fancy swordplay. And that's exactly what we get. Every duel is excellently filmed and choreographed, and each confrontation has a feel all its own. The first two are precise, even elegant displays of swordsmanship. Then comes a brutal, incredibly physical slug-fest, an exceedingly tense horseback duel, akin to a medieval joust, and finally a deadly game of cat and mouse, played with two pistols apiece among overgrown ruins. When their contest a wills is settled once and for all, it is done so masterfully, and in a manner I could not have anticipated.The Duelists is a work of excitement and suspense, held together with a solid plot, and filled with strong performances and lavish attention to detail. It may be at quite the same level as Gladiator or Alien, but it is everything audiences should come to expect from Ridley Scott.

This is a great movie about honour and is it really worth the cost of keeping it.The acting in this movie is definitely top notch with Harvey Keitel and Keith Carradine.The movie is based on a short story or more to the point a series of serialized short stories that make up a really short novella. The stories were written by Joseph Conrad the famous writer from England in the late 1800s and early 1900s. I recommend the movie for any fans of war movies but also anyone who is interested in seeing great actors play characters who have a lot going on psychologically.