The Last Duel: A Puzzle with a Clear Answer -⭐⭐⭐⭐

Warning: Significant spoilers for The Last Duel follow.

The Last Duel is the story of an alleged rape, and the events which unfurl in the wake of that rape. The plot itself is good, the acting strong, and the quality of the production high, but they are not what make the movie special. What places The Last Duel among the best films of the year is its fascinating three-act structure, during which competing accounts of the alleged rape are put forth.

The first account comes courtesy of the knight Sir Jean de Carrouges (Matt Damon). Brave, hot-tempered, and unskilled in the art of court politics, Carrouges weds the young noblewoman Marguerite de Thibouville (Jodie Comer), who brings both beauty and wealth. Carrouges is an exceptional warrior but his estate is in poor condition, and he soon comes to owe his vassal, Count Pierre d'Alençon (Ben Affleck), a considerable sum of money. Arriving to collect this debt is Carrouges’s friend Jacque Le Gris (Adam Driver), a squire in charge of squaring the Count’s finances.

Soon enough, for reasons beyond the debt, the friendship sours, and Carrouges and Le Gris become bitter rivals. This rivalry finally boils over when Carrouges arrives back from an ill-fated campaign in Scotland to find Marguerite disconsolate. She reveals that while he was away, Le Gris showed up unannounced at their castle and raped her. Carrouges, after only slight skepticism, accepts his wife’s charge as fact and vows to defend her honor. And thus the duel is set.

Except maybe it’s not that simple, and so begins act two, Jacque Le Gris’s account of events. Here, the focus is on Le Gris’s rise to prominence within the Count’s court. Propelled by his learnedness, his diplomacy, and even his virility, the Count soon favors Le Gris, and Le Gris’s estimation of his own worth rises accordingly. When he meets Marguerite at a wedding, he becomes entranced, and is determined to have her. Thus it is that we finally get to see this alleged rape, only to find out that it is…inarguably and certainly a rape.

Mind that this part of the film is from Le Gris’s point of view; it is his version of events. And yet the story of his relations with Marguerite leaves no doubt that he took advantage of her—-that he raped her. But crucially, Le Gris does not feel that he raped her. He attributes her repeated, “No, no, no!” as merely an attempt to play coy, and his overpowering of her as the standard operating procedure of man and woman in the bedroom.

Le Gris’s view of his crime cuts to the heart of the movie’s message: Women in medieval times were property. Their feelings, their words, and their desires meant little, if anything, to the men they were beholden too. In act three, when we finally see Marguerite's description of events, this truth becomes yet clearer.

Beginning on their wedding day, and continuing throughout the years, Marguerite shows that the picture of her husband set forth in act one was burnished to a fine shine. It remains clear that Carrouges is a nearly unrivaled soldier in his skill and ferocity, but in all other areas the deep flaws of his character are laid bare. He views Marguerite principally as an avenue to money, land, and an heir, and her needs and desires are far less important than his own.

As to her rape by Le Gris, it is portrayed here more brutally than it is in act two, but the material facts are unchanged. Marguerite and Le Gris would agree about what transpired, with the only difference being that Le Gris feels their encounter was consensual while Marguerite most certainly does not. 

There should be no doubt among the audience, though: Marguerite was raped.

This may then beg the question: Why the three-act structure? Why show three versions of events that ultimately are not in conflict. It seems like a waste of time.

It is not. And that is because The Last Duel is not actually a mystery. There is no puzzle to be solved. Rather, it is an indictment of medieval France, and more specifically, its male-dominated power structure which left women without a voice. Jean de Carrouges is a boorish warhound driven by his basest needs and a misguided view of “honor.” Jacque Le Gris is so used to getting what he wants that any actions he takes to do so are ipso facto right. Left in between them is a smart, kind, capable woman who neither of them even know. In their eyes, she is barely a person. Unfortunately, 600 years later, this view of women by some percentage of the male population still exists. The Last Duel is here to remind us of that.