Guy Ritchie's The Covenant (2023)

[Winston T. Boogie]

Title: The Covenant (2023)

Tagline: A bond. A pledge. A commitment.

Genre: Action, Drama, Thriller, War

Director: Guy Ritchie

Cast: Jake Gyllenhaal, Dar Salim, Antony Starr, Alexander Ludwig, Emily Beecham, Jason Wong, Bobby Schofield, Sean Sagar, Reza Diako, Abbas Fasaei, Swen Temmel, Rhys Yates, Ash Goldeh, Christian Ochoa Lavernia, Marcel Zadé, Hadi Khanjanpour, Gary Anthony Stennette, Fariba Sheikhan, Damon Zolfaghari, Javier Ramos, Kawa Mawlayee, Altamasch Noor, Javid Hakim, Sina Parvaneh, Mo Ahmadi, Cyrus Khodaveisi, Paeman Arianfar, Shoaib Lodin

Release: 2023-04-21

Plot: On his last tour of duty in Afghanistan, Sergeant John Kinley is teamed with local interpreter Ahmed to survey the region. When their unit is ambushed on patrol, Kinley and Ahmed are the only survivors. With enemy combatants in pursuit, Ahmed risks his own life to carry an injured Kinley across miles of grueling terrain to safety. Back on U.S. soil, Kinley learns that Ahmed and his family were not given passage to America as promised. Determined to protect his friend and repay his debt, Kinley returns to the warzone to retrieve Ahmed and his family before the local militias reach them first.

 

[Winston T. Boogie]

Two from Ritchie this year, I wonder if that is a bit of Covid back-up.

 

[Keith Cobby]

Still waiting for Operation Fortune: Ruse de Guerre to have a release date, although it's been shown in the middle east.

 

[YANG]

this seems to be one exciting work from Guy Ritchie to look for this year... a first work of modern military drama.

 

[benbess]

Saw this today with A-list. In contrast to Guy Ritchie's often "cute" directorial style, this one is deadly serious, but quite good. I mean it's really grim in places, with a high body count, but still inspiring at times, if that makes sense.

One of my top movies of the year so far. My rating: A-

Powerful music score by Christopher Benstead.

 

[YANG]

as a military drama, i say... Guy Ritchie is definitely have the chops to make one that will make a tough guy jerk some tears in subtle yet strong "memory haunting" moments! when comes to action, compared to fellow older countryman Ridley, it‘ll feel a little lackluster and tense, but hey... nothing is left out.
i wouldn't give a very high score to Guy’s first attempt... certainly will not be low. 3.5/5 fair?

 

[SamT]

Saw this. How egomaniacal should you be to put your own name in the actual title of the movie!

They got their US Visas, great, wait these are US Passports. Who let that pass?

 

[mark brown]

Ritchie’s Covenant is a well-made film!

 

[Tino]

How egomaniacal should you be to put your own name in the actual title of the movie!

Yeah. Like that’s never happened before.

 

[SamT]

Well, even Hitchcock didn't do that as far as I remember.

Ritchie’s Covenant is a well-made film!

To a degree, but it has some big errors. The US Passport stuff.

And that gun plane shooting at white dots at the end. Aren't they there to help? Don't they think that maybe one of those white dots are the people who they are not supposed to kill?!

By the way, the important documents you want, let's give them to you at the scene of war. We can't keep them safe at the base and give them to you when you are back!

 

[benbess]

Sam T wrote: "Well, even Hitchcock didn't do that as far as I remember."

He did, actually, but it was a very long time ago, and so I can understand that you don't remember. Two examples from 1945 and 1948.

My guess is that the reason Guy Ritchie did it is that there was already a 2006 movie called The Covenant, and so for copyright and confusion reasons they needed a somewhat different title. But the title is so important to this movie that they couldn't come up with a better one, and so just added the director's name in front of it.

 

[SamT]

Those are advertisements on a poster. Completely natural.

The official titles of the movies

Spellbound

Spellbound (1945) ⭐ 7.5 | Film-Noir, Mystery, Romance

1h 51m | Approved

www.imdb.com

Rope

Rope (1948) ⭐ 7.9 | Crime, Drama, Mystery

1h 20m | Approved

www.imdb.com

Guy Ritchie's The Covenant

The Covenant (2023) ⭐ 7.5 | Action, Thriller, War

2h 3m | R

www.imdb.com

What are the chances that the 2006 The Covenant was playing in 2023 in the theaters, next to Guy Ritchie's The Covenant to confuse them!

 

[Robert Crawford]

It's simple, Guy Ritchie has recognized that his name is now a brand and he's selling his brand.

 

[Tino]

It's simple, Guy Ritchie has recognized that his name is now a brand and he's selling his brand.

As did John Carpenter

 

[TravisR]

It's simple, Guy Ritchie has recognized that his name is now a brand and he's selling his brand.

I suppose that's true but is Guy Ritchie a much bigger name in England than in the U.S.? Not knocking him but I don't think anyone outside of movie fans has ANY idea who Ritchie is in America.

As did John Carpenter

One of the few people who I don't dislike for using the ownership title. Although because of Carpenter, pretty much every hack horror movie director has used the "A Film By..." for decades now. "Timothy Bradford Hagen's Diarrhea Of The Mummy's Tomb" or "Blood Bath At The Babe Brothel, A Film By Harding T.C. Jennings, III".

 

[SamT]

If I say Guy Ritchie to anyone I know in real life, they would say who?! But they know Steven Spielberg for example and some of the top names.

 

[Robert Crawford]

I suppose that's true but is Guy Ritchie a much bigger name in England than in the U.S.? Not knocking him but I don't think anyone outside of movie fans has ANY idea who Ritchie is in America.

If that's truly the case, then he's trying to promote his brand into something bigger than what it is now. If some people have a problem with that then that's their issue.

 

[Kent K H]

I'd say pretty much every one of my friends knows who Guy Ritchie is. And if they don't by just the name recognition, all I'd have to say is Snatch or Lock Stock. For others it might be Aladdin (unfortunately.) As for this film, it might at least partly be because it's not typically the kind of film he's known for and they wanted that association.

I'd meant to catch this in theaters (as I did Operation Fortune, which I found surprisingly delightful) but managed to miss it. After Wrath of Man, I was curious to see another more serious Ritchie film to see how he evolved on that front.

 

[Josh Steinberg]

It's simple, Guy Ritchie has recognized that his name is now a brand and he's selling his brand.

I think it may be something else. There’s another existing (modern) film with the title The Covenant. While it’s not possible to copyright a title, there is an agreement the studios and MPA have about registering titles and it’s not permitted to reuse a title another studio has registered without providing some form of compensation. If you violate that rule, the MPA has the power not to approve the film for release or rate it, which makes it nearly impossible to be shown in theaters. By adding the Director’s name to the official title, they are able to circumvent that rule.

There was a similar situation several years ago with a film that ultimately wound up released as “Lee Daniels’ The Butler” - “The Butler” was already taken by another studio and the studio behind Daniels’ film didn’t want to make a deal with the studio that had title rights so they amended the title to get around it.

Given that Ritchie hasn’t taken this kind of credit on his other films, I would surmise it was the title registration issue.

 

[SamT]

^ we got them.

The Butler (2013) ⭐ 7.2 | Biography, Drama

2h 12m | PG-13

www.imdb.com