THE WARRIOR: A Feudal India-Based Philosophical Road Movie

The Warrior is the feature debut of Asif Kapadia, an English director of Indian descent, best known for his later films such as Senna, Amy, Diego, and more recently, Federer: Twelve Final Days. Although the creator first visited the country of his ancestors at the age of 23, he decided to set the action of his film in India. This gives the film a specific exotic quality, and the story being told seems to take on an entirely different dimension.

Lafcadia is the leader of an armed group of mercenaries in the service of an Indian raja. His tasks include collecting tax arrears but also carrying out executions on resistant subjects. He is a detached executioner and a merciless killer. Lafcadia has a teenage son who, just like his father, will one day serve his lord, but before that happens, his father tries to keep him away from the work he does. One day, the raja orders Lafcadia and his men to pacify one of the villages under his rule, which has been unable to pay its tax arrears. The warriors collect the payment, burn the village, and rape the women. During the raid, when Lafcadia is about to kill a teenage girl, he notices an amulet around her neck that was given to her by his son. This makes him realize the significance of his actions, and together with his son, he decides to flee to avoid the raja’s wrath. However, the raja is not willing to let the insult go unpunished and sends his own men after them, led by Lafcadia’s former deputy.

In terms of the story, The Warrior somewhat resembles Roland Joffé’s The Mission. Its action takes place in equally exotic settings (though in a completely different part of the world), but above all, it tells of breaking away from the past and redeeming one’s sins. Asif Kapadia uses the convenient road movie formula to depict the transformation of the protagonist, who, both physically and mentally, undergoes a long journey. Lafcadia, following the shadow of his murdered son, emerges from the depths of madness to become a different man. In the scene of the village pacification, just before the impulse that catalyzes the hero’s transformation, we see him with his saber drawn against the backdrop of snow-capped mountains. At that moment, we do not yet understand the meaning of this scene, but we will learn its significance much later. Right after that, the former killer symbolically renounces violence by discarding his weapon – the saber, which will appear throughout the film, returning in the pivotal moments of Lafcadia’s life. This is the beginning of the journey.

The hero, stunned after the death of his closest companion, sets off to the place where he was born – to the mountains, encountering the strangest characters along the way: a boy whose parents he once murdered, a blind old woman heading toward the holy lake, a traveling merchant. Death follows him step by step, not allowing him to forget the deeds he has committed. He himself undergoes a symbolic penance, persecuted by the echoes of his past actions. The mountains, looming in the distance, seem as distant a goal as the prospect of forgiveness for the crimes he has committed. The journey to the mountains – the place of birth – is another symbol embodying the return to irretrievably lost innocence. We see them as majestic, grand, pure, untainted by human wickedness and the blood of the innocent. Before Lafcadia reaches them, he will have to face his past one more time, take up the hated saber, and make the final reckoning.

In terms of narrative style, The Warrior is reminiscent of Mohsen Makhmalbaf’s Kandahar, currently playing on Polish screens. The Warrior shares many similarities with Kandahar: the similarly shot images in yellow tones, as well as the involvement of “non-professional” actors in most roles (except for the lead played by Irrfan Khan). Although both films were made by directors raised in completely different cultural circles, they share a similar worldview (through the eye of the camera). One cannot fail to mention the breathtaking desert and mountain landscapes, beautifully photographed by Roman Osin.

Someone might say that Asif Kapadia’s The Warrior cannot be considered an innovative film, as it shows a well-known hero transformation scheme influenced by the surrounding reality, filmed in the road movie genre. However, it seems that Kapadia achieved something very difficult – he breathed new life into a convention that American cinema had exploited to its limits. The Warrior is not an ostentatious film; it does not rely on flashy editing, sudden plot twists, or spectacular fights, but its form makes us perceive it almost as a philosophical treatise on the human condition, and thus… about ourselves.