calnaturegal-75956 But this isn't a series, it's a movie, so it's listed wrong but the description is correct. Not Sorvino's best movie, but I've seen a LOT worse. At least I was entertained. :D

classicalsteve Probably the most glaring flaw of this rather over-long but somewhat entertaining religious-mystery in the same vain as the Da Vinci Code is its depiction of Turkey which looks more like Saudi Arabia in the film. (Turkey is a relatively plush and green landscape with some brown rolling hills, but not like the Sahara desert of Iraq and Saudi Arabia.) According to the back-story, the Templar Knights of the Middle Ages were on the verge of extinction in the late 13th century. (At dawn on Friday, 13 October 1307, many Templars were arrested on trumped up charges, and many were executed which destroyed the Order of Templar Knights.) The Templars have in their possession a document purportedly revealing the location of ancient Jewish-Hebrew treasures uncovered beneath the ruins of the ancient Jewish Temple of Jerusalem which was destroyed by the Romans in 66 CE. The master of the Templars ordered the document to be taken by a special envoy of knights back to Turkey. Jerusalem is under siege from Saracens who were conquering part of Jerusalem which was under the control of Christian Crusaders and Byzantine Eastern Orthodox. (Islam would permanently take control of Jerusalem and the Near East in the 15th century, only a few decades before Columbus' voyage.) Fast-forward 700 years. At a special exhibition at a museum in New York, artifacts of ancient and early medieval Christianity are on display. One of the artifact-finders is an Indiana Jones type, Tess Chaykin (Mira Sorvino). According to the story, her father had found the Cross of Constantine which he supposedly held on his deathbed when he converted to Christianity in the mid-4th century, an artifact which just happens to be on display. In the film, the ornate Cross itself looks like a Latin Cross in the style of many centuries later, more akin to those of the time of Charlemagne, circa 800 CE and later, not like the Cross Constantine would have known. Constantine's Cross looked more like an "X" with a "P" on the top, called the "Chi Rho". This is just one example of many little "flaws" in the film which would certainly cause the raising of eyebrows of many-an historian of Early Christianity.Then four guys on horses dressed in Templar garb with helmets storm the exhibit and snag several of the artifacts, including the Cross and some sort of 13th-century decoder with metal gears about the size of your average box of corn flakes. Again, such an artifact would have only been conducive no earlier than the Renaissance in the late 15th century, not as early as the 1200's as suggested by the film, another one of the film's interesting "innovations". Tess subdues the "Templar" with the Cross but the others get away. Turns out the entire escapade was masterminded by Bill Vance (Kenneth Welsh), a fellow archaeologist and friend of Tess' father. Turns out he only wanted the decoder because of a secret document he found which is in "Templar Code". However, Vance's accomplices are being killed by an assailant whose motives are as of yet unknown. FBI agent Sean Daley (Scott Foley) is hot on Tess' trail, at first suspecting she's behind the murders of the "Templar" thieves of the museum. We also learn Daley is a devout Catholic, and because the artifacts belong to the Vatican, he turns to a Monsignor in the diocese of New York, played by Victor Garber, who interestingly enough played Jesus in the film version of the hippie-religious musical "Godspell", produced in the early 1970's.The film then becomes similar to "The Da Vinci Code", "Raiders of the Lost Ark", and "National Treasure" where the codes lead to other secret messages which in turn lead to other places. All the while, we get flashbacks to the small band of Templars of the late 13th century and what they were trying to accomplish. The trail leads Tess and Agent Daley to Turkey where the messages claim they hid a secret artifact in a Byzantine Church. One of the film's strengths is we see the episode in flashback of the Templar's adventures only as the next clue reveals what they had done. Part of what makes the whole thing work is a memorable performance by Mira Sorvino. Although I'm sure she wasn't nominated for any awards for this film, we run with it largely because of her. I thought Foley's performance as the FBI agent seemed a beat inconsistent, where he's portrayed as a devout catholic while simultaneously seeming uncaring about the Templar artifacts. So much of the film has elements which mirror the Da Vinci Code. Bill Vance is very similar to the character of Sir Leigh Teabing, scholar of Early Christianity and the so-called Priory. Vance is portrayed as the foremost scholar of the Templar Knights. The enigmatic and silent assailant is a cold assassin, similar to Silas of the Da Vinci Code, although in "The Last Templar" he's black instead of an albino. Tess has elements of both Indiana Jones and Robert Langdon, and of course she's coupled together with a member of the opposite sex who's an FBI agent, similar to Agent Sophie Neveu of the French police who gets together with Langdon. Overall, the story seems to be about archaeology versus faith which has become a hot-button issue in the late 20th and early 21st centuries, particularly in the wake of the discoveries of known Christian gospels found in Egypt in the 1940's. The theme is a decent one, although I am not sure I bought the overall point of view of the story which is revealed in the final climactic scene. Similar to Leigh Teabing, Bill Vance becomes a rather enigmatic character who seems at odds with who is by film's end.

Claudio Carvalho In New York, during the opening of the exposition of the Treasures of the Vatican for the public, four criminals posing as Templar knights break in the museum riding horses and heist the valuable artifacts. The archaeologist Dr. Tess Chaykin (Mira Sorvino) steals the horse of a policeman and chases and captures one thief with Red Cross of Constantine. The FBI Agent Sean Daley (Scott Foley) teams up with Tess that learns that the criminals' prime intention is a decoder mechanical device that can provide the location of the Templar treasure. They travel to Turkey where Tess expects to find the treasure and discover a conspiracy of the Church to keep classified information in secret to protect the Catholic Church.Yesterday I saw "The Last Templar" on a DVD just released in Brazil and I did not know that this is a mini-series. The DVD has 171 minutes running time; therefore the original series was edited and 69 minutes are missing. The edited film is too long and boring, without the suitable pace of an action movie, but it would be unfair to criticize this aspect since it is not the work of the director but the producer. The romantic corny conclusion is awful. I am a big fan of Mira Sorvino and the shape of this gorgeous actress is amazing and she does not look to be a forty-three year-old woman. The lame screenplay is dreadful, with ridiculous situation such as: (1) Tess cries to the thief in the heist to return the Constantine Cross that does not belong to him; (2) Tess investigates the case with several murders by herself, holding information that might have helped the official investigation, and is released by FBI; (3) The Catholic agent does not drink coffee in the Lent, but he shags a woman that he has just known; (4) The experienced archaeologist Tess drives reckless on the streets to show off to Sean; (5) A city buried by a volcano has light and only dust inside the building; (6) In a perfect storm with a huge wave, the perfect attitude is to jump overboard. There are many other silly and stupid situations that make the film a comedy, and not a suspenseful adventure. My vote is four.Title (Brazil): "O Último Templário" ("The Last Templar")

b-guvenilir Please be aware that the scenes stated to be as "bodrum-turkey" is not real Bodrum. Bodrum is one of the well-known touristic places of Turkey with beautiful sea and forests. It is not a village in the middle of middle east or north Africa. On the other hand, the language spoken and stated to be Turkish does nothing to do with Turkish. So as a result, I believe that producers, directors and actors of this film should have made more investigation about BODRUM since it is one of the most beautiful places on earth and Turkish language which is one of the oldest languages spoken on earth.Please search for Bodrum/Turkey on internet and you will see that this film is unfair to Bodrum and Turkish people.