WARNING: The following contains spoilers for The Lost City, now playing in theaters
Any good action-adventure film will feature plenty of nameless henchmen and minions for the heroes to dispatch along the way. The same extends to The Lost City, which finds the unprepared Loretta (Sandra Bullock) and Alan (Channing Tatum) contending with a deadly mercenary force. One of the best running gags in the film though centers around the surprising humanity of these henchmen, with the leads actually expressing shock at their demises across the course of the film and helping infuse the tired trope with a bit of fun character.
Most adventure-heavy films rely on a sense of danger and excitement to help ratchet up the tension. An easy way to highlight this is by showcasing the potential fates of the numerous henchmen any villain will eventually employ. This extends to The Lost City, which is driven by Abigail Fairfax (Daniel Radcliffe) and his increasingly manic attempts to force Loretta to help him find a lost treasure. Increasingly through the film, his henchmen are whittled down by the adventure — either being taken down by the short-lived Jack Trainer (Brad Pitt), killed by Alan and Loretta’s bumbling and effective plans or the treacherous terrain itself — with more than one henchman, including Julian (Thomas Forbes-Johnson), falling to their death.
However, the film doesn’t treat these sudden demises as casually as other films in the genre. Instead, the mortality of the henchmen and the lack of concern Fairfax has for them is a major joke. Loretta and Alan are horrified when their plan to stop two goons on motorbikes results in the pair tumbling down a hill to their likely deaths. The henchmen Julian and Rafi (Héctor Aníbal) are given little batches of characterization, particularly Rafi — who repeatedly expresses frustration with Fairfax’s cavalier attitude to tearing up his homeland for the sake of the treasure. Julian’s death comes as a shock, falling off a cliff-side to his death and catching the group by surprise, but Fairfax’s disconnect from it is used to highlight his increasingly manic side and is a precursor to how brutal he’s becoming.
Even Loretta and Alan seem shocked by Julian’s death and are later able to only escape the climax of the film thanks to Rafi — who saves the pair by leaving a crowbar behind for them. Rafi is a great take on the “treacherous henchman” archetype, but not one motivated by greed — he’s motivated by humanity.
This is reflected in Loretta and Alan saying Rafi was always their favorite of the henchmen, even though that’s slightly muted by him helping put them in mortal danger to begin with. It’s a surprisingly humanistic take on the henchmen archetype — and a surprisingly loyal one too. He’s not the only one, as another henchman is revealed to be furious about the deaths of his compatriots and is set up as a major threat — only to be seemingly burnt to death in short order.
The henchmen in The Lost City are indicative of the film as a whole and a great example of what elevates the movie. The humanity and characterization throughout of the entire cast elevate the relatively one note-characters, with figures like Radcliffe’s Fairfax elevated as a concept thanks to his manic performance. Aníbal does something similar with Rafi, infusing a lot of surprising quick depth into what could have been a forgettable character. The Lost City works because of its cast imbuing the basic tropes with personality, and that extends all the way down to the surprisingly realistic takes on the typical goons that usually occupy this genre.
To see the Fairfax henchmen trying (and failing) to stay alive, check out The Lost City, now playing in theaters
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