Who Is The Kurgan? What The Set Photos Of Dave Bautista's Highlander Villain Tell Us
It’s better to burn out than to fade away...
An immortal hero is only interesting if they must face an immortal villain who is the embodiment of evil. Or, at least in the case of the original 1986 Highlander, the thing that truly makes the film’s central plot work is the notion that Connor MacLeod (Christopher Lambert) can’t allow the wicked Kurgan (Clancy Brown) to become the last immortal standing. “If he wins the prize, mortal men would suffer an eternity of darkness,” Ramirez (Sean Connery) says to Connor in the original film.
Now, 40 years after the first movie, Dave Bautista is rebooting the Kurgan for the new Highlander movie. Recent leaked set photos suggest that this version of the “perfect warrior” will take a slightly different direction than Clancy Brown’s psychopathic portrayal in the classic movie.
Though these photos haven’t been officially released, the images show Bautista wearing what appears to be a priest’s frock, which seems to hint that the Kurgan is hiding out in a church at some point in the movie. If this is a plot point in the film, it seems to invert an infamous scene from the 1986 film, in which the Kurgan and Connor have a tense conversation prior to their final battle in New York City.
Dave Bautista on the red carpet for Spectre in 2015.
As is Highlander tradition, you can’t have a sword fight on holy ground, so, in the classic movie, Connor and the Kurgan can be frank with each other, without drawing their weapons. If Bautista’s new Kurgan is working as a priest, it could throw a new twist onto the nature of the character. There’s basically zero chance that the Kurgan is good in this movie, but he might be abusing the holy ground rule in a way that makes him even more evil than the classic take.
In 1986, Clancy Brown’s Kurgan was a straightforward, unsubtle baddie in Highlander. He openly assaulted people and murdered for pleasure. That version of the Kurgan would almost certainly never pretend to be a priest to get the jump on someone; he was more outwardly a monster, a brute who would kick anyone’s ass or frighten anyone just by looking at them.
Now, Bautista certainly has the brawn to pull off that kind of menace, but it will be interesting to see what tone Chad Stahelski decides to strike with the new Kurgan. Will he be a broadsword-swinging savage? Or someone a little craftier?
Connor and the Kurgan’s church confrontation from the original 1986 Highlander.
Either way, like the casting of Henry Cavill as Conor, Bautista is physically perfect for this role; he’s played brutes before, like Mr. Hinx in the James Bond movie Spectre. But perhaps these set photos suggest that this version of the Kurgan will be a little more complex. Or, at the very least, craftier than he was in 1986.
