| KING ARTHUR |
 2004 - USA / IrelandDirector: Antoine Fuqua - Reviewed by Linda
At no point do the Knights link arms and sing:
"We're Knights of the Round Table! And, perhaps saddest of all, when Arthur and cohorts thunder through a dark forest on horseback, you just KNOW that the Knights of Ni should be there waiting for them. Instead, you get Merlin (as a shaggy hippie forest shaman!) and his tribe, covered in blue "native" warpaint armed with bows and arrows. Huh. And you know what? It's all really too bad. Because for such a classic story full of adventure, romance, and a noble quest, well, you can't help but drift off in your head and start humming songs from Monty Python and the Holy Grail to amuse yourself. Why? Because unfortunately King Arthur is a total bore. King Arthur is apparently based on the more realistic idea that Arthur lived in the Dark Ages (around 500 AD) rather than 1000 years later in the Middle Ages (which has been the popular perception). This Arthur is a half-Roman, half-British soldier of servitude. He and his merry men, ahhh, I mean the Knights of the Round Table, are only thundering across the land and whacking people with swords in the name of the Holy Roman Empire, as opposed to In the Name of All that Is Good. When Arthur and his Knights think their stints as soliders for the Empire are up, they are of course given one more assignment before they get their freedom papers. It doesn't really matter what this one last assignment is. Let's just say that of course it spells doom, as the Knights must go through enemy territory in the North of England, where they are threatened not only by Merlin and his peeps, but by the invading Saxons, who all look suspiciously like the Vikings. I have to just expound on the Saxons for a moment, because they are some hee-larious bad guys. The leader, played by Swede Stellan Skarsgård, looks like a Harley Davidson biker, beard and all, but speaks like a drawling American cowboy for no reason. His son, on the other hand, played by German superstar Til Schweiger, has a hipster skinhead look, replete with a braided tuft of chin-only goatee, and fashionable furs slung over his shoulder. He pouts, simpers, and sneers... and gains a cool scar across his face by the time the last battle rolls around. Now, notice I don't say much about Guinevere (Keira Knightley)? It takes her a good half of the movie to show up. There is the requisite half-naked shot through gauzy curtains as Lancelot (Ioan Gruffudd) peers longingly through, she quickly gets busy with Arthur, then she flings off her clothes, straps her boobs down with two tight pieces of tape, and becomes Xena: Warrior Princess for the rest of the film. She doesn't have much to work with, and her character just comes across as a superfluous addition of some estrogen into a very brawny, very burly male movie. King Arthur is super-violent in the best (or worst) Braveheart tradition. Blood flies, swords swish, hair gets muddied, and men cup each other's faces longingly when they have something really important to say (usually when one of them is dying). But speaking of longing, it made me long for the natural comraderie and character development of the Lord of the Rings movies. It made me wish for some of the traditional Arthurian myths (the Guin/Artie/Lance love triangle, for instance). And it even made me wish for some of the good old magic of the story (Excalibur!), rather than bloody realism. But when I cry "Camelot! Camelot! Camelot!"... I have to remember, it's just a movie. |
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At no point in this film does King Arthur (Clive Owen) pronouce with authority, "I am Arthur! King of the Britons!"
