I suppose they meant well. And their attempts to place the legendary hero Arthur in a more realistic era are to be applauded. But in truth, there are all sorts of problems with this disappointing failure.
On the upside, it looks good. It's well dressed, well shot, and where the lesser characters are concerned, well acted. But unfortunately that's where the plaudits end and the brickbats begin.
As Arthur, Clive Owen is about as wooden as it's possible for an actor to be and remain in place as the star of the film. He's far too clean cut, and doesn't pack anything like sufficient passion to be convincing as a Dark Ages war-chief. He should have been replaced in the role by Ioan Gruffud, who is wasted as Lancelot, Lancelot himself being wasted his part in the famous tale is here reduced to that of a cynical lieutenant. Guinevere is portrayed by Keira Knightley as a Celtic warrior princess not a bad idea, but as always in the hands of Knightley, and particularly ludicrously on this occasion, she sounds as though she's just emerged from ladies finishing school. Perhaps the biggest disappointment of all is the absence of Merlin, the most enigmatic personality in the whole story. Okay he's here, but he does and says so little that he might as well not be.
We also have several bizarre switches from winter to summer. One minute we're on a frozen lake, the next we're on a verdant meadow with all the trees in full leaf. It's baffling and rather silly, and completely detracts from the otherwise effectively harsh climate that the film seeks to create. Even the battles don't work particularly well. They've been applauded by many, but to me they suffer from what I call "the 'Troy' disease" in that they are painfully over-choreographed. It's more like watching a ballet rehearsal than an actual fight.
There are all sorts of historical issues too, and yet again you wonder why, when they had such a good original story to work from, the movie makers had to change so much. Everybody knows nowadays that Arthur, if he existed, was not a medieval king presiding over a chivalrous court. He was most likely an ex-Roman officer, who assembled tribal leaders to fend off the Saxon incursions (the Saxons incidentally did not invade Britain via Scotland, as is shown in the film they came in through the south-east, and their conquest was not a holocaust, but a gradual colonisation). In this instance however, Arthur is presented as a Roman officer serving at the head of a troop of Samartian horsemen (very anachronistically referred to as 'knights'); an odd and pointless diversion from the myth, in which, far more excitingly, his supporters are natives who must learn to defend their homeland after the protection of the legions has been withdrawn. Sadder still, none of the really dramatic events of Arthur's reign his creation of the Round Table to unite a nation, his heroic death not at the hands of invaders but in a treachery-filled civil war are even touched upon. All we're really dealing with here is a rescue mission just north of Hadrian's Wall, which goes badly wrong. Hardly the stuff great romances are made of.
Another missed historical opportunity, and in this case a particularly bad one with the money that was spent here, a seriously good Arthurian epic could have resulted.
On the upside, it looks good. It's well dressed, well shot, and where the lesser characters are concerned, well acted. But unfortunately that's where the plaudits end and the brickbats begin.
As Arthur, Clive Owen is about as wooden as it's possible for an actor to be and remain in place as the star of the film. He's far too clean cut, and doesn't pack anything like sufficient passion to be convincing as a Dark Ages war-chief. He should have been replaced in the role by Ioan Gruffud, who is wasted as Lancelot, Lancelot himself being wasted his part in the famous tale is here reduced to that of a cynical lieutenant. Guinevere is portrayed by Keira Knightley as a Celtic warrior princess not a bad idea, but as always in the hands of Knightley, and particularly ludicrously on this occasion, she sounds as though she's just emerged from ladies finishing school. Perhaps the biggest disappointment of all is the absence of Merlin, the most enigmatic personality in the whole story. Okay he's here, but he does and says so little that he might as well not be.
We also have several bizarre switches from winter to summer. One minute we're on a frozen lake, the next we're on a verdant meadow with all the trees in full leaf. It's baffling and rather silly, and completely detracts from the otherwise effectively harsh climate that the film seeks to create. Even the battles don't work particularly well. They've been applauded by many, but to me they suffer from what I call "the 'Troy' disease" in that they are painfully over-choreographed. It's more like watching a ballet rehearsal than an actual fight.
There are all sorts of historical issues too, and yet again you wonder why, when they had such a good original story to work from, the movie makers had to change so much. Everybody knows nowadays that Arthur, if he existed, was not a medieval king presiding over a chivalrous court. He was most likely an ex-Roman officer, who assembled tribal leaders to fend off the Saxon incursions (the Saxons incidentally did not invade Britain via Scotland, as is shown in the film they came in through the south-east, and their conquest was not a holocaust, but a gradual colonisation). In this instance however, Arthur is presented as a Roman officer serving at the head of a troop of Samartian horsemen (very anachronistically referred to as 'knights'); an odd and pointless diversion from the myth, in which, far more excitingly, his supporters are natives who must learn to defend their homeland after the protection of the legions has been withdrawn. Sadder still, none of the really dramatic events of Arthur's reign his creation of the Round Table to unite a nation, his heroic death not at the hands of invaders but in a treachery-filled civil war are even touched upon. All we're really dealing with here is a rescue mission just north of Hadrian's Wall, which goes badly wrong. Hardly the stuff great romances are made of.
Another missed historical opportunity, and in this case a particularly bad one with the money that was spent here, a seriously good Arthurian epic could have resulted.
