King_Arthur

King Arthur

Thoughts:

Afterthoughts:

My Advice:

I love fantasy movies and I love Ioan Gruffudd, so this movie has a lot going for it. The only thing I can see that might ruin it is a poor adaptation of the myth of King Arthur and/or Kiera Knightly. I like strong female characters, but I can�t stand Kiera Knightly. My sister and I call her the codfish because she couldn�t� seem to close her mouth all the way in Pirates of the Caribbean. She annoys me. End of story. Maybe the character of Guinivere will make up for it, but you never know.

The plot seems to be a straightforward adaptation of the love triangle and the round table parts of the myth. I�m not too big on the love triangle aspects, but I�m all about sword fights and the fantasy aspect of the myth. Merlin, you�re my only hope! My mother was making wisecracks about the length of the movie possibly being around 3 hours, but if the plot is interesting and the director paces the movie correctly, the 3 hours should fly by.

That.

Blew.

It could have been sooooo good, but they totally dropped the sword. It starts out being a character piece about Lancelot�for about the first 5 minutes. Then, it turns in to an ensemble piece about the knights. Okay. I can live with that. That lasts another 10 minutes and then the plot turns to Arthur. You know? If you�re gonna make an ensemble piece, make an ensemble piece. If you�re gonna do a character piece, pick a damn character � �a� character as in ONE � and stick to it!

Lancelot was the whole reason to watch this movie. He was gutsy, noble, and angry, but he had personality. He made lots of furtive glances at Guinevere, but never did anything. Not totally like the original myth, but that�s cool. There were lots of things in the movie that were twisted in to being a little more realistic and less mythical. That�s good. It�s a unique twist on the myth and unique is cool.

Arthur was just kind of�there. Corn-fused? Let me give you an example. Before the final, climactic battle, Arthur makes the usual raucus, rousing, raving, horseback-riding Braveheart-esque speech to his men�all 4 of them. Tell me: what is the purpose of weaving around frantically on horseback, spewing out an inspiring-on-paper speech to 5 guys? It�s an incredible sight if you�re trying to rouse an entire army because you see how much of an influence one guy can be on so many. However, it�s just dumb if the guy is trying to inspire 5 guys that you already know are career soldiers and are going to follow this guy in to hell and back. There�s no suspense there! You know they�re gonna go no matter what. It would have been more powerful if Arthur had just sat there and looked at the men on either side of them and simply said, �Ready?�

And then, there�s Guinevere. The character served exactly 3 purposes. One, as an attempt to shut women up about the lack of strong female protagonists in movies. She only succeeds in killing a lot of guys and, I�ve got news for you. A chick that thin and frail wouldn�t survive a down-and-dirty battle like that. Even if she were the most skilled fighter in all of Britain, she�d be knocked over by the force of one sword against her own and that�d be all she wrote. Her second purpose was as a fortune cookie. Every word out of her mouth was some cryptic speech about Arthur�s ties to Britain, not Rome. The third purpose? The obligatory sex scene with the hero (Arthur). So much for the strong female protagonist purpose. I honestly didn�t see any love there. Hell, I didn�t even see any respect there. Just a desire for the alpha male.

On the plus side, the battle scenes kicked ass! The best by far had to be the one on the ice floe. Ohhhh, that was great. Seven people against 200 and guess who won? And they won through tactics and guts, not because they had the biggest guns. Oh, that was great!

Bottom line: If you are a die-hard fan of some cast member of the movie, then go. That and the battle scenes would be worth the price for a matinee. Otherwise, wait until it comes out on DVD.