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I watched “King Arthur” this evening with Sandra…

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I watched “King Arthur” this evening with Sandra…

What a bloody waste of time. That’s “bloody,” the adjective, meaning “spattered with, drenched with, drowned in, and soaked clear through with human circulatory fluids.” I’m not using the UK English epithet, though that probably applies too. That movie went nowhere. The only worthwhile moments:

1) a long shot towards the beginning, with people doing their wash stooped over at the shore of a lake.
ME: “There’s some lovely filth over here.”
SANDRA: *giggle*

2) Some dude telling young Arthur why he is the commander of these knights, and what his responsibility will be. Cut to vaguely apprehensive faces of the boy-knights riding off to be trained…
ME: “King, eh? Well I didn’t vote for you.”
SANDRA: *giggle*

I didn’t have the heart to pantomime the coconuts, or quip “it’s only a model” every time we saw castles.

Most of the rest was chopping and hacking and grimy people and “chunky” sword-splatters and smoke and stupid unfinished CGI shots of “Hadrian’s Improbably smooth and perfect 400-year-old Wall.” Oh, and Kiera Knightly in warpaint.

There was some dialog, including some repeated babblings about “freedom,” but it didn’t seem to be worth paying attention to, so I tuned it out.

–Howard

16 thoughts on “I watched “King Arthur” this evening with Sandra…”

  1. Sue, my ladylove, vetoed us going to see Arthur. She has studied the mythology a bit, and she was not at all pleased with what she had learned and picked up from the movie. Rather like me vetoing seeing “Troy”, since way back in the day I’d studied the Greek mythology.

    The ladies looked cute, though. *grin*

    Glad we avoided it.

  2. Yup. Summarized pretty accurately there. I’m a huge fan of Stephen Lawhead’s pendragon series of books about Arthur and co. The movie was like seeing a puppy being strangled.

  3. There was literally nothing to like about this movie.

    The only way I got threw it was imagining the Studio execs listing all the things they needed to have in it in order for the movie to be a success.

    – We need Kiera Knightly to show her thigh.
    – We need her in Xena Celtic Princess Gear.
    – We need a Brave Heart speech.
    – Lets give Clive Owen package producing leather pants.
    – Lets take the best thing in this movie (Ioan Griffudd) and do NOTHING WITH HIM!
    – We need the gruff talking seargant with a heart of gold.

    Or something.

    Just talking about that movie makes me ill.

  4. I think I remember them saying in a featurette that at least a good sized chunk of the wall was actually built using measurements of the stones from the real Hadrian’s Wall. I thought that was pretty neat.

    1. The close shots of the walls, the people, the fights, and the forests were all very convincing, yes. If nothing else, the movie was pretty (when it wasn’t ugly-full-of-gore)

      The CGI of the wall was horrible. If they used meausurements of real stones, they should have introduced a little bit of “chipping and wear” on the stones, rather than just going all CTRL-C, CTRL-V.

  5. “It’s only a model.” “SHH!”

    Twenty years ago, when Cepheid Variable was still doing SF movie nights at Texas A&M (in addition to AggieCon), we discovered a valuable lesson:

    If you show a double feature of EXCALIBUR and MONTY PYTHON AND THE HOLY GRAIL, do NOT I say again NOT show Holy Grail FIRST!

    The whole THEATER was doing that.

    “WHAT IS THE SECRET OF THE GRAIL?”
    “I- I don’t know!” *fling* “AAAAAUUUUUUGH!”

  6. Just out of curiousity did you see the regular version (that was in the theater) or the director’s cut? The reason I ask is everyone who saw the theater version has complained about it, but my fiancee and I saw the director’s cut and it seemed much more tolerable, dare I say entertaining, than what the theater version was described as being.

    1. We saw the Director’s Cut.

      Honestly, the only redeeming factor the movie had was that it will function as “aversion therapy” for folks who think fighting with swords is noble.

      I doubt the theatrical version had that level of blood and gore in it. I also doubt that the story could have been any worse in the theaters.

      –Howard

      1. aversion therapy…hrrm…I think that it might have the opposite effect for some of the people I’ve known who thought it was noble. lol

        Good points though, I saw MP’s Holy Grail again AFTER I’d watched King Arthur, and I’m sure your viewing was much more entertaining than ours was. 🙂

      2. From what I’ve heard, the theatrical version was pretty much the same except they cut away in every shot right before the sword hit so there was no obvious blood or gore.

  7. I enjoyed the movie when we saw it in the theatre.

    Since the story is a myth, I’m happy losing myself in the fantasy and the story, and don’t worry about historical (or hysterical) accuracy.

    Our hugs to you and all you hold dear.

  9. I will be the voice of pseudo-dissent here. We knew better than to pay theatre prices for this movie, so we waited for DVD, got a big group of friends together, and watched the director’s cut. Yes, there were inaccuracies a-plenty, and we all (well, almost all) enjoyed ripping on things throughout the movie. Then, at the end, when the trash talk really started, I spoke up. I said, “Okay, so it was pretty bad. But have you ever seen a better Arthurian movie? Nobody could think of one.

    So don’t be upset for what it wasn’t, be happy for what it was. The best job Hollywood has ever (?) done with the legend of Arthur.

    1. The sad part is that Excalibur is a better movie than this, and that’s with the “O Fortuna” snippets playing in the background. Monty Python and the Quest for the Holy Grail was more entertaining, and I hear the musical “Spam-A-Lot” is worth the price of admission.

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