DVD Review - KING ARTHUR

The latest version of the Legend of Arthur has been "Hollywood-ized" by removing all mystic and fantastical elements from it and creating an "historical fiction" film (notice i used "an" instead of "a" before "historical"... that's 'cause I was in college!) This means no Ecalibur/Sword in the Stone/Lady of the Lake scenes, no Merlin the Magician throwing spells, no shining armor and grand castles. This follows a trend used in Troy which left all the greek mythology out of the ultimate greek myth! All of the epic adventure films in the last 10 years are trying to play catch-up to Braveheart, and King Arthur does not even attempt to be subtle about it.

There's the graphic battle scenes (beheadings, arms chopped off, stabbing through neck, blood splatter). Check. Blue face paint. Check. Speech about freedom delivered on horse-back in front of the troops. Check. It's funny how these have all become cliche' in this type of film. Hell, even Return of the King borrowed a little. This can be forgiven.

The story goes a little something.....like this: The roman empire is degenerating and contracting it's borders. It's abandoning it's outpost in England and recalling all true roman citizens and leaving the britons to fend for themselves. There's a "great wall" (ala "of china") seperating England from Scotland which is controlled by the savage Saxons. The wall is defended by Arthr, a Roman citizen (but his mother was English) and a group of knights from western Europe who were pressed into service fifteen years ago. Arthur and the knights also protect roman intrests from the native (you can tell by the blue paint!) britons led by Merlin (wasn't he a wizard or something?). Well, there's only seven knights left now but they will be given their freedom if they accompish one last mission: Retreive a Roman and his family from north of the wall before an advancing Saxon army gets them. Hijinks ensue.

Casting and acting is above average. The knights a likable and don't deliver too many cheesy lines. Arturius (Clive Owen) leads them , then there's Zen-like warrior/archer Tristan (Mads Mikkelsen) big loud strong guy Bors (Ray Winstone), big quiet strong guy Dagonet (Ray Stevenson), Do-nothing whiners Gawain (Joel Edgerton) and Galahad (Hugh Dancy) and frowns and shakes head alot Lancelot (Ioan Gruffudd). I like the unknown cast. Three of these guys will bite it. Guess which ones? Probably not the ones you'd expect. There's also the super-hot but toothpick-like Keira Knightley playing Guinevere, who they've turned into a native warrior princess, blue face paint and all. The saxons are led by the father and son conqorers Cerdic (Stellan Skarsgard) and Cynric (Til Schweiger), how cute. They're probably invading cause ol' Cerdic seems constapated the whole movie and giving his best Nick Nolte impression.

There are a few things that really bothered me in this film. First Arthur uses the word freedom about a bajillion times. It's actually every third word out of his mouth. This from a Roman commander fighting the non-free british natives while leading a group of non-free knights. In fact there's a flashback to an 11 year old Arthur who actually makes some comment about soldier's freedom. Seems to have freedom on the brain. Then ther'es the ludicrous strategy employed by the armies of this movie. The saxons burn everything they find. yes, we get it, they're bloodthirsty and ruthless, but when moving a large army across enemy territory, you need supplies, food, shelter. Nah, let's just burn it! When they get to the great wall of arthur, they find the doors...open! Oops! Of course it's a trap and when a small force of saxons go in the doors slam and they're destroyed. But then the door is opened again!?!?! And here come the rest of the army!! DUMB! The saxons had no artillery to penetrate that wall. Arthur had some Trebuchets and could have sat behind the wall picking them off with those and his superior archers all day. Nah, let's fight hand to hand. And it was laughable to see Keira Knightly, all 80 lbs of her, swinging a sword in one hand and axe in the other, killing burly saxon warriors left and right, little bitty titties strapped down by a few leather belts. Pshaww! And when Guin comes to Arthur to do him one night, Arthur acts like he's never touched a woman before. In the wild and swinging dark ages, there needs to be a little more sex.

Even given all this, the movie was still enjoyable. It was a solid epic, with a few memorable scenes, especially the knights making a stand on the frozen lake (an actual original concept!) I would have preferred it if all ties to King Arthur were left out. I would have rather just seen a "Knights of Briton" lead by "Clive" then plugging Arthurian names onto these characters. On the Braveheart scale I'll give it a 7, but on the King Arthur scale it gets a 4.

The Sneaky Cheetah's Grade: C+