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King Arthur
Story: The Arthurian legend, allegedly. Running Time: 130 minutes. Certificate 12A
I so wanted to like this - it's British, it's dirty, it's based on flimsy legends so you can invent stuff to make it better and it's got Ray Winstone in it, but would you Arthur-and-Guinevere-it, I don't. It's just another war film and frankly I'm sick and tired of having cornflake packet morality shoved down my throat whenever I'm shown an image of someone killing someone else. The bad guys are baaaad, the good guys are oh so sensitive, the women fight as equals with the men, awwww look at that poor kiddie who needs wescuing, OH JUST PLEASE STOP! I've been tortured with so much of this nonsense that I'm actually beginning to think it's some kind of government propaganda telling us that it's OK to kill people, as long as it's the "baddies" that are the ones being killed. I can take a 12-year old to see this and have them learn that they have a right to kill as long as they think the other guy is a baddie, whereas I can't let a 17-year old watch The Exorcist. Go figure.
King Arthur is most definitely a war film, but it is more palatable than the usual warmongering claptrap due to its earthy and original look, though that's probably a felicitous side effect of having £8.30 to play with after finding out how much those little CGI effects cost (although they did seamlessly meld with the live action). Instead of capitalising on this tangibility, however, and playing the story as historians believe it to be, the scriptwriters have invented nonsense around the edges, in a kind of Leonardo-and-Kate Titanic way, which sucks away at the atmospheric mist like a Dyson, leaving a feeling of wanting-to-be-Hollywood but not being able to afford it. We know the mist is only there to hide the fact that you can't afford 10,000 extras or the CGI to make them, we don't care. Just treat us like adults, please. So, for those who can't be arsed to read all of the review and skip to the last paragraph (I don't blame you, I do yabber on sometimes) ... If King Arthur had been billed as a war film with King Arthur in it, I might have warmed to it more, but I feel justified in my disdain because it was billed as a depiction of the Arthurian legend, and whilst I lay no claim whatsoever to knowing anything about it bar it involving a table with no corners, it came across as just another war film that I will have forgotten by next year. Credit to the historical advisors though, for they had enough influence to make Merlin a weirdy foresty figure rather than a becloaked necromancer, but unfortunately the cash cows must have stampeded at that point. No, not even calling him Arturius half the time (only half, mind, we don't want the viewers thinking they've tuned into Time Team by mistake) could convince this sceptical reviewer. Take it away and string it up. It's the only language it understands. I enjoyed this film: I think the average moviegoer will enjoy it: Testosterone Satisfaction Rating: Lots of scrapping but no blood. Twisted morality (see above). To enjoy this film you should be: More forgiving than me.
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Cast: Clive Owen, Keira Knightley, Stellan Starsgard, Ray Winstone, Ioan Gruffudd, Hugh Dancy. Directed by Antoine Fuqua.
Sorry, I went off on one a bit there. Best get back to the review. The casting department
has done a very tasty job in finding some low budget talent - Stellan Starsgard bravely tries a
new side to the he's-so-horrible baddie and it works perfectly. Ray Winstone is as Ray Winstone
does, and in this context he's a shining light of clarity. There are very few actors who make you
wonder who else could have played their role as effectively, but Ray Winstone does it regularly.
The remainder of the cast - Clive Owen, Keira Knightley, Ioan Gruffudd - all potentials for Bond
or Bond babe - all earn their salaries but
could quite easily have been replaced by more talented unknowns.
