Long before I went into 'King Arthur', the latest Jerry Bruckheimer film, I predicted that the film would have three things in accordance with the Bruckheimer formula.
1: A repetitive soundtrack provided by Hans Zimmer.
2: Lots of helicopter shots of lush scenery to make up for the lack of interesting dialogue.
3: Explosions.
Well now I've seen it, and even though the last item on the formula seemed unlikely seeing as how this was supposed to be a historically accurate telling set in the DARK AGES, it somehow found a way to throw big fiery explosions into this mix of drab and boring mud covered battle sequences and perhaps an even more dry and uninspired love story than the one in 'Star War: Attack Of The Clones'. The humour in this film is locker room at best (a joke from Austin Powers 3 was actually used), and was crafted to appeal to the under 18 'bathroom' crowd. I say 'bathroom' because there are a lot of intelligent teenagers, the humour in this movie is not for them - the jokes in this movie are for stupid teenagers. In fact during one particularly lame joke, I found it hard tell apart the laughter on screen from that of the four 16 year old guys sitting behind me, who were the only ones in the audience to find the joke about one of the Knights having a penis so large it was like "a baby's arm holding an apple" funny. The dialogue is dry and tedious, as is the pacing of the film. A scene involving a gate SO RUSTY AND HUGE that it takes two huge war horses to pull it open takes so long I thought I was going to pass out from lack of oxygen as the audience collectively yawned, and yet later in the film the door is opened by a single mortally wounded soldier in a matter of seconds I guess even in the Dark Ages they had some WD-40.
The film's logic is so preposterous that it actually makes the simple mistake of KILLING THE NARRATOR and yet having him summarize the story at the end of the film! Perhaps the writer completely misunderstood the purpose of a narrator in a film - that the narrator has born firsthand witness to the story and lived to tell about it. How could the Narrator tell the story if he's DEAD?! Never mind, don't ask questions like that at this movie. At the start of the film Arthur and his Knights are sent on one final mission from Rome to rescue the beloved pupil of the Pope, who for some reason lives with his family in the middle of hostile territory. Why or how the Pope's star pupil came to live in the middle of Barbarian infested England is another question you're not meant to ask. The villain, a Saxon chieftain is like a really bored cross between Captain Barbosa and Darth Sidious, Guinevere looks like an angry 15 year old girl at an Avril Lavigne concert in her battle getup and is about as convincing as one when she's supposed to be noble and inspiring in her queen getup, and Arthur is a completely implausible moral centre of the film. Arthur in this story is a former Roman Centurion who is completely shocked when he witnesses torture. That's right, a Roman soldier, serving the country that invented such lovely devices as the Catherine Wheel and Crucifixion is shocked by torture! I'll leave you to figure that one out for yourselves.
A film with the audacity to call itself the 'true story of King Arthur' must be held to a higher standard than that of a fun popcorn flick, which is all this film seemed to be trying for. The sad fact is that this movie doesn't pull off even that meagre feat. This movie is not fun, it's drab, it's uninteresting, and it's boring. You'll have more fun eating your popcorn than you will watching this movie.
1: A repetitive soundtrack provided by Hans Zimmer.
2: Lots of helicopter shots of lush scenery to make up for the lack of interesting dialogue.
3: Explosions.
Well now I've seen it, and even though the last item on the formula seemed unlikely seeing as how this was supposed to be a historically accurate telling set in the DARK AGES, it somehow found a way to throw big fiery explosions into this mix of drab and boring mud covered battle sequences and perhaps an even more dry and uninspired love story than the one in 'Star War: Attack Of The Clones'. The humour in this film is locker room at best (a joke from Austin Powers 3 was actually used), and was crafted to appeal to the under 18 'bathroom' crowd. I say 'bathroom' because there are a lot of intelligent teenagers, the humour in this movie is not for them - the jokes in this movie are for stupid teenagers. In fact during one particularly lame joke, I found it hard tell apart the laughter on screen from that of the four 16 year old guys sitting behind me, who were the only ones in the audience to find the joke about one of the Knights having a penis so large it was like "a baby's arm holding an apple" funny. The dialogue is dry and tedious, as is the pacing of the film. A scene involving a gate SO RUSTY AND HUGE that it takes two huge war horses to pull it open takes so long I thought I was going to pass out from lack of oxygen as the audience collectively yawned, and yet later in the film the door is opened by a single mortally wounded soldier in a matter of seconds I guess even in the Dark Ages they had some WD-40.
The film's logic is so preposterous that it actually makes the simple mistake of KILLING THE NARRATOR and yet having him summarize the story at the end of the film! Perhaps the writer completely misunderstood the purpose of a narrator in a film - that the narrator has born firsthand witness to the story and lived to tell about it. How could the Narrator tell the story if he's DEAD?! Never mind, don't ask questions like that at this movie. At the start of the film Arthur and his Knights are sent on one final mission from Rome to rescue the beloved pupil of the Pope, who for some reason lives with his family in the middle of hostile territory. Why or how the Pope's star pupil came to live in the middle of Barbarian infested England is another question you're not meant to ask. The villain, a Saxon chieftain is like a really bored cross between Captain Barbosa and Darth Sidious, Guinevere looks like an angry 15 year old girl at an Avril Lavigne concert in her battle getup and is about as convincing as one when she's supposed to be noble and inspiring in her queen getup, and Arthur is a completely implausible moral centre of the film. Arthur in this story is a former Roman Centurion who is completely shocked when he witnesses torture. That's right, a Roman soldier, serving the country that invented such lovely devices as the Catherine Wheel and Crucifixion is shocked by torture! I'll leave you to figure that one out for yourselves.
A film with the audacity to call itself the 'true story of King Arthur' must be held to a higher standard than that of a fun popcorn flick, which is all this film seemed to be trying for. The sad fact is that this movie doesn't pull off even that meagre feat. This movie is not fun, it's drab, it's uninteresting, and it's boring. You'll have more fun eating your popcorn than you will watching this movie.