This movie, or first knight, or any other contender?
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pol-edra — 13 years ago(June 09, 2012 04:44 AM)
Difficult question! Though not First Knight, definitely.
I'd say Excalibur is probably the best Arthurian movie out there at the moment. It also has the advantage of being a retelling of the "story of Camelot", as you put it in your question, from its creation to its end, like its source material, which is not the case of many other adaptations (or source texts). But unfortunately, that doesn't make it a particularly faithful adaptation of the medieval tales. To me a true adaptation of Malory, or any other medieval text, is yet to be seen.
Other contenders:
The Knights of the Round Table (1953); its Technicolor flamboyance is very reminiscent of the medieval tales, but its characterization is pretty poor.
"
Occasionally
I'm callous and strange." -
deeveed — 13 years ago(June 11, 2012 12:41 PM)
pol-edra
You got it right and it is a surprise to think that Excalibur is probably the only film to really get to grips with Camelot, Mallory and Arthur. Perhaps it's tough to edit Mallory for the screen and to get the rich visual grandeur of the characters and times. It wojld be intersting to see if another filmmaker can top Boorman's adaptation. Not sure if Ridley Scott harbored any thoughts to the legend. I'd think it would be real interesting to see his potential approach. You know we'd get visual splendor for sure. -
pol-edra — 13 years ago(June 11, 2012 10:40 PM)
With the current trend for historical movies, I'm afraid we'd get another "true story behind the legend" movie by Ridley Scott. Interesting, to be sure, and since I was a bit sceptical of Fuqua's King Arthur, I'm all for a new historical Arthur movie. But I'm not sure I'd want Ridley to direct a literary adaptation, and that's what I really ache to see. So far, Arthurian movies have always more or less put the vague "legend" into images, without really paying attention to the original writing, the original characterization and plot, the sequence of events, the dialogue etc the way one would do to adapt Jane Austen or the Bront sisters or Dickens. The Morte Darthur is just misused as a catalogue of events from which to pick and choose, while the characters are seen as only names to be defined by the modern scriptwriter. Sometimes the name "Morte Darthur" is just thrown out there, along with the words "based on", when in fact you can't recognize a single thing form it (I'm thinking of the recent Camelot series: why did they ever throw the name Malory out there, if not for marketing purposes? it was certainly for no artistic ones). It is a pity, because Malory truly is an artist, and I want to see his work translated into images and a script, not somebody else's work pillaging his characters. Of course tremendous alterations would have to be made, but that's because of the process of adapting a literary source to the screen; not because the Morte Darthur is not an interesting literary source in itself.
Sometimes I think the Morte Darthur should get the Star Wars treatment: shoot the trilogy in the middle first (Arthur is kig, his knights go on adventures, the whole Lancelot-Guinevere thing, Tristan and Isolde, Joyous Guard, tournaments), then go back to a prequel (how Arthur became king, how the most famous knights joined the Round Table), and maybe, even, this time, shoot the postquel (Perceval, the Grail Quest, Mordred's betrayal, the collapse of the Arthurian world). 9 movies wouldn't be too much to pay a decent hommage to dear old Thomas. If not, then at least a TV series. A good one, this time.
"
Occasionally
I'm callous and strange." -
deeveed — 13 years ago(June 12, 2012 06:01 AM)
9 movies wouldn't be too much to pay a decent hommage to dear old Thomas. If not, then at least a TV series. A good one, this time.
I'd like to see it too but you know I'm pretty skeptical I'll see it in my lifetime. Something tells me there's an interest and money factor bobbing around when it comes to Malory's great tales. It's apparent that moviemakers 1. haven't tackled it all and 2. they don't want to or feel the need to. The Star Wars treatment is intriguing but the question I'd have is how far do the makers go with CGI/technology and also telling Malory's stories. Excalibur for me had the right balance of effects and story. I'd be curious as to how all that would play out in the SW's scenario. One thing I hope doesn't happen but perhaps some will disagree is the treatment say of "300" going into Malory's tales. It's quite 'modern' technologically but personally I hope it doesn't ever happen with Arthur. I guess my taste is kind of locked in.;-)But maybe that could be a consideration since it could be less expensive to produce. -
pol-edra — 13 years ago(June 12, 2012 06:22 AM)
I think the stylishness of 300 or Sin City worked very well for an adaptation from a comic book. I wouldn't see the point when adapting Le Morte Darthur.
CGI there would necessarily be some, if only because nowadays when you want to shoot a battle scene with 10 000 guys on each side, You don't hire 20 000 guys, you just make up most of them on a computer. LOTR di dthat very well. I could see the same thing working at Salisbury. But the most important things to me, in capturing the "maloriness" of Le MD, would be the way the plot stresses the tensions between the different ideals and bonds and the straightforwardness in telling the great story of an even greater failure. In a way, there's a bit of an Upstairs, Downstairs story in Malory, in the sense that these quasi mythological heroes embark on grand and wonderful adventures, while at the same time stumbling along the way on their own humanity. So many details in Malory are realistic and easily relatable for the modern reader. And yet the great scheme of things is entirely superhuman. That's what a Malory adaptation needs to convey, otherwise it's just another Arthurian reboot.
"
Occasionally
I'm callous and strange." -
deeveed — 13 years ago(June 13, 2012 01:10 PM)
You have some fine points. I'd just have to think the magic of Arthur, Malory, Camelot etc would have to go through a screenwriter who can visualize the prose and bring it to the screen with say a "Malorian" embellishment. He/she would also have to apply at the same time some sort of cohesion to the stories as well. Maybe it is a real hard hard project, eh?;-)..In any case, I wish it could be pulled off. The legend of a mythic Arthur and his Round Table is a fantastic story to tell after the mist of centuries.
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pol-edra — 13 years ago(June 13, 2012 01:30 PM)
To be honest, I have such high expectations of a Malory adaptation that I'm almost glad no one has attempted it yet. I'd probably turn into one of those sour and hateful posters who open dozens of threads just to spill out their disappointment in everything from the script to the directing to the costuming to the lighting department "and that horse bridle wasn't even historically accurate, bwaaaaahhhhh!!!" Please remind me not to be like that when/if "Arthur and Lancelot" (or the next Arthurian movie) ever sees the light of day?
"
Occasionally
I'm callous and strange." -
deeveed — 13 years ago(June 18, 2012 07:00 AM)
Well you know it's happened to me with "300". I am a very very very disappointed viewer with that daaptationbut that's me and what I like in film. Now I really hope you won't feel it with an adaptation you disagree with regarding Malory. It's not a good feeling to have especially if you like films like I do..;-).
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CDN_Dragon — 13 years ago(July 13, 2012 01:12 PM)
After Excaliburit has to be this one:
http://www.imdb.com/board/10071853/
Ignorance and prejudice
And fear walk hand in hand -
TheGingerReview — 13 years ago(September 12, 2012 08:55 AM)
For my money, it's Excalibur, the only film to capture the camp fun of the early years and the dark Bergman-esk world of Arthur's last years.
Though, I certainly wouldn't mind a truth behind the legend kind of deal from someone like Ridley Scott, if he followed the Warlord Chronicles by Bernard Cornwell. I'm a big Arthurian Legend geek and those books are among the best in my opinion (I know this seems like shameless plugging, but you guys really seem like lovers of the legend, so I hope you'd get a kick out of my review of the books:
http://ginger-review.blogspot.co.uk/2012/09/the-warlord-chonricals-rev iewgushing.html
)
"We came on holiday by mistake!" -
ozymandias312 — 13 years ago(September 14, 2012 11:59 PM)
Here's the thing about this movie and me: I didn't like it when I saw it in the theater back in 1981. I was 24 then. Not only was I both a history and a fantasy buff, but I was sooo serious and literal-minded.
I took this movie much too literally at first. I was all annoyed and outraged at what I took to be the historical inaccuracies and anachronisms.
What I missed on the first viewing was that they weren't even trying to accurately portray whatever actual underlying historical reality there might have been.
They were trying to do justice to the legend, the myth, with all its otherworldly mysticism. And they did that very well.
With repeated viewings this started to soak in on me, and the movie started to grow on me. The more I "got" it, the more I liked it. I finally came around to seeing it as the definitive film interpretation of the story, to date.
Ozymandias312
And I stood where I did be; for there was no more use to run; And again I lookt with my hope gone. -
drjettrink — 13 years ago(October 22, 2012 02:59 PM)
Without a doubt I think the best adaptation of the story of Camelot is Monty Python's Holy Grail.
In fact, I cant watch this version without comparing it to the Holy Grail.
But this version is truly epic.
