The legend of King Arthur and his Knights of the Round Table conjure up words such as magic, stirring, spellbinding, and timeless, none of which apply to Jerry Bruckheimer’s cinematic rendering. Except, maybe, the timeless part, because sitting through this seems like an eternity. Bruckheimer and director Antoine Fuqua have taken gold, as in the stuff of legends that have enthralled people for a thousand years, and turned it lead, as in a mind-numbingly turgid revision masquerading as entertainment. Boldly tossing aside the tales that are rife with archetypes and adventure, not to mention forbidden passion and doomed love, the stuff that captured the collective imagination, they present us with what they claim at the outset is a more historically accurate Arthur. That may or may not be true, but if it is, we now have a case study in why given the choice, legend is the way to go.
It’s the 6th century, which is when the backwoods warlord named Arthur lived, and the art direction doesn’t shrink from the overwhelming griminess of the time. From there fancy runs free and to a mostly Goth style of leather costuming. Arthur (Clive Owen) is a half-British Roman of the Equestrian class, read knight, keeping the Empire safe at its outmost occidental border, Hadrian’s Wall, which you will recall was a stone fence dividing Britain from the savage native tribes to the north. The Romans called them Picts, the film calls the Woads, and Guinevere (Keira Knightly) is one of their crackerjack warriors, and so is Merlin (Stephen Dillane), or, to be more accurate, he’s the magician king of them and, hence, Arthur’s sworn enemy. Lancelot (Ioan Gruffudd) is a conscript into the Roman army from someplace in Central Europe. All the other knights are also conscripts, Gawain, Galahad, et als, but they are more or less indistinguishable beneath their long matted hair and stubbly beards, save for Bors, who has a buzz cut. Except for the armor, they look pretty much like the invading hordes of Saxons, who pose a threat to Britain now that Rome has decided to cut its losses and withdraw from the island altogether. The Saxons turns out, they are even more blood-thirsty and savage than the Woads
The story opens with Arthur and his knights one day away from being released from the army after fifteen years of service, a plot device so trite that one wonders at the nerve of those who chose to use it in a purportedly serious context. Of course, before they get their discharge papers, they have one last mission and, naturally, it’s of the suicide variety. They must go north, over the Wall, where the Saxons are marauding and the Woads are still steamed at them, and save a patrician Roman family that for some reason has built its estate in enemy territory. Perhaps the property values were lower. Basically, what we have here is a tale pulled from thin air and varnished with a few facts pulled from history books and then sexed up with familiar names and a round table. That, by the way, is as sexy as it gets, even when Arthur and Guinevere engage in some disconcertingly dull heavy breathing.
This brings me to director Antoine Fuqua, the man who directed Denzel Washington to an Oscar in TRAINING DAY. The advertising for KING ARTHUR mentions that credit prominently. Forgotten is the film he’s done since then, namely TEARS OF THE SUN, in which star Bruce Willis famously never moved more that three muscles on his face, and never more than a few millimeters at that, throughout the running time. Fuqua seems to have been taken with that, and so has directed Owen, an actor heretofore of considerable charisma and raw talent, to do a Bruce Willis impersonation. It was a very bad idea. And even worse when applied Stellan Skarsgard as the Saxon leader with whom Arthur must do battle. Where Owen is rendered merely lethargic, Skarsgard actually seems to be sleepwalking and unsteadily at that. Only Knightly manages to work around Fuqua’s vision by occasionally wafting an air of cool mystery, even in battle, where she wears a series of leather straps wound around her in such a way as to preserve the films PG-13 rating. That such attire is historically inaccurate goes without saying. The Picts, or Woads, or what have you, went into battle, male and female, stark naked except for a layer of blue-colored mud called, in point of fact, woad. Odd, yes, but it did freak the Romans out.
But I digress.
The script by David Franzoni offers little help. It has the characters marching to and fro around the countryside spouting high-minded and pompous dialogue. It’s like MONTY PYTHON AND THE HOLY GRAIL, but not as entertaining, and forget funny, at least, not on purpose. Bruckheimer, known for his penchant for things that blow up real good, did not let the lack of gunpowder in England during the Dark Ages stop him from indulging in pyrotechnics. Reduced to using pitch-soaked hay in the film’s climactic and interminable battle sequence, he still manages to make things look like they’re exploding even when, technically, it’s impossible. You have to admire the tenacity of his obsession, undercut though it is by Skarsgard continuing to sleepwalk through the clank of swordplay and the endless billows of smoke.
Those stuck seeing KING ARTHUR would do well to follow Skarsgard’s example and pretend that the whole thing is just a bad dream.
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