Tag Archives: movie

01/11/13

Robin Hood Review (spoilers)

I just watched movie again and had to comment on it.  Since I’m a sap for anything medieval, I knew I would probably enjoy Ridley Scott’s, Robin Hood, even if his movies are generally too violent for my taste.  I have to say that I liked the movie more than I thought I would.  He refrained from his usual slo-mo blood spray as the hero kills another man (or dies himself), for which I was grateful. 

In summary, the movie follows Robin from France, where he was in King Richard’s train, to England, where he falls into an impersonation of the dead heir to the Locksley lands.   To be fair, Robin did impersonate the poor dead Sir Locksley initially, but he approached the dead man’s family on the up-and-up.  Meanwhile, John, now King John as Richard died in a final siege in France on his way home from the Crusades, has put his trust in the wrong man.  This Englishman, Godfrey, was a nursling with John, and thus is trusted by him above all others.  King John strips William Marshal of his station and gives it to Godfrey.  Unfortunately, Godfrey is secretly in league with the King of France and decides he must hunt Robin down since Robin knows of this alliance.  Naturally, Robin evades him and proceeds to rally the unhappy northern English lords against John, who has put his Godfrey in charge of collecting taxes.  Unbeknownst to John, Godfrey is killing English people and besieging towns, all to foment unrest and open the way for the King of France to attack a divided England.  Clever, actually.

Ultimately, the barons force King John to promise to sign the Magna Carta (15 years early) and the King of France is defeated at the sea, along with the Godfrey, whom Robin kills.  Robin is one of the leaders in the battle (having earned Willliam Marshal’s respect, natch).  But somehow (and this is never explained) King John discovers that Robin is a fraud and in a fit of anger not only refuses to sign the Magna Carta but outlaws Robin.  No idea how that happened.

Although the plot is full of holes and historical inaccuracies, I liked the character development, I liked Russell Crowe in this role, and I thought Cate Blanchette made an interesting 40-something Marian.  Nitpicking, the color of her hair was odd and she wore it down all the time, but she was appropriately sharp-witted.  Virtually all the characters and situations, barring King John himself and William Marshall, one of the greatest knights of his age, are fabrications, including the evil Godfrey.  Louis, the Prince of France, not the King of France, did plan to invade England at one point–was invited in, in fact, by the rebel barons–but not until 1215.

From Wikipedia:  “At first, in November 1215, Louis simply sent the barons a contingent of knights to protect London. However, even at that stage he also agreed to an open invasion, despite discouragement from his father the King of France and from the Pope.  This came in May 1216 – , watchmen on the coast of Thanet detected sails on the horizon, and on the next day, the King of England and his armies saw Louis’s troops disembark on the coast of Kent. John decided to escape to the Saxon capital of Winchester, and so Louis had little resistance on his march to London. He entered London, also with little resistance, and was openly received by the rebel barons and citizens of London and proclaimed (though not crowned) king at the cathedral. Many nobles, including Alexander II of Scotland for his English possessions, gathered to give homage to him.

Many of John’s supporters, sensing a tide of change, moved to support the barons. Gerald of Wales remarked: “The madness of slavery is over, the time of liberty has been granted, English necks are free from the yoke.” On 14 June Louis captured Winchester (John had already left) and soon conquered over half of the English kingdom.”

John died in October of 1216, however, and the barons immediately decided they’d rather be ruled by his son, Henry III (then only 9) with William Marshal as regent.  By September of 1217, all of Louis’ English barons had defected back to Henry and he sailed back to France.  None of this is in the movie, of course.

I had hoped that certain aspects of the plot would make more sense when watched a second time. To a certain degree they did, because I watched the Director’s Cut (I always recommend Ridley Scott’s Director’s cuts–he puts way to much into his movies, and then cuts them, leaving key plot points on the floor). I enjoyed this movie.

p.s. I don’t think my eyes deceived me when the opening text said something about the unrest in England ‘at the turn of the twelfth century’. To my eyes, that should read ‘turn of the thirteenth century’ since it is set in the 1200s. A quick Google search shows me, however, that for the British, the phrase means either 1100 or 1200 so Scott’s usage is correct. Still looks wrong to me :)

09/16/12

The Best and the Worst of King Arthur movies

I’m bumping this post because I’ve just discovered that a new King Arthur movie is in the works.  Now, King Arthur always provides good fodder for story-telling, but I’m not so sure about this: http://moviehole.net/201257625men-in-tights-writer-turns-his-attention-to-spoofing-king-arthur

The title of the article says it all, but here’s a quote:  ”J.D Shapiro wordsmith of “Robin Hood : Men in Tights”, will take the Mickey out of the Knights of the Roundtable in a future feature …  In 524 AD, Arthur Lol Pendragon went to Camelot. One thousand, four hundred and eighty five years later this footage was found. What it reveals is both shocking and more shocking. We have discovered that, out of all the legendary tales told about King Arthur and his knights… not one of them got it right.”.

I think I’m terrified …

______________________

While we’re on the subject of King Arthur, which of course, we always are, except when we’re talking about Llywelyn ap Gruffydd, I thought we could talk movies.   Since I’ve ranted about the King Arthurs I don’t like to read about or watch (http://www.sarahwoodbury.com/the-fictional-king-arthur-rant/), how many King Arthur movie depictions have there actually been?  And how many have been done well?

Here’s the list from Wikipedia of straightforward King Arthur movies:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_films_based_on_Arthurian_legend

I’ve seen very few of them, as it turns out.  In reading the list, I realized that I found that the movie I liked best was the 2004 King Arthur version where he’s Roman.  The history was bad, and it was a vehicle for Keira Knightly to fight a battle wearing next to nothing, but . . . I still kind of liked it.  The fact that Modred and Morgan le Fay were entirely absent may have had something to do with it.

I tried to watch First Knight when it came out, and then quite recently on Netflix.  I couldn’t cope with it, though normally I’ll watch Sean Connery in anything.  This is the ‘classic’ tale (meaning French) to which I object the most.  Everyone dies in the end.

I can’t believe Quest for Camelot is on this list.  My kids liked it.

A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court has it’s own category, as it deserves, further down on the web page.  I remember liking it as a kid.  If you haven’t read the book by Mark Twain, you’re missing out.

Colin Firth is apparently in The Last Legion, which has a score of 16% on Rotten Tomatoes.  I’m requesting it from Netflix, because, honestly, with that description how could I not?

Excalibur is also the ‘classic’ tale with the even worse addition of Mordred as Morgana’s and Arthur’s son.  Horrible.

Painfully, I watched Avalon High.  It does have Castle’s daughter, Alexis, as the cheating girlfriend.

Don’t get me started on Monty Python and the Holy Grail.  My son made me change one of the descriptions in Cold my Heart because it was too close to a line from the movie and he couldn’t read it without laughing.  It’s ruined everything :)

I’d love to know how many of these movies you all have seen–and what you thought?

As a side note, this is my favorite King Arthur book:

Avalon by Stephen Lawhead.   There are thousands of books about King Arthur, but this is one of the few that was actually fun.  Hint–he doesn’t die in the end   Publisher’s Weekly liked it too:  “In this rousing postcript to Lawhead’s bardic Pendragon Cycle (Taliesin, Merlin, Arthur, Pendragon, Grail), such a monstrous evil stalks near-future Britain that an ancient Welsh prophecy will be fulfilled: the Thames will reverse its course, Avalon will rise again from the cold gray sea and Arthur will return. A series of Royals so rotten that the Brits can’t wait to dump the whole stinking lot enables scheming Prime Minister Waring to creep trick by political dirty trick toward Magna Carta II, the abolition of the monarchy. Far in the Highlands, though, former career officer James Arthur Stuart feels destiny stir within him. He is Arthur, come again to exalt Britain and its grand old values:  goodness, compassion, mercy, charity and justice. Accompanied by his enigmatic adviser Embries, his boon drinking buddy Calum McKay and the lissome Jenny, James struggles to come into his own, proving his mettle against modern monsters: skinheads armed with pit bulls, the fickle hydra of the press and the redheaded “total dish” Moira, Arthur’s old witchy nemesis who destroyed Camelot. By the time James ousts Moira’s insidiously treacherous buffalo-wing- and pizza-chomping politicos, Lawhead makes even aristocracy-phobes want to stand up at the skirl of the pipes and cheer on the eternal virtues James represents. In revisiting nearly every romantic Arthurian clich? and playing off snappy contemporary derring-do against the powerful shining glimpses of the historical Arthur he created, Lawhead pulls off a genuinely moving parable of good and evil.”

03/13/12

Kingdom of Heaven (movie review)

Since any movie with swords garners my immediate attention, Kingdom of Heaven was on the top of my list to see when it came out a few years ago.  Starring Orlando Bloom, Jeremy Irons, David Thewlis, and Liam Neeson, and directed by Ridley Scott, what could go wrong?

Confession:  I love this movie.  That doesn’t mean it deserves five stars, because it doesn’t.  Maybe 4 on a good day, but I still love it.  I love the character of Balian (played by Bloom), I’ll watch Jeremy Irons in anything, even slumming in Eragon, and all the medieval crusade material makes my mouth water.

That said, the history is terrible, and for the purposes of this blog, that’s what I’m going to talk about.

First, the good:  The Kingdom of Jerusalem did have a King Baldwin who gained the throne as a young man and suffered from leprosy.  He did have a sister named Sibylla.  She married William of Montferrat, who died a year later, leaving her a son, Baldwin V.  This is alluded to in the Director’s Cut of Kingdom of Heaven, which I recommend for clearing up some oddities in the screen version of the movie.

Then things kind of fall apart for accuracy.  Sibylla was in line to the throne with a co-heiress, Isabella, the daughter of her father’s second wife, Maria Comnena.  Sibylla married Guy de Lusignon (as in the movie) whom Baldwin favored to take the throne until he removed him from the line in 1183.  He then crowned Sibylla’s son, Baldwin, as his co-ruler, passing over Sibylla’s rights, and “went so far as to offer the overlordship of the kingdom to the kings of France and England.”  (The Crusades, Jonathan Riley-Smith, 2005:101).

Then Baldwin IV died in August of 1185, after which Baldwin V (Sibylla’s son) also died, in August 1186.

Saladin invaded in 1187.  “Just before it occurred, the political crisis came to a head.  After Baldwin V’s death . . . Raymond of Tripoli, the regent-elect, lord of Galilee through marriage and leader of the claimant Isabella’s partisans, was persuaded to go to Tiberias while the little king’s body was sent to Jerusalem in the care of the Templars.  Acre and Beirut were seized in Sibylla’s name, while she and her knights hurried to Jerusalem, where they were joined by Reynald of Chatillon, the lord of Transjordan.  Sibylla, who also had the support of the master of the Templars and the patriarch, was crowned in the Church of the Holy Spulchre and she herself then crowned her husband, Guy of Lusignan.”  (Riley-Smith p. 109).

Here is where it gets (more) complicated, especially in light of the movie.  Raymond of Tripoli had already made a treaty with Saladin in April 1187 (as was his right as regent) and allowed a Muslim reconnaissance force to enter Galilee.  At the same time, Guy sent a mission to the same place, led by Balian of Ibelin, who was the second husband of Maria Comnena (Isabella’s mother, Sibylla’s step-mother).   “Despite Raymond’s warning to stay behind the walls of the castle of ‘Afula until the Muslim troops had left the area, the Templars and Hospitallers rashly attacked them and were cut to pieces” (Riley-Smith p. 110).

As in the movie, Reynald de Chatillon was incredibly aggressive towards the Muslims and attacked a caravan traveling from Cairo to Damascus, engendering Saladin’s ire and caused him to marshal one of the largest armies every put together:  30,000 men.

The Christians managed to put together an army of 20,000 to counter him at Tiberias.  They camped 6 miles away from the city.  When Raymond of Tripoli recommended that Guy not move his troops and let Tiberias fall, Guy ignored him.  They ended up surrounded, far from water, at the ‘Horn of Hattin’.  Guy was captured, along with the True Cross, which was “paraded through Damascus fixed upside down on a lance” (Riley-Smith p. 111).

Balian and Raymond of Tripoli escaped.

Saladin stormed through Palestine and Syria, finally taking Jerusalem on 2 October 1187, after a two week seige countered by Balian who “had taken charge of its defense . . . [he] resorted to the knighting of all noble boys over sixteen years of age and thirty burgesses” (Riley-Smith p. 111).

So, sadly, no blacksmith-turned-knight in this story.  Still.  4 stars :)