First Knight (1995). Massively inconsistent.
King Arthur (2004). Boring as hell.
Legend of the Sword (2017). Sucked harder than Meryl Streep before every Oscar show.
Hollywood doesn't really remember how to do good epics. Everything is too dripping with irony and/or "grittiness". It's the same reason that nobody's made a great Superman film in ages.
Consider the superhero flicks: they brood (Batman) or joke (Marvel Extended Universe), but they never do a straight-up joyous, flashy superhero film (Donner's Superman).
Most films also try to avoid having a "good" side or "bad" side. Shades of grey are more interesting. The mistake, of course, isn't acknowledging shades of grey, it's denying a right or wrong at all. There is a lot of moral ambiguity in stories like Arthur and Lord of the Rings, but there are, ultimately, good and bad goalposts. Most modern storytellers seem to loathe the idea of absolutes, ideals, or paragons in any form.
They managed Lord of the Rings on a fluke, but other than that, the epic film is hard to come by. It's too earnest for modern Hollywood. Until Hollywood remembers how to do this, it will be impossible to come by a great Superman, Robin Hood, or King Arthur movie.
I think part of the problem is greed. To make a really good epic film you need to have lots of money for the production not just sets but also to have lots of extras... yet with the greedy actor wanting 10 and 20 million a piece a hug piece of a movies budget gets eaten up by the actors and directors which doesn't leave enough money to make a good epic. It is the reason lots of movies will have few scenes with lots of people in them because they can't afford them. God forbid they throw in any CGI crap because then an actor size piece of the budgets goes for the dragon or whatever the fuck they are doing in CGI.
shareYeah, budget's a part of it, for sure.
Epics need hosts of warriors squaring off. So they need to either hire those warriors or build them in CGI. CGI is slightly cheaper, but also doesn't look at good. So, yeah, it's a huge financial risk. As a result, the closest we get to epics these days are Marvel films because the studio feels okay with making that risk - they'll see that money back. But those are...tired. In my opinion, anyway.
And even in the marvel movies if you use a stop watch and add up all the screen time with a large group of people in the frame the amount of time is very limited, mostly they spend the CGI on showing building being blown up or torn down because it is a lot cheaper to do than to have a lot of extras running around in the background.
shareI quite recently read Mary Stewart’s superb series of Arthurian novels. The first three - starting with The Crystal Cave - are Merlin’s life story and could in the right hands be wonderfully cinematic.
There was apparently a TV adaptation of the Merlin trilogy in the ‘80s but I would love to see them adapted for the big screen one day - but I suspect that the failure of the more recent Arthurian movies means it may be a long time before anybody tries again.
I enjoyed the Stewart books as well.
shareI think the best recent attempt was that Merlin miniseries with Sam Neill back in the 90s.
shareWhich was then followed up with the PC crap called Merlin which is where so much of the movies are today. Doesn't matter if you were doing a movie on a family of whites trapped on an island they would somehow find a way to throw in people of color just so they could say they were inclusive.
shareHollywood went from an land for ideas and into a land of agendas that's why, take the forthcoming movie The Green Knight for example, when I think of Sir Gawain I don't think of an actor of Indian heritage, when I think of medieval villages I don't picture it to be multicultural.
Hollywood cares more about virtual signalling right now than telling or adapting decent stories.
What confuses me is that these films fail and a lot of money is put into them.
Why do they keep doing it?
An Indian knight will be ridiculous and I love Indian people.
Yeah, why not make a Sir Palamedes movie or give him a large supporting role rather than cast an Indian actor as Sir Gawain - a knight who comes from the Orkney Islands, (the Orkney Islands are above Scotland, their ethnic group as of 2011 was 100% white)
https://www.scotlandscensus.gov.uk/documents/council_area_profiles/Orkney_Islands.pdf
Sir Palamedes is a Saracen pagan who converts to Christianity later in his life, he later becomes a Knight of the Round Table, he is one of the primary knights involved in the hunt for the questing beast, he is in love with Isolde and often duels with Tristan. That would be an interesting movie!
Safir and Segwarides are his brothers, who are also Knights of the Round Table.
Why don't they make some cool Indian movies!
Indians have an amazing bunch of stories related to Hinduism. Hindus would have a heart attack of happiness if they were made right!
Have an Indian Indian Jones, or whatever.
They need to make new shit. This kind of thing is an insult where they're trying to undermine white stories. They did this with the one King Arthur story where he's a Roman soldier. Romans were like rapists that came and attacked the British.
PC does kill a lot of these stories. The most recent Robin Hood film looked like a mess as well. Battle scenes that were like the war on terror, clothes that looked modern. Of course you get the kick ass women.
Then you have to have minorities to show how diverse it all is even though there was no diversity back then. And of course story lines must mirror modern causes so you will no doubt have the Knight of the round table battling the KKK while they work towards defeating man made climate change.
the KKK was the cause of the 2017 Charlottesville Protest stop acting like Racism is non exist
Not to mention the ludicrous clothing and weapons used in the latest Robin Hood and King Arthur flops, seems like the producers saw all the money Game of Thrones generated and they wanted a piece of that. 🙄
sharevirtual signalling stfu everyone should contiune to themselves also Sir Gawain ethnicity isnt established diversity is not bad in fiilm that thinking will lead uus back into The Dark Ages
shareSir Gawain is King Arthur's nephew and a Knight of the Round Table in the Arthurian legend.
Gawain is one of a select number of Round Table members to be referred to as one of the greatest knights and closest companions of King Arthur. He is usually the son of Arthur's sister Morgause (or Anna) and King Lot of Orkney and Lothian, and his brothers or half-brothers are Agravain, Gaheris, Gareth, and Mordred.
dev patel is a BAFTA Winning actor best choice for Gawain
shareI’m going to take a shot in the dark here and take a guess that you aren’t at all familiar with Gawain and the Green Knight to come to a conclusion like that. LOL
shareIm going to take a shot and your racist bigot like your Overlord Donald Trump
shareChildish little comment, much like many comment's you've made on these forums, going by your posts you seem far too young to be posting here.
im 28 years old
shareI find that hard to believe, you act and type like a 12 year old, calling various posters nazi’s, pedos and racists here.
cuz they are im a forward thinking individual Im not a Radical Liberal/Republican im a Centrist/Liberatarian im just trying to help you get out that radical mindset society will be better for it dont harass me pal
sharelol you also said im young. do you have any actual criticisms when people bring up points or is your modus operandi just to say they are young and have a fit?
sharecheck out the green knight board. Notorious is losing it like the sensitive snowflake he is compiling about dev being from Indian heritage...
He then told me Gaiwan and the green knight isnt a fantasy...
Funny how he doesn't want a not pure white playing. role because its not accurate... in a. fantasy movie based of a fantasy story that has monsters.... and magic.....
I guess we need to make sure the fantasy characters speak like how The Britons did, since this takes place before the Saxon invasion.
we better make sure we find some our blooded Britons not mixed with Saxon blood to play the lead or else this movie is just "woke garbage" like he described it
sorry but having all-white cast makes me think of some insenstive 80s action movies this post is racist I'm sorry there not box office as they use to be Diversity isnt a bad thing accept it
shareii liiked King Arthur Legend of The Sword and The Green Knight is gonna be great
shareExcalibur had some great performances and moments.
I don't think it's quite the classic that people want for a King Arthur movie, but it's pretty good.