
KING ARTHUR: LEGEND OF THE SWORD
*1/2
It seems that every decade rates its own King Arthur flick, which means those folks who never wanted the 1980s to end now have another reason.
John Boorman’s 1981 Excalibur remains a superb motion picture – literate, lush, intelligent, and absolutely stunning to behold. Since then, though, audiences have been privy to the underwhelming likes of Jerry Zucker’s 1995 First Knight (starring Sean Connery as Arthur) and Antoine Fuqua’s 2004 King Arthur (with Clive Owen in the title role). This current decade now brings King Arthur: Legend of the Sword, and it’s the feeblest interpretation yet.
Arthur grows up among the rabble (he’s played as an adult by Charlie Hunnam), and his lineage is only determined once he pulls Excalibur from the stone. Excalibur, of course, is the mighty sword forged by Merlin himself – it should be noted that Merlin, one of the great characters in the Arthurian saga, only appears for a few seconds in a flashback sequence, presumably because the filmmakers couldn’t meet the asking price of Ian McKellen or Patrick Stewart or, considering the film’s overall incongruity, Kevin James.
Director Guy Ritchie’s kinetic style, perfect for Snatch and Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels, crucially hampered those daft Sherlock Holmes films starring Robert Downey Jr. – the ones that basically reimagined the sleuth as an elementary Indiana Jones.
It’s even more damaging here, with Ritchie employing tiresome tricks of the trade to cover up the anemic screenplay he helped write. To complicate matters, the 3-D version of the film appears to have been shot through a dirty washcloth, with the darkness recalling the early years of the current 3-D craze when filmmakers were still tweaking the technique.
As Arthur, Hunnam displays little of the authority or magnetism integral to the character, although, to be honest, nobody really stands out in this blasé grouping. The impersonal nature of the project extends to the visual effects – when most of the villains are dispatched by a snake that’s the size of a Boeing 747, it’s hard to care about anything going on.
To borrow from a far superior film about this king – 1975’s Monty Python and the Holy Grail, of course – it would be easier to cut down the mightiest tree in the forest with a herring than to willingly watch another entry in this errant enterprise.
Film Details King Arthur: Legend of the Sword

When the child Arthur's father is murdered, Vortigern, Arthur's uncle, seizes the crown. Robbed of his birthright and with no idea who he truly is, Arthur comes up the hard way in the back alleys of the city. But once he pulls the sword from the stone, his life is turned upside down and he is forced to acknowledge his true legacy - whether he likes it or not.
Film Details King Arthur: Legend of the Sword 3D

When the child Arthur's father is murdered, Vortigern, Arthur's uncle, seizes the crown. Robbed of his birthright and with no idea who he truly is, Arthur comes up the hard way in the back alleys of the city. But once he pulls the sword from the stone, his life is turned upside down and he is forced to acknowledge his true legacy - whether he likes it or not.
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