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King Arthur

Movie King Arthur Director Antoine Fuqua Cast Clive Owen, Keira Knightley

By Subhash K Jha

Rating: *1/2 From Brad Pitt in Troy to Clive Owen in des-Troy?! In his effort to demystify the legend of King Arthur and the Round Table, director Antoine Fuqua simply turns Troy into an erect tree with his faithful colleagues serving as branches in the burlesque. What could have prompted a studio as immense as Touchstone Pictures who thrive on making blithe family films, to go so dreadfully medieval? King Arthur is like Troy without the aura of glamour and mystique. Sure, the war scenes shot with hundreds and thousands of junior artistes shooting fiery arrows in the sky that fall to the ground in combustive splendour, are done with a zest for the epic that Cecil de Mille would have approved of. But the sabre-rattling 'Braveheart -meets -Gladiator -meets- Troy -meets -nemesis’ presentation never goes beyond a half-baked homage to all the spectacular period epics from Stanley Kubrick’s Spartacus in 1960 to all the costume dramas that have come and groaned in the last two years in an effort to revive the grandeur of the eras gone-by. Arguably King Arthur is the most impotent period film in recent times. The conflicts between Arthur’s band of swordsmen and the Roman empire is reduced to a one-on-one between Good and Evil. There’s no effort whatsoever to explore the grey region even on a surface level. Everyone is either busy being noble or scummy. Where’s the middle ground? The characters are all heroes and villains. This makes it easier for the screenwriter David Franzoni (who co-scripted Gladiator)to fill the spaces in the frames with a blizzard of sound and fury signifying nothings. The Romans are all demented or devious. Arthur’s men are at the most, raunchy. One of his faithful companions keeps talking about his banana, and he doesn’t mean the kind that can be made into a split. When the film opens Arthur’s men are sent off on one last mission by the Roman villains to rescue a priest from the villainous marauders. Predictably Arthur rescues Guinevere (Keira Knightley) whose broken fingers he mends. She then proceeds to dart saucy looks at him from her cart while he rides by next to her. If this was a Hindi film she would break into a song. Given Hollywood’s sober and matter-of-fact parameters of romance the two are shown pulling off each other’s clothes and panting with the urgency of porn stars who must pack it in before the sun sets. The trouble with this medieval mess is its twisted vision of territorial anarchy. In his effort to contemporize the Arthurian legend, director Fuqua turns the epic on its head. The villain (Stellan Skarsgard) resembles an aging rock star, while the hero is so unobtrusive as to seem like a junior artiste who’s standing in for the leading man who’s making out in the makeup room. The hand that wields the camera never stops flashing on screen. The flamboyant fights are staged to woo and win audiences who have grown up playing video games in the neighbourhood parlour. The combat on thin ice with the fighters going under is lavish enough to render the characters into parodic puppets of a pyrotechnical province. Hans Zimmer’s overpowering music saturates the soundtrack. There’s no effort to follow the characters’ hearts as they fight for country honour and self identity. Instead they all seem to be heading towards a nemesis that signifies the end of the road for all costume dramas. Brad Pitt in skirts appealed to the ladies. Clive Owen in the same? What a shame! As for Keira Knightley battling it out with the men on the battle field...Kareena Kapoor did it better in Asoka.