Two hours and fifteen minutes, a tight-paced, modern-styled ahistorical retelling of King Arthur in the vein of the 2009 Sherlock Holmes film by the same director. All-star cast, excellent acting, and although it drags a little and is a bit unconventional, it’s a darn fun watch. Lots of action, lots of London-accented story-telling (fitting, since the director is famous for coming from and directing films about the London underworld), and a great handle on action. Imagine the ‘90’s Robin Hood combined with the Sherlock Holmes film combined with ‘80’s Excalibur. It’s a banger.
This film was apparently poorly received when it came out in 2017, but that’s probably more due to poor marketing and expectations than anything else. It’s hard to make a NEW blockbuster franchise (this was scheduled to have FIVE sequels) when Marvel, DC, Disney, and Star Wars are long-established and snatching up the customers. This film cost $200 million to make and would’ve needed to make twice that much again to be a success, and people aren’t gonna want to see the tenth King Arthur screen adaptation when they can watch a comic book movie with an original plot.
This is ironic, of course, ‘cause this film tries to be much more different than any of its predecessors in its premise, taking the humble hero premise of King Arthur (Charlie Hunman) and turning him into a kind of friendly 9th century gangster , who spends his days beating up Vikings and keeping his buddies’ kids out of trouble. From there, he becomes king because he gets spotted by the evil king Vortigern (Jude Law) and spends the film trying to fight back against his vicious reign. It takes a BUNCH of liberties with the source material, but most people in the Western Hemisphere already know the King Arthur story, so taking liberties gives us something new.
The action in this film is stellar - using slo-mo, undercranking, CGI, and choreography all working together to make an awesome action scene. The director has a black belt in karate AND Brazilian jiu-jitsu (which takes at least seven years to get), so he has a solid base in actual fighting that he brings to the big screen in a few ways. Notably, the titular sword endows its wielder with supernatural powers, and when the hero finally gets a chance to use it, it’s like watching a person-shaped hurricane.
The film’s a little long, and a little frenetic in its pace; the tenth scene of Cockney-accented scalliwags talkin’ ‘bout dat education don’t do ya neuw good can be a bit grating, but this film has vision it has continuity, it has EXCELLENT performances from its lead actors (Charlie Hunman can howl at the sky in rage like no other), and it’s a solid good time. 4 out of 5.
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