Don't go see "King Arthur"

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Yeah, I bet that review was funny. I went to see it with my sister and a friend, both are younger than I am and impressionable. I laughed in the theatre when they showed how are faith looked. I know during a period of time the church was misguided severely, but this was over the top. I also thought it was funny that they had Arthur hook up with Gwenavier on the eve of battle before they were married. If he was really the christian they try to protray him to be, he would not have done that. And on top of that, it was a historical anachronism for warriors to, ahem “make love” before battle because in that time, they believed that when a man engaged in sexual behavior before the battle, his energy and strength was taken from him. They only put that in there for modern culture. It made me sick to my stomach. Also, as a younger writer, even being as young and un experienced as I am, I could still see how cliche and stupid the writing was. Not to meantion all the added stuff to the plot. I thought it was horrible and really disappointed me. I think I could write a better story, and I’m just a simple girl. :banghead:
 
I saw the movie last night and was really disappointed as well. In fact, I came away viewing it as a depressing commentary on the state of our culture. It had the potential to be great (many good sets etc . . .), but was clearly anti-Christian.

It is said that one of the reasons C.S. Lewis converted to Christianity is because he accepted J.R.R. Tolkien’s claim that myths present Truth in a way not possible with reality.

Since Hollywood rejects Truth, for the most part, it is not surprising that it would have such difficulty recreating the real value in a legendary story such as Authur.

P.S. I think there is a great deal of evidence indicating there is historical reality behind the Authur legend. Some documentaries even claim they have found the location of the round table.
 
There seems to be some misconceptions here.

I know the title of the movie is King Arthur but is it not the legend of King Arthur.

This movie attempts to show one of the many historical people (in a fictionalized way one could argue) who many historians believe were a source of the legend. It is not an adaptation of any of the Authrian legends.

As for the comment made by kjvail,
As soon as I saw Gwenavier fighting on horseback and shooting a bow I knew it *was not historical *
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When Rome first moved into Britian they almost lost to the Celts who were lead by a Warrior Queen. So it is not that much of a stretch to have Pict tribes lead by a woman.
 
Here’s an excerpt from the review found on the website for the United States Council of Catholic Bishops:
More troubling however is the film’s paganizing of what has traditionally been a quintessentially Christian myth. Arthur has always been held up as the ideal Christian king; his chivalrous brothers-in-arms aspired to be paragons of Christian virtue, epitomized by their quest for the Holy Grail.
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In Fuqua’s version, the knights are unabashedly pagan and Arthur is nominally Christian at best, aligning himself theologically with Pelagius, a fifth-century monk whose writings were condemned as heresy for denying original sin and the necessity of grace in attaining salvation. Throughout, church authority figures are depicted as conniving and cruel, while the egalitarian pagans are cast in far more flattering hues.
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Sounds like typical Hollyweird fare to me. It’s kind of like the paganizing of Pocahontas by Disney, when in reality, she was one of the first Native Americans to be baptized a Christian. But, don’t get me started on Disney… :mad: :eek: :nope: :bigyikes:
 
Captain Napalm:
Here’s an excerpt from the review found on the website for the United States Council of Catholic Bishops:

Sounds like typical Hollyweird fare to me. It’s kind of like the paganizing of Pocahontas by Disney, when in reality, she was one of the first Native Americans to be baptized a Christian. But, don’t get me started on Disney… :mad: :eek: :nope: :bigyikes:
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I will say it again, your comment as well as those of the Bishops deal with this film as if it is an adaptation of the Arthurian Legends, which it is not.

There are many historians who think the Arthurian Legends have as their source some historical figure or figures. This movie is the fictionalized representation of one of those historic figures, it is not the Legend of Arthur.

Sometimes I feel like I am :banghead: .

Why is this so hard for people to understand? Or is it that they do not wish to understand… :ehh:
 
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ByzCath:
I will say it again, your comment as well as those of the Bishops deal with this film as if it is an adaptation of the Arthurian Legends, which it is not.

There are many historians who think the Arthurian Legends have as their source some historical figure or figures. This movie is the fictionalized representation of one of those historic figures, it is not the Legend of Arthur.
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Assuming you are right no one is going to know that. 99% of people that see the movie will assume it is a ‘true’ telling of the legend of King Arthur, no matter what the fine print says. Under your theory they could make a movie “The Spanish Inquisition” featuring all the typical ridicoulous distortions and when questioned they would just have to claim “it wasn’t supposed to be about the *spanish *inquistion”, that’s a nonsense excuse. They named the movie King Arther for a reason.
A pretty scathing review here:

techcentralstation.com/072004G.html

It sounds like more thinly vieled anti-Catholic, anti-Christian propoganda.
 
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kjvail:
Under your theory they could make a movie “The Spanish Inquisition” featuring all the typical ridicoulous distortions and when questioned they would just have to claim “it wasn’t supposed to be about the *spanish *inquistion”, that’s a nonsense excuse.
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Cardinal Fang, fetch…the COMFY CHAIR!

The…comfy chair?

Now! You will stay in the comfy chair until lunch time, with only a cup of coffee at eleven!

You’re saying that didn’t really happen?
 
I liked the movie…Kjvail, you ar assuming that people are stupid. It’s like they believe the real King Arthur was animated and merlin had a pet owl that talked. Though i understand where you are coming from, the story is called a legend for a reason…Besides, All the other King Arthur movies deal with his crusades AFTER he became king, this movie focuses on who King Arthur could’ve been BEFORE he was king.

People who assume that the movie is anti-catholic, or anti-christian, please, keep in mind that the movie is set in a time when christianity was not fully flourished. The tribes in Briton may not have believed in the Christian Gods, besides, this is movies has very little to do with christianity other than the fact that arthur was a roman and the romans were christian.

The monks were fulfilling a masters commands when they were starving the pagans. He was the type of person who took God’s word out of context and mixed it with the Romanesque idea of conquer and defeat. This very well could’ve happened.

The bishop needed to be evil. It further’s the plot. If we wasn’t such an arse he would’ve given them their dischrage papers when he was supposed to, thus end the movie. There needed to be some sort of catalyst in order for the knights to be sent back.

Guinevere’s role was fairly accurate to the time period, especially in tribes throughout Briton and Ireland. These tribes put a lot of superiorty in the role of women. They were, after all, the source of life. These religions were pantheistic, and sometimes, polytheistic. They emphasised life. Women took on many roles such as leader of the army, leader of the community itself, healer etc. This is mainly because women had the ability to give birth, produce life, thus sustaining the population. Once christianity came along, the role of women was de-emphasised, and men took a superior stand. Therefore, i find it very likely that guinevere lead her army.
 
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kjvail:
Assuming you are right no one is going to know that. 99% of people that see the movie will assume it is a ‘true’ telling of the legend of King Arthur, no matter what the fine print says. Under your theory they could make a movie “The Spanish Inquisition” featuring all the typical ridicoulous distortions and when questioned they would just have to claim “it wasn’t supposed to be about the *spanish *inquistion”, that’s a nonsense excuse. They named the movie King Arther for a reason.
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So using your logic, any movie with the name King Arthur in it has to be about the Arthurian Legends.

If people see the movie and assume that it is a retelling of the Legend of Arthur, even after the trailers state that it is not.

If you and other assumed this then it is your fault not the movies.

I would once again add, if you are going to the movies to get your history then you deserve what you get. This was made as entertainment, not education.
 
I just spoke with some friends who saw it. They said the setting was very good. The dialogue was cheesy and the plot weak. The men were good looking and Keira Knightly played a ‘Mary Sue’ character. A Mary Sue is a literary device usually used in fanfiction when the author places him or herself in the story. In the cases where young girls are the authors the character usually is a strong beautiful Xena princess type character. I have no idea who wrote the script or why…but that is what they came away with.

They will probably see it again, but just for the good looking men.

dream wanderer
 
Auberon Quin:
You’re saying that didn’t really happen?
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I’m not sure I’m reading your question correctly, but if this refers to the black legend of the Spanish Inquistion - yes, emphatically I’m saying it didn’t happen. The legends of the Inquisitions, Spanish or otherwise have been debunked in the last few years.
 
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ByzCath:
So using your logic, any movie with the name King Arthur in it has to be about the Arthurian Legends.
If people see the movie and assume that it is a retelling of the Legend of Arthur, even after the trailers state that it is not.
If you and other assumed this then it is your fault not the movies.
I would once again add, if you are going to the movies to get your history then you deserve what you get. This was made as entertainment, not education.
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Therese a reason they named it what they did, if it was supposed to have nothing to do with King Arthur, then why name it that? That makes no sense at all.
Kjvail, you ar assuming that people are stupid
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Ya? And your point?
 
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kjvail:
Therese a reason they named it what they did, if it was supposed to have nothing to do with King Arthur, then why name it that? That makes no sense at all.
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Either your having trouble reading my posts and following along or your ignoring them.

The movie had to do with one of the historical figures that many historians think was one of the sources of the Arthurian Legends, hence the name King Arthur as this could have been the histoical Arthur… duh! :ehh:
 
Oh boy, a thread on medieval “history” and movies! how can I, the medievalist, resist?

Sadly, I haven’t seen the movie (yet). I will see it eventually – gotta see all the medieval movies, no matter how cheesy. Speaking of cheesy, did you hear that Mel Gibson’s production company’s next movie is going to be on Boudicca, Britain’s warrior queen? They’re calling it “Braveheart with a bra.”

Anyway, on Arthurian legend, for it IS legend, not history. There is no such thing as an “accurate” King Arthur movie, because there was never any such person as King Arthur. My husband is an Arthurian scholar, we’ve taught classes on this – you can believe me, heretic though I may be. So any movie on King Arthur is just another retelling of the story, no different in that sense from Geoffrey of Monmouth, T.H. White, Marion Zimmer Bradley… it’s all fiction. Fun, but fiction.

And since I’m a scholar of heresy and inquisition, I can’t help jumping in on the Inquisition part of this, too. You’re right, the “Black Legend” about the Spanish Inquisition is mostly ****. I spend a lot of my time debunking people’s loony ideas about inquisition in the Middle Ages. (and I always show both Monty Python and Mel Brooks in my classroom!). I even tried to persuade a class once that Bernard Gui wasn’t really all that bad I guy (I will NOT try this about Torquemada, however – he really WAS a nut).

That doesn’t mean, however, that there weren’t abuses of inquisition in medieval and early modern europe. There were. Burning people at the stake was a gruesome thing to do, and many, if not most, of those who died that way were innocent by any reasonable way of looking at things – and even if they weren’t, is that any kind of a reasonable punishment? What about a culture of life? When you read the accounts of people who watched their brothers and sisters burn, as I have, you become more than a little sympathetic.

But I’m definitely psyched that Arthur is portrayed as a Pelagian. Heresy in Hollywood! We heretics are moving up in the world. I better brush up on my Pelagianism, because all my students will be asking about it in the fall…

Naprous
 
So Naprous,

Do you deny that many historians think that there are historical figures that were used as souce material for the Arthurian Legends?
 
ByzCath – I don’t deny that some historians assert that there is a historical basis for the Arthurian legend, but I don’t think that they are very good historians!

I’ve read ALL the earliest sources, and there is really nothing there. The contemporary sources (Gildas, 6th century) make no mention of anyone named Arthur at all, and the name Arthur doesn’t turn up until the ninth century (Nennius). Here’s a link to some of the earliest sources:

medieval.ucdavis.edu/20B/Arthurian.html

Taking Nennius as your authoritative guide to the historical facts is like saying that your average cabby on the streets of New York really knows what happened when Peter Minuit supposedly bought the island of Manhattan for $24 worth of beads!

The best source for that period, the author of the Ecclesiastical History of the English People, that is the Venerable Bede (d. 735), says NOTHING about Arthur, or anything even remotely Arthurian. And Bede even mentions the battle of Badon Hill – but no Arthur.

It’s not like we moderns are the first people to notice that Arthur was not historical. A twelfth-century author, William of Newburgh, wrote on the subject of Arthurian “history”: “Even a person of dim mental vision can observe how much the unadulterated historical truth preempts the falsehood which has been compiled at this point.” And William of Newburgh was otherwise incredibly credulous – you ought to hear his story of little green men!

So sorry, I’m with William of Newburgh on this one!

Naprous
 
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naprous:
ByzCath – I don’t deny that some historians assert that there is a historical basis for the Arthurian legend, but I don’t think that they are very good historians!
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Naprous,
You really didn’t answer the question I asked.

I asked, “Do you deny that many historians think that there are historical figures that were used as souce material for the Arthurian Legends?”

That is that there are a couple of historical figures, who have names close to Arthur, such as the Roman depicted in this movie, who were used as source material for the Arthurian Legend. That parts of these individual were used.

I have heard of nothing of a historical basis, only of this historical source. A difference there.
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naprous:
The best source for that period, the author of the Ecclesiastical History of the English People, that is the Venerable Bede (d. 735), says NOTHING about Arthur, or anything even remotely Arthurian. And Bede even mentions the battle of Badon Hill – but no Arthur.
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Such as you show here. The battle of Badon Hill is used in the Arthurian Legends and it is a historical fact. So this fact was used as source material for part of the Legend.
 
Sorry, Byz Cath, I thought I had answered your question: yes, I know that there are historians who think there is a historical basis for the Arthurian legend, but as I said, I don’t think that they are very good historians.

Saying that if the battle of Badon Hill happened, then Arthur was historical is no different from saying that because Peter Minuit existed, then he must have bought the island of Manhattan for $24. And if we make a movie about it, then that makes it historical.

Unfortunately, my husband (the real Arthurian in the family) is teaching so I can’t ask him, and I can’t find the copy of the Arthurian handbook that has all the earliest sources in it (it’s a useful book, by the way, my H has used it several times in classes). I vaguely recall a figure named Riothamus, and if that’s the source you’re referring to (I seem to recall that – gasp! – he died near the Burgundian town of Avallon), well, I just don’t buy it.

Arthur is legend – and what’s wrong with legend?

Naprous
 
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kjvail:
I’m not sure I’m reading your question correctly, but if this refers to the black legend of the Spanish Inquistion - yes, emphatically I’m saying it didn’t happen. The legends of the Inquisitions, Spanish or otherwise have been debunked in the last few years.
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My only point (and I will make it explicitly now) is that people know perfectly well that many of the things they see in movies or read in books are not true.

I chose to illustrate this point by flippantly using dialogue from Monthy Python’s Spanish Inquisition skit to call to the reader’s mind that very, very few viewers of that skit (if any) believed as a result of viewing it that the SI used a comfy chair as an instrument of torture.
 
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naprous:
Sorry, Byz Cath, I thought I had answered your question: yes, I know that there are historians who think there is a historical basis for the Arthurian legend, but as I said, I don’t think that they are very good historians.

Saying that if the battle of Badon Hill happened, then Arthur was historical is no different from saying that because Peter Minuit existed, then he must have bought the island of Manhattan for $24. And if we make a movie about it, then that makes it historical.

Unfortunately, my husband (the real Arthurian in the family) is teaching so I can’t ask him, and I can’t find the copy of the Arthurian handbook that has all the earliest sources in it (it’s a useful book, by the way, my H has used it several times in classes). I vaguely recall a figure named Riothamus, and if that’s the source you’re referring to (I seem to recall that – gasp! – he died near the Burgundian town of Avallon), well, I just don’t buy it.

Arthur is legend – and what’s wrong with legend?

Naprous
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Again, your missing the point.

This is like all legend… I have heard that all legends have traces back to fact.

No where did I say, nor have I heard anyone say, that because the battle of Badon Hill is fact that King Arthur is fact.

I will try it one more time… There are a bunch of historical figures that have had parts of their historical lives as sources for the Arthurian Legends.

I never said Arthur is fact, neither have these historians said this, what they say is that some of the material that was used in creating the Arthurian Legends is fact and they search for this.

Any historian who thinks they can say that the Legends have no factual material used in its creation or who thinks they can say positively that they know what has happened are not good historians.
 
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