King Arthur: Legend of the Sword
(2017)
(SPOILERS) I can certainly see why Guy Ritchie’s latest has
flopped. Audiences weren’t interested in what he was selling, and what he was selling
was very clear from the trailers (it’s the same with Ghost in the Shell; all these post-mortems offering a list of
reasons why really boil down to whether those two-and-a-half minutes are
appealing, not whether Charlie Hunnam’s a star or Scarlett Johannsson can open
a movie). Much weaker movies become hits every year, so it was his take on King
Arthur – which, like everything Ritchie gets his paws on, immerses itself in laddish
camaraderie – not it being the umpteenth retelling of Camelot per se, that put
them off. And I can relate to the disinterest; I want my Arthurian legends to
be steeped in just that: legend. Make them too immediate, relevant or – as was
the case with Antoine Fuqua’s King Arthur
a decade ago – mundane, and the audience will give them a wide berth. But, for
all that I’m not a fan of the approach Ritchie took, this is still a Guy Ritchie movie, which means stylistically there’s
much to enjoy in King Arthur: Legend of
the Sword despite yourself. Plus, it could have been much worse; we could
have been enduring Bryan Singer’s Excalibur
remake instead.
Ritchie apparently (according to a recent Empire interview)
had an Arthurian tale brewing for about a decade (“I’m an Englishman. I grew up with King Arthur and Sherlock Holmes”:
indeed, perhaps we can soon look forward to his epic account of fish and chips).
By the sound of it, it consisted of the most rote elements of Legend of the Sword; his orphan growing
up in a brothel and hanging with the boys before recognising his calling. The
fantasy element wasn’t there (this tone-deafness previously did for King Arthur, a choice that seemed perversely
self-destructive – albeit Jerry Bruckheimer is never given to throwing money
away if he can help it – given The Lord
of the Rings was at its zenith at the time).
The whole origins story bit isn’t, per se, a problem;
whatever Ritchie’s tinkering, the sword in the stone is, by definition, an
origins story, the rise of a king, one who discovers, and must come to terms
with, their power. The issue is rather that it’s guilty of perversely butting
heads with a trope audiences are heartily sick of; spending an entire movie
having the hero denying the call (and in not terribly interesting fashion,
tormented by visions until such a point he can wield Excalibur effectively).
The movie’s biggest crime, then (not that audiences would have premeditation of
this), is that it’s guilty of not getting to the point. Even worse than the
hero protractedly denying their destiny Legend
of the Sword is structurally designed to serve as teaser to starting the
“proper” story in a movie to come.
And this is WB’s folly: assuming they can simply manufacture
a shared universe and that there will be a demand for it, because that’s what
Marvel has done. It may well turn out to be Universal’s folly too, with their
“Dark Universe” (getting a novice director to kick off your franchise isn’t
necessarily the safest of bets, less still initiating a “horror” universe that’s
actually an action-blockbuster universe; it could even be regarded as ham-fisted
when you’re getting low budget horror movies – Get Out – grossing more than The
Mummy is likely to for a negligible cost). All the studios, besides Disney
– of course – are so at a loss over how to repeat that Marvel magic that
they’re putting the cart before the horse, making assumptions about long term
properties that are unlikely to be realised (even WB’s HBO, putting forward
various Game of Thrones prequel
series, appear to be flogging an expired badger; they should be initiating that
next big thing rather than hedging their bets). How else do you explain a Transformers universe (a movie devoted
to Bumblebee?!) or Sony’s Spiderman’s Supporting Characters universe with likes
of Venom and Black Cat & Silver Sable (particularly ludicrous as Spidey is now
a distinct and separate entity in the Marvel-verse).
It’s this thinking that saw WB latch on to Joby Harold’s
multi-part shared Arthurian pitch, envisaged to feature a movie for each of the
main characters (Arthur, Merlin, Lancelot etc.), explaining why some of the big
names aren’t in here, and also why, by assuming there will be an appetite for a
$200m shot in the dark, they’ve managed to eschew what might have been their
greatest assets (I mean, seriously, not including Merlin? You could start with
Merlin and not include Arthur more confidently). The result is the worst of all
worlds, a movie built on the assumption of further instalments that, while it
has nominal closure, hasn’t even come close to getting to the good stuff
(pulling the sword from the stone is the only iconic moment here; the Lady of
the Lake is present, but used in a manner that seems like an afterthought,
particularly as it occurs at Arthur’s most irritatingly petulant moment; he
throws away his sword because Neil Maskill snuffs it. It is, at least, the one
occasion in the picture where Ritchie is willing to operate by dream logic, in the
fashion of John Boorman’s Excalibur).
Harold has a Robin
Hood screenplay coming out next year, with Tarron Egerton. It was initially
titled (yes, really) Robin Hood: Origins.
You can see where this is going (or isn’t, if it has the reception of Legend of the Sword). Harold’s Arthurian
universe had the supernatural element Ritchie’s lacked, hence the finished
picture’s mashup of elements. It’s ironic that, for all that he claims it’s
foreign territory, Ritchie handles the fantasy part of Legend of the Sword with consummate skill. He cites Excalibur as a favourite, for its “mystical quality” (so how did he so
completely not get why it worked and the
appeal of these legends?) He admits that fantasy “is completely out of my wheelhouse”, yet the various elements, from
oversized beasties (“Guy doesn’t want
completely fantastic beasts”) to beckoning Syrens are visualised with care
and investment. But one has to wonder at his stated desire to offer “something people won’t have seen” (why
not just dive into the actual stories, then, there’s more than enough John Boorman
didn’t even sniff at, rather than overlaying the well-worn Moses plot?), unless
he means having Arthur as a contemporary bruv, complete with leather trousers
and sculpted hair.
While Ritchie has delivered a movie that’s frequently as
stylistically engaged as anything he’s done, he himself admitted he lost the
movie in the edit, and it shows. When Legend
of the Sword works, it’s usually because it’s adopting his trademark
faux-lad posturing; Arthur comes from a place of privilege and destiny and is
only moonlighting as one of the lads (Ritchie himself is a posh boy turned geezer.
As such, it’s interesting that both he and his ex-producer Matthew Vaughn’s
most recent movies concern an ostensibly “working class” character whose revealed
heritage invites his ascension to an elite throne; it’s a coded reversal of the
duos actual behaviour, and a reflection of their designer charades).
Ritchie’s strengths, as are Vaughn’s, are most evidenced by his
ability to convey action musically, rhythmically and kinetically. When Legend of the Sword engages with such
sequences, it’s a blast, from Arthur’s growing up montage, to recounting an
incident with Viking traders that could have come straight out of Snatch (the tale isn’t very interesting,
even though its crucial, but you nevertheless get into the knockabout verbiage)
to Edgar Wright-inspired “what if?’ sequences (“And you’re going to say…”), all of which show his facility with
editing, playing with time, repartee and sound to an energising degree. Daniel
Pemberton delivers a fine score (maybe not in the league The Man from U.N.C.L.E., his previous collaboration with Ritchie, but
very little is), and there really are few filmmakers around right now with the
grasp on fusing score and image to such propulsive effect (I’d probably give
Vaughn the edge over Ritchie, but only because he has a better track record).
The weaknesses of Legend
of the Sword are most highlighted by how long it feels. It’s only two
hours, but it draaaaaags. That’s partly rejecting the call, but it’s also partly
not caring about anyone. Should we give a stuff about Maskell’s Backlack
getting stabbed and bleeding out for about an hour? We certainly shouldn’t end
up resenting him, as we do, when Arthur proceeds to chuck his sword. Charlie Hunnam’s
okay. He holds the screen, just about. But there’s nothing special about his
Arthur. He’s just a guy with a gang, and it ultimately weakens the stew, for
all the seasoning Ritchie throws in. Hunnam no doubt had good intentions (if
he’s watched Excalibur more than 40
times) but he can only play the character his director requests of him, who is
devoid of any kind of regality or spark.
Aiden Gillen’s best feature is his character name (Goosefat
Bill), but otherwise he has reached a place where he elicits a sigh of tired
familiarity whenever arrives on screen. There’s a character called Kung Fu
George, played by Tom Wu, whose most interesting aspect is his very-Snatch name (and his eventual Sir-ness).
David Beckham’s cameo has been much remarked upon, negatively, but it really isn’t
so distracting, prosthetic hooter aside. Geoff Bell’s Mischief John stands out amongst
hissable henchmen.
Jude Law (who appears to be the latest victim of de-aging –
its de rigueur right now, albeit fairly unobtrusive here) makes a decent fist
of evil King Vortigern, but he’s undercooked until the moment he sacrifices his
daughter, when there’s suddenly a palpable sense of the extent of his
dedication. Alas, but by that point the movie’s almost over. Maybe there was
more in the two hours Ritchie excised to try hone it down, but it’s always more
interesting if you’re as invested in the villains as in the heroes. One of the
few unqualified successes is Astrid Berges-Frisbey’s Mage, who essentially
takes the Merlin role (but was, I was surprised to learn, intended to be
Guinevere) and prods Arthur along magically.
The picture needed to be tighter, certainly. It also needed
to embrace its (anathema to Ritchie or not) fantasy more fully. Arthur’s
journey to the Blacklands is intriguing until you realise there’s nothing there
but big rats. It’s disappointing that the wood nymphs are the product of his
hallucinations… it seems. But who knows, there’s a trio of slithery tentacled
Syrens in the basement.
They’re the greatest visual success of the picture, and
it bears noting that the effects generally, given CGI in every other blockbuster
released is so very variable, are really first rate. The Syrens elicit exactly
the right mix of the repellent and erotic, and ought really to have been
Ritchie’s starting point for the movie’s tone: the seductive allure of power
and its corruptive, bloating, corrosive quality. When it comes to the power of
Excalibur – something of a one-ring effect that appears to harness dark
energies, much as the Ancient One in Doctor
Strange did – it’s something of a standard superhero bit, but if you’re aren’t
wholly rejecting the picture as an Arthurian aberration by this point, you
probably won’t mind too much.
Ritchie has experienced two flops in a row now, and there’s
no doubt Disney won’t let the same thing happen with his upcoming Aladdin (I for one am intrigued to see how
his style mashes with the property – it surely can’t be as somnambulant as the
beat-by-beat translation of Beauty and
the Beast). King Arthur: Legend of the Sword certainly isn’t the unfairly
ignored minor gem The Man from U.N.C.L.E.
is, but neither does it deserve ignominy. If you can get on board with
Ritchie’s predilections, there’s a mostly good time to be had here, lulls
aside. It’s entirely misjudged, but it’s also good fun. Just a shame that, for
an intended saga, the invitation to “Now,
tell me a story. Tell me every detail” is left hanging.
Agree? Disagree? Mildly or vehemently? Let me know in the comments below.