‘Arthur’ takes a so-so stab at heroic lore
Visuals that become heavy-handed spoil the rollicking fun
The seminal hero’s journey gets a punk-rock makeover in King Arthur: Legend of the
Sword, a sharptongued swing and a miss at the tale of the Knights of the Round Table.
There’s no shortage of modern attitude in director Guy Ritchie’s new take ( out of four; rated ★★✩✩ PG-13; in theaters nationwide Friday) on Arthurian lore. It’s a messy mélange of the British filmmaker’s own gangster pictures and Lord of the Rings, a medieval Avengers with Charlie Hunnam as the reluctant hero. The Sons of Anarchy star gives Arthur plenty of muscular charisma, but Legend of the Sword’s overemphasis on the supernatural and the visually spectacular mortally wounds an often-rollicking adventure.
Instead of the glorious Camelot, this Arthur’s origin story begins in hardscrabble fashion, finding the hero living out of a brothel and heading up a gang of miscreants. His nights are filled with crippling nightmares of a violent incident from his childhood, and Arthur discovers his hidden lineage when he’s the only guy able to pull a mystical sword from a stone: He’s the son of King Uther (Eric Bana), who died by the unholy alliance of his brother (and current ruler) Vortigern (Jude Law) and the malevolent magician Mordred (Rob Knighton).
Vortigern sets his sights on his nephew, since Arthur is the only person who can challenge his uncle’s rule, and Arthur is recruited into the resistance by a motley group that includes his father’s loyal subject Bedivere (Djimon Hounsou) and marksman Goose Fat Bill (Aidan Gillen). There’s no Merlin, but our main man does have a mysterious female mage (Astrid Bergès-Frisbey) who helps him learn the amazing abilities imparted by Excalibur.
Hunnam’s hero has a captivating sort of rule-breaking scruffiness, and while Law isn’t as over-the-top as on The Young
Pope, he’s still chowing down as much scenery as he can. Freshfaced Bergès-Frisbey is underutilized as Arthur’s witchy confidante, and so is David Beckham, who plays against type as a very undashing royal henchman.
In creating new versions of the Lady of the Lake and other as- pects of the ancient legend, Ritchie offers a few amazing visuals when King Arthur dives into fantasy weirdness. Super-size elephants are destructive forces of nature in an attack on Camelot, and the Sirens are a strange, slithering three-bodied sight working with Vortigern on his nefarious plans. What doesn’t work as well are the “superpowers” that Arthur’s sword gives him, with CGI making fight scenes indecipherable, and the large-scale climactic battle heavy-handed with filmmaking wizardry.
It’s a shame, because Ritchie’s best works have a heightened normalcy at their core. His Sher
lock Holmes films resonate because they’re about a really smart dude who sees the little details no one else does, and movies like
Snatch and Lock, Stock and Two
Smoking Barrels are quick-cut, highly stylized looks at cockney hoodlums navigating an eccentric crime world. Similarly, King Ar
thur shines when it boasts a flip of the familiar, with Arthur and the boys engaging in wanton thievery or on a caper to assassinate Vortigern.
But this Sword should have stayed in the stone. A well-intentioned albeit unfocused effort,
Arthur offers campy fun yet only a so-so stab at something new.