Believe in the legend
King Arthur

Stars Clive Owen, Stephen Dillane, Keira Knightley, Ioann Gruffudd, Stellan Skarsgard, Ray Winstone, Hugh Dancey, Schweiger and Joel Edgerton.
Rated M.

Reviewer: LT Simone Heyer

Rating:

IMAGINE being the son in your family (for some of you that won’t be hard).

Then imagine being plucked from your family as a child, and riding off into the sunset with a bunch of burly Romans to be a hired gun for the next 15 years.

Sure, the story of King Arthur is a myth, but this is how Lancelot (Gruffudd) came to be one of the knights of the Round Table.

Arthur (Owen) – who’s not yet the King – and his knights protect Roman interests in England from Merlin’s Woads (the indigenous population).

They’re well-known in the region for being cold-hearted killers, who, despite their small number, can whop the nastiest crowd.

Shoot forward a few years and the pagan knights are at the end of their tenure.

They’re about to get discharged from the Roman forces when they are asked to do one more mission as a special favour to the Pope.

Arthur is disgusted, but soon the group saddles up to do Rome’s bidding one more time and we know that it’s going to be the end of the line for most of them.

As Arthur approaches Hadrian’s Wall from the south, the Saxons are closing in from the north and there begins the cat-and-mouse pursuit for Britain.

Along the way we meet Woad Guinevere (Knightley), who’s feisty enough to charm the knights, and brave enough to back them up on the battlefield. Now King Arthur isn’t your usual Jerry Bruckheimer-style all-singing, all-dancing Hollywood blockbuster.

It has a modest-budget feel that think brings more class and authority to the film. It’s not one of those films that is made great because of special effects.

The cast is fantastic – all the Knights are low-level on the fame scale and are perfect in the battlehardened knight role. Australian Joel Edgerton, who plays Gawain, was made for the part.

He’s knight through and through. His laid-back-yet-rugged look makes him very believable. Keira Knightley proved her action- history genre prowess with Pirates of the Caribbean.

At least King Arthur she gets to wield some weapons.

King Arthur is a great movie, though quite long at 125 minutes.

It explores the myth of the legend without being a cash-filled epic, and is thoroughly believable.