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I watched it last night for the first time since it came out and mostly enjoyed it and was struck by the beauty of the lavish sets and music. It reminded me of Fellini's Satyricon with the color and how some scenes seemed detached from the rest of the film (like little skits thrown in).
I fast forwarded thru some of the fight scenes (because it was a bit long) but overall was struck by the obvious effort that went into it and thought it was largely successful. a bonus is that young (ish) Helen Mirren is featured...
I just wonder if any here remember this film and if so,
what do you think of Excalibur?
Follow Ups:
But it would have been better if they had used real horses, IMO... ;-)
SF
......right by putting the whole thing into proper perspective. (grins)
-Steve
fun to read!
I liked Merlin but Arthur had no gravitas and Lancelot was just a pretty boy...
The cast contained some actors yet to gain fame/notoriety at that time, but did in later years.
Liam Neeson
Helen Mirren
Patrick Stewart
Gabriel Byrne (to name a few)And it contained some actors destined to remain obscure.
I thought the directing/acting with regard to Lancelot was over the top and just plain bad. Bad taste. Bad acting.And the betrayal scenes re: Lancelot / Guinnevere were also overdone.
Nigel Terry as King Arthur seemed mis-cast. A light weight actor in this role. ....'did not carry it.
Nicole williamson as Merlin was bad. At times trying to inject a sense of comedy, and failing. At other times he just looked and acted wierd. When you think of the mythological character Merlin, this actor in this role does not come to mind. Ian Mackellan (from Fellowship of the Ring,as Gandolf the Grey)would have been an exceptional Merlin.
On the other hand I thought the film had good atmospherics conducive to imagining what these Dark Age times may have been like to live through. And the musical score was good. I thought that the opening scene with Siegfried's Funeral March as the background score was involving.
An uneven movie. Not completely bad. Perhaps mostly bad. And memorable for me as a disappointment.
-Steve
Edits: 09/22/13 09/22/13
I watched the dvd of Excaliber last night. Or at least 3/4ths of it. And, having refreshed my memory of the film, I must now amend some of my criticisms of it.re: set design. Merlin's "crystal cave" was nicely imagined in this movie. A very elaborate, extravagant and beautiful set was provided for the scenes in the movie. Particularly in the scene where Morgan Le Fay traps Merlin in the cave.
The Lancelot/Guinnevere scenes were not as badly done as I had previously remembered. It seemed as if these star-crossed lovers were drawn to one another like magnets. No matter how well they knew the consequences of this betrayal to the King, they simply could not prevent themselves from a lustful calamity.
Then Morgan gets her lair, a castle in parts of the country where brave men go to be hung by the neck, slowly, while the crows pick out their eyeballs. But this is where Morgan Le Fay, Arthur's half sister, raises Arthur's illegitimate son, her son, Mordred. Mordred grows up thinking it is his mission in life to replace his father as the 'great king'.
There are more scenes after this worth recounting, but I probably should not spoil all the main bits of this movie.
Anyway, acting by the entire cast is stiffly borne and shouted out. The demeanor of most of the knights in this movie is savage and animal-like. True barbarians, the entire lot. I'd have thought that in consideration of the times, the Roman occupation that had just ended a generation or two previously -would have / might have- taught at least some of these Brits a bit of culture. Plus, even the Celtic tribes that preceded the Roman occupation would have had more dignity and civilized bearing than do these brutes. Oh well. It's just one vision of the myth.
Then again, it does follow closely the fantasy retelling by Malory*. A book I read in my adolescence with great interest. And on reflection it has much in common with some of the comic books I also read. Pure fantasy.
-Steve
*.... Le Morte D' Arthur, Sir Thomas Malory
Edits: 09/29/13
Nigel Terry just didn't do it for me, as there was no subtlety in the acting. He seemed to be shouting and acting like he was on a playhouse stage; then again, he was mainly a theatre actor. Ian Mackellen as Merlin would have been great I imagine, and with these two roles with different cast, the movie could have been a true classic..
It was so very lush and I enjoyed Mirren and Nicol Williamson's overplaying Merlin. I don't recall seeing Liam Neeson (poorly acted drunk) or Gabriel Byrne before this. I have watched it over the years and feel it doesn't hold up to the test of time. If anything, the Wagner soundtrack had as much to do with selling the audience on this film as anything.
A major conceptual disaster.
"Lock up when you're done and don't touch the piano."
-Dr. Greg House
than it contained one of the greatest bloopers in cinema history
second post down in the linked thread
--------------------------
"I'd like to own a squadron of tanks"
And of course, they got to know their Wagner excerpts (Götterdämmerung and Parsifal) through this flick. I also liked the director's efforts to induce a dream-like state in certain scenes. So, yes, I liked "Excalibur", but I haven't seen it in many years, and, as suggested below, it might not hold up as well if I saw it today.
I saw it when it came out and liked the surrealism, the flowers blooming as King Arthur rides along, the cool armor, but when I rented it five years ago I couldn't get off on it. For me Deliverance holds up a lot better.
unfortunately...
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