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Review: A Knight's Tale 65

Posted by JonKatz from the -AC/DC-meets-Camelot- dept.
If you didn't know that the same guy who co-wrote LA Confidential wrote and directed A Knight's Tale, you wouldn't believe it. Merrie Old England may never recover from this amusing collision between American teen/pop culture and the brawling, allegedly chivalrous jousts of the 14th century. It would be worth a trip to London to sit in a British cinema and watch jaws drop. (Just hang on a bit. The really good stuff starts coming out next week.) SPOILAGE WARNING: Plot is discussed, but not ending. (Read more.)

The tone is set right away when the film opens with Queen belting out "We Will Rock You" -- at a jousting match. (And the movie ends with a song by AC/DC, probably not what the Knights of the Round Table were tapping their toes to.)

The movie is dead-aimed at teens -- girls who'll sigh over Australia's Heath Ledger, playing the commoner who follows his bliss, pretends to be a knight, and tries to win the lady's heart; and boys who enjoy watching horses, lances and knights slamming into one another for the better part of two hours. The computer renderings of jousting stadiums and olde cities are nice.

It's a silly movie, but knowingly silly, and it's also entertaining and -- even, at moments -- inventive. Brian Helgeland is winking at the old Camelot myths; A Knight's Tale doesn't take itself seriously for a moment.

William, our hunky hero (introduced to American audiences in the cheesy The Patriot), is shocked to discover the body of the dead knight he serves after a tournament. Seizing the moment, and looking and sounding exactly like a Disney prince rather than the poor street kid he allegedly is (his poor thatcher Dad is frequently invoked as hokey inspiring spirit). He dons his armor, practices for a few weeks with his buddies, starts piling up tournament champsionships, falls in love with Lady Jocelyn (Shannyn Sossamon), encounters some royalty, and runs afoul of the evil Count Adhemar (Rufus Sewell). The problem is that only nobility have the right to have their heads knocked off in tournaments, and unmasking will lead to the stocks or worse.

Jocelyn is a poor choice for William for several reasons. First off, she's noble and he isn't, a relationship issue. Second, she's a twit, demanding at one point that he permit himself to get clobbered by other jousters to prove his love for her. Third, Count Adhemar (yes, his armor is black and he is nasty to his horse) is also in love with her, and deeply suspicious of William's lineage. William and his buddies, played by Mark Addy and Alan Tudyk (with a winning turn by Paul Bettany as Geoffrey Chaucer, here portrayed as a writer, poet and gambling addict), understand that if they are found out, William will go straight to the stocks at the center of computer-animated Tudor London.

Revealing any more of the story would be unnecessary spoilage, though frankly, nobody will be on the edge of his seat with suspense about the outcome. Still, the movie is good-hearted, and since the good stuff doesn't roll out until next week, it's good for a few laughs. The teen movie has been a distinct and popular subgenre for several years now, but A Knight's Tale is genuinely groundbreaking: it would hardly have seemed possible to fuse that genre with this oft-told yarn, turning Geoffrey Chaucer into a player in a teen buddy yarn. But Hollywood has risen to the occasion.
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Review: A Knight's Tale

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  • Heath Ledger (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward
    He actually made his debut in Ten Things I Hate about you, not the Patriot.. at least to my knowldege that was his first major movie in the states. My sister loved that movie, its not bad, but you can only see it so many times before it makes you ill. I think the cutoff is somewhere around a dozen a month.

  • Factual Error (Score:4)

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 13, 2001 @06:45AM (#226134)
    Actually, Heath Ledger's first big American breakthrough was "10 Things I Hate About You." However, he had been making films and TV series for some time prior.
  • He's AUSTRALIAN not Austrian. :-) If anything he should sound like Crocodile Dundee right? G'day.
  • This movie was pretty good, but it was made even more fun because the local theater wanted us from the local SCA/Markland group to put on a demo on heavy weapons combat.

    After we played for an hour we were led to out own, private showing of the movie where we were allowed to make as much noise as we wanted to. If I went to see it by myself, I'd have liked the movie but would have been wanting more.

    This is a "Go see it as a group" flick or a "Friday night, hang around, drink beer and watch silly movies" flick

    Phoenix
  • duh. Turn in your nerd credentials. You have violated commandment #1. Don't bash others expression of geekness even if you don't like it.

    Vermifax
  • If you did go to a London cinema, obviously you wouldn't be able to see jaws dropping because of the fog.
  • Sorry Jon, but having her request that he does the 'worst possible' in the tournament to please her is a VERY period thing. It was often that a knight would go to the extremes to please a lady, responding to her whim, going against their normal 'creed'.

    I found this to be very well done (although I was suprised that he just 'stood there', would have looked better to have galloped forward with lance raised high crying her name loudly for all to hear).

  • Argh. (Score:3)

    by KFury ( 19522 ) on Sunday May 13, 2001 @07:49AM (#226140) Homepage
    Funny? I suppose, but if you'd like a slightly harsher review [fury.com], here you go.

    Kevin Fox
    --
  • > and Medieval peasants could certainly be a rowdy bunch.

    The big churches actually had to have bouncers, who were called "dog beadles" (for reasons that escape me).
    --
  • A criticism of a movie review from one who has a movie quote as a .sig

    There are plenty of people on here with amusing quotes in their .sig, but you don't see Slashdot delivering a joke story of the day, now, do you?
  • Every time Katz does a movie review somebody bitches about how this is offtopic. Of course it is. Is it going away? No. Shut the fuck up.

    Oh, good point! Forgot about that. We're powerless. Thanks. I'll be sure to let those anti-Communist protesters in, so they can stop wasting their time too. No sense in bothering with voicing one's opinion. Appreciate that insight!
  • Damn skippy.

    I don't want to see depressing stuff. The news tells me that everything is bad, we're there are tons of things that make society look like its going down the crapper. I want to be happy.

    My friend used to do Vampire LARPs, and I was having him explain the whole ordeal to me... I was amazed by it! People want to be sneaky and back stab other people and get fame at the expense of others... Blarg. I would hate to have a friend do that to me or vica versa. Thats why I play a superheroes RPG like Aberrant [slashdot.org]. Its fun. The good guys generally win. I get to play nice with my friends. Bleh, who needs depressing?
  • For a long time, I've tried to see things from Katz's perspective: fish out of water, trying to spark debate on lazy sunday mornings about something that geeks might be interested in, even if it's not specifically geeky. I've tried to be patient, but I'm feeling punchy, so here goes: Katz, I know you want to fit in here, or that you were brought in by some contractual deal handed down by Andover, but give it up. Geeks here don't need any help sparking debate or finding random, non-geeky crap to flame about. If you want to continue to opine in your trite, faux-Ebert style, take that crap over to geocities. Either that, or start posting these things on Saturday night instead of the following morning, so you can get the belligerent geeks at their drunkest and most pugnacious, not in the middle of their hangovers.

  • Where's the spoiler in that? I haven't seen the movie yet (and I don't plan to), but I got that much out of just the previews I've seen! I guess that does say a lot about the plot, or lack of it!
  • Could someone please stop Jon Katz from reviewing movies here?

    You may want to take a closer look at your preferences page. Last time I checked, you can turn off stories based on the category they fall under, or by author. With just a few clicks, you'll never see a story by Katz on the front page again. Personally, I like seeing the occasional story from him, if just for the entertainment value in some of the comments following it!
  • I think it's more along the lines of Katz getting so much contrary feedback due to his Mummy 2 review that he decided something along the lines of, "Huh, people don't like my negative, critical reviews. I'll review something positively," and, since he doesn't have any common sense or intelligence, he wasn't able to tell when the film was genuinely bad.

    However, I've not yet seen the film, so I can't make a complete judgement on it. My assessment of the film, however, is that it will be another bomb. Might be entertaining, in it's own special way. *shrug*

    -------
    CAIMLAS

  • I was surprised by a few things in this movie. Firstly, except for "We Will Rock You" at the start, the modern songs didn't detract from the movie like I thought they would. They worked quite well. Secondly, the characters actually seemed interesting: the Count wasn't pure evil, just a jerk; and the woman he wanted (Jocelyn) wasn't a perfect fairy princess. The plot seemed to be driven by the characters for the first half of the movie.

    <SPOILERS>
    Then, halfway through, everything freezes up, and the interesting characters vanish and are replaced by one-dimensional robots whose only purpose is to get the plot to its inevitable conclusion. Everyone seems to forget that Jocelyn was a spoiled brat. The Count became the epitome of evil. All the supporting characters became identical weepy-eyed sycophants whose only purpose was to spout supposedly inspiring tripe at the appropriate moment. (Note to writers: you can't create drama just by having everyone cry.) And just when our hero is in the stocks, with no hope of escape, we have the textbook deus ex machina moment when the prince of Wales comes and releases him.
    </SPOILERS>

    I thought the first half of this movie was very entertaining, and the second half was as dull and inevitable as watching bathwater flowing down the drain.

    I guess that's pretty harsh, but I was all the more disappointed because the first half seemed so good.

    Overall, I think the movie is worth seeing. It's quite entertaining if you don't think too hard.
    --
  • Haha. Or the smoke from the burning cows.
  • You forgot to mention the surreal David Bowie dance scene. This movie was the bomb, yo.
  • I resent movies that promote out of context, graphic sexual irresponsibility [...] This film handled both with kid gloves

    I liked this movie, but here we disagree.

    The hero and the token babe have, if memory serves me correctly, three short public conversations, one short public argument, and sex, in that order. That's a bit rushed for me.

    Maybe not graphic sex, and if "We Will Rock You" wasn't out of context, than a little boinking surely wasn't, but it flunked the responsibility test flat.

    Still a hilarious, fun movie, though, and I'll recommend it to any of my friends.

  • Nope, no crack smoking, just the genetically determined ass crack that most of us have. But unlike some, my brain is not located just behind the ass crack.
  • I saw a Knight's Tale last night. I thought it was pretty funny and I'm not a teen; I'm in those 30 something years. The music was well matched to the theme, and the acting was well done for the movie's ambiance. Accuracy, I have no idea, but what they portrayed in the movie was just right.

    I didn't find myself once distracted by the tempting glow of the neon exit sign.

    I just wished William had fallen for the right girl, the blacksmith, ferrier, armoursmith or what ever they called her. She was far more interesting than the royal twit.

    If you haven't seen it yet, stick around to the very end of the credits for a taste of really immature humor that will leave you with a chuckle.

    P.S. I find the Katz bashing on this review as bad as the bashers claim Katz to be. Other than the teen comments, Katz got this one pretty close to the mark.
  • It doesn't even deserve a review. The whole plot is pointless. Some wannabe knight guy, who's real name is william, wants to be champion in a tournament. Somewhere along the line, he finds this beautiful woman at church, and instantly 'falls in love' with her. She's a bitch though. Won't even give out her name at first. He's gotta prove his worthiness or something. So he leaves, not knowing her name. As he leaves, she and her friend start whispering, 'oh he's cute'. Blah, blah.... Later on, she starts attending these tournaments as a spectator. She's the prettiest one there, so all the knights try to impress her. But this william guy is special. He's not trying to win this 'for her'. So then she sends her friend to tell him her real name (she uses her friend chick as the 'messenger' throughout the movie). It is jocelyn. 'wow thats beautiful'. Ok, so now they go to the dance or whatever. Some point later in the movie, he says something to piss her off. Now he must prove he loves her by losing in the tournament. So he loses a match. Now she feels sorry for him and he must win now. Oh i forgot to mention there's this other guy that likes her too. he's the 'bad guy', cause he just wants her for sex. Ok, that's basically the whole movie. It's so predictable. There is no suspense at all. There were a few laughs though. Probably the most entertaining parts of this movie were listening to chaucer's announcements, and seeing jocelyn's nipples through her clothes. Other than that it's all shit we've seen before. The jousting was somewhat interesting also, i guess.
  • What do you mean "where's the spoiler in that?" I just told you the entire movie. Go ahead and see it. If you dare...
  • However, I've not yet seen the film, so I can't make a complete judgement on it. My assessment of the film, however, is that it will be another bomb. Might be entertaining, in it's own special way. *shrug*

    There's not "own special way" about it--the movie sucks. But it's like The Blues Brothers in the way it sucks--the movie is so bad, it's good. It's actually a bit witty, and never, ever takes itself seriously. When we saw it on friday night, my girlfriend asked, "Do we want to leave now, or should we wait a few minutes?" during the opening Queen scene. By the end of the movie, we and the other couple we saw it with, agreed that it was actually a decent flick. (Of course, it helped that we kept the theater going with MST3K-like commentary... :)

    YMMV

  • uhhh I beg your pardon? No boy bands??
    So what were the Spice Girls anyway if they weren't an artificially put together band?
    But yes there are boy bands, In April, I took a trip to Wales (part of the UK for those needing geography lessons) and what did I see on TV but some sort of "making the band" type of boy band fluff. And British girls screamin their heads off over them.
  • If you care about authentic jousting, or authentic anything, then you must stay away from this movie. I saw it last night and it sucked beyond sucking. I wish so much that the Filthy Critic [bigempire.com] already reviewed it so that I could send you there.

    The theatre was only about 1/2 full and this was opening weekend. That was the first sign of suckness. Then, I saw that about 95% of the audience was under 16, and they were giggling a lot before the movie even started. Second clue to suckness. Then, all of the previews were for teen movies. That was the third sign of suckness. (Side note: There was a preview of American Pie 2, which looks like a jolly good teen movie. Not all teen movies suck, just most.)

    The movie is full of modern music and it is just plain stupid. AC/DC, Queen, and so on, just as Katz said. I can't believe he didn't completely trash this movie! What is wrong with him. It sucked.

    The jousting is boring. It is the same thing again and again. The sword fights are much worse than any Society for Creative Anachronism [sca.org] fight I have evr seen. My backyard light saber fights as a kid were better done. The fighting sucked! Don't see this movie expecting any reasonable fighting.

    Don't see this movie as a favor to your girlfriend or wife, or friends. Don't see it is a way to burn off extra time on the weekend. Don't see it because you are drunk or high. Don't see it. Please don't see it. It sucked so bad that it isn't even worthy of a MST3000 [scifi.com] lampoon. It wasn't stupid or funny or interesting. Avoid the sucking beyond sucking! Avoid it like the plague!

    Talk about how bad a Knight's Tale is right here [quicktopic.com]! Tell other people about how bad the movie was. Share your story about the sucking beyond sucking. Prevent others from suffering through this crap stick of a movie....

  • Whenever I see rms I think "root mean squared [qut.edu.au]" from my days doing statistics in psychology. What do other folks think when they see RMS (or rms)? Oh, I mean, what do people think besides Richard M. Stallman [stallman.org]? This isn't a question out of disrespect. It is question that digs into how people think, and categorize and use TLAs [internet.tao.ca].
  • I like him on the Naked Chef. :)
  • Wow. This reviewer cannot possibly be the same man who, just a mere week or so ago, bagged The Mummy Returns [slashdot.org].

    Okay, so Jon goes from "Hollywood execs would do well to ponder the reality that Baldur's Gate II and Everquest are far more imaginative and skillfully done." to "it's a silly movie, but knowingly silly, and it's also entertaining and -- even, at moments -- inventive."

    So, now a Knights Tale is better than the Mummy Returns? I disagree - you should switch the text for these two reivews. Jon makes it sound like were comparing a Ed Wood movie to Star Wars.

    Let me get this straight, The Mummy Returns (over 84 million in ticket sales [yahoo.com]) is uninventive, over-CGI'ed and sucky, while a Fast Times at Ridgemont High/D&D ripoff, aka A Knights Tale, is fantastic and silly but inventive? Riiiiiigggghhhttt.

    I dont know about you guys, but i find it hard to trust a reviewer who displays such capricious tendancies...

    "I dont eat mammals." - Kimmy from Survivor 2 on eating a chicken with her tribe.
    "Chickens arent mammals, duh." - Me.
  • ... he liked Knight's Tale for a lot of the same reasons he seemed to hate Mummy Returns ...

    That's not unusual. The same elements are often central to two movies, but one is clearly the worse. In the case of Mummy Returns, Katz's review explains exactly why he didn't like it. Even though he suspected it was being intentionally silly, it didn't come off right. The movie, rather than setting that mood, expected you to come in with it. The context that frames your perception of the movie is probably the most important aspect. Whereas Katz sees A Knight's Tale as setting the mood immediately, he didn't see Mummy Returns as doing anything to establish itself as an intentionally silly romp. Read his reviews again. He doesn't have to explain here why he liked Knight's Tale even though it shares elements with Mummy Returns. The individual reviews spell out what he liked and disliked.

    Also, the factual error regarding Heath Ledger's first American appearance...

    He said, "Introduced to American audiences in..." and not, "Heath Ledger first appeared in..." There is a difference and he's absolutely correct in stating that Heath Ledger's role in The Patriot did introduce him to the American audience as a whole. His previous American movies were not mainstream, so his role in a major blockbuster alongside a superstar certainly did put him into the mainstream.

  • Well, given his tendency to bitch and whine about the Gnu/Linux thing, I sometimes think it's "PMS".

    Rich

  • I think you'll find that 'The Dish' shows a much darker, and world dominating, side to those antipodians. Beware those cricketing heroes...
  • I can't help but snicker to myself when people go on about the music in A Knight's Tale--early music is getting more of a following, but I bet most of the kvetchers are wishing for a soundtrack of John Williams-style 21st century pastiche of 19th century Romantic music, which is every bit as anachronistic as Queen and David Bowie, dang it! Authentic would be isorhythmic motets, Machaut virelais, troubadour and trouvere music, stuff from the Carmina Burana (no, not Orff's settiing), or something like that "Your God wants you for the nth Crusade" recruiting song, "Crucifigat omnes."

    In a way, they did the right thing. At the time of the movie, the motets and such were modern music. (Heck, some medieval French college students sang a motet--"Hare, hare, hye/Balaam"--as they rioted over a tax on alcohol. The quality of protest music sure has gone downhill over the past few centuries...) The songs in the Carmina Burana were rowdy and raunchy; love songs of the era were every bit as treacly as the Backstreet Boys or 'N Sync. Rock and pop are their analogues to modern ears, not ossified 19th century art music. (If you want an example of what I'm talking about, check out the Bang Lassies web page [banglassies.com]--it's a couple of centuries later, but if I hadn't heard Dowland's "Come Again, Sweet Love" and someone played the Bang Lassies' version without telliing me who did it, I'd swear it was a Todd Rundgren track I hadn't heard.)

  • This movie had a pop culture twist just like the modern "Romeo and Juliet" (although I hated that movie). This movie wasn't supposed to be true to the time. Also, the movie theatre that I work at has had a good showing of ALL ages.

    You screwed up some points in the movie:

    "Jocelyn is a poor choice for William for several reasons. First off, she's noble and he isn't, a relationship issue."

    She doesn't know that he isn't noble (until later).

    "...Count Adhemar (yes, his armor is black and he is nasty to his horse) is also in love with her.."

    He wasn't in love with her - he refered to her as a trophy, he obviously didn't care about her.

    "...she's a twit, demanding at one point that he permit himself to get clobbered by other jousters to prove his love for her."

    If you would have been paying attention you would have known that she was fed up with knights saying they would win the tournament for her. All it proved was how vain the knights were.

    It wasn't by any means an excellent movie, but it was a good, entertaining movie.

    I'm still waiting for Shrek and Pearl Harbor!
  • I just saw this movie last night and howled in laughter through much of it. Heck, I'm sure that my friends and I were getting strange looks from everyone else in theater... The different characters are extremely well done; Chaucer was too hilarious for words, particularly as we realized all of the Canterbury Tales references. People comment that William just picks up a lance and learns how to fight in a month, but they miss one thing - he's been a squire since he was nine, so I suspect he'd had a bit of practice; we know he had plenty of sword practice. Basically, this movie made fun of a lot of things - sports crowds, particularly wrestling, with the announcer style of Chaucer-as-herald and the makeup, were a particular target... I loved how when they switched to modern music in the courtly dance, the dancing still maintained a feeling of precision. I thought the Nike product placement was hilariously funny. Just for the record, I'm not a teenage girl - I'm married and in my twenties. Oh, and I saw it was several Scadians, who pointed out some of the mistakes, but mostly with amusement. Time to stop babbling. Kria
  • I wouldn't say that this movie review is off-topic. I know there's a bunch of SCA nerds who would just love this movie. And a bunch of SCA nerds who would just hate this movie, as I bet it's full of inaccuracies. I wouldn't know, but if you're looking for accuracy in movies of any kind, you have a long search ahead of you.

    I've heard many people who say that "We Will Rock You" playing during the opening credits sets the tone for the movie, and I think that's especially true on an individual level. If you see it as pandering, you'll see the rest of the movie as some teenager flick that might as well end at the prom. If you see it as an invitation not to take the movie too seriously, you'll see the rest of the movie as a fantasy that probably doesn't reflect history. Indeed, the repeated infusions of classic rock and other neologisms serves to reinforce this attitude.

    That's probably a good idea because the story itself is really too implausible to buy at face value. The course of William's career, his rivalry with the Count, the fairy tale love story, all of it is an exaggeration. Without such dissonant elements as the classic rock sountrack, I don't think the movie would have succeeded. Silly things like that loosen up the audience and allow a movie to tell its story in its own way.

    Compare it to Wayne's World 2, which had such dissonant elements as talking to the camera, multiple endings, an inexplicable room full of training ninjas, and the Bohemian Rhapsody. The movie was 67% filler, but most people I know loved it. That filler made us care about the characters enough to pay attention to the content. And in contrast, A Knight's Tale has far less filler.

    That being said, I'd give the movie three stars. It's not probably going to make any critic's best-of lists, and I think some of the exaggerations might have gone a bit too far. I especially share Katz's sentiments about the love interest. But as long as you try not to think of it as a teen movie, you'll probably enjoy it.

  • s/Wayne's World 2/Wayne's World/
    s/dissonant/extraneous/

    Would that I had edited the post better.

  • ...That was the first sign of suckness...

    I thought the first sign of suckness was the trailer, which unfortunately makes a good argument for giving away too much of the movie in a preview. I think I'll spend my 7 bucks on renting a truly accurate historical epic, Holy Grail [oraclehumor.com].

    Ni!

  • ***mild spoiler alert** ...That has the main character screaming his own name when defeating the bad guy. If there's anything cooler than that, I'd like to hear it.
  • Couldn't have said it better myself, mod the parent comment up =)
  • Okay, so "The Mummy Returns" was a steaming pile of crap and "Knight's Tale" is modern day Shakepere in Katz's eyes? What is this? He can see the tongue-in-cheekness of this movie but not the other? What a moron...

  • I dunno, if they distance you from it and make it perverse enough, even the darkly depressing can be funny. Play Paranoia to see that. Your worst enemies are your teammates, the whole world is out to get you, and your likely to die at least 2 times over the course of the adventure. Still, its the funniest game I've ever played, its just got a very morbid sense of humor.
  • So many people bitch out the music... when you think about it, a full orchestra isn't realistic either. Jousting took place before symphonies, sorry. Nobody bitched about Gladiator's symphonic soundtrack, did they? Well the time-distance between gladiators and symphonies is more then it is between classic rock and jousting. It makes as much sense as anything.
  • ...First Knight. Its a decent story, but they attached Arthurian legend to it to desecrate "Morte d'Arthur".

    I wasn't going to see this, and everyone has convinced me not to even look in the direction of the theater...
    Hopefully, Pearl Harbor is as good as everyone is trying to make it... or I'll have to wait for Lord of the Rings...
  • Most movies that have been hits in recent times have been silly. It's proibably because to many serious things are happening around us and we haven't been able to afford to be silly in our social lives.

    Preston Sturges made this very point in his 1942 film Sullivan's Travels [imdb.com]. A director of crowd-pleasing fluff films decides that, with the Depression on, he needs to turn toward social relevance -- but a trip among the common people convinces him that what they really need is escapism.

    By the way, the title of his planned grimly realistic film was O Brother, Where Art Thou?. Nice to see that good titles get recycled...

    --

  • Well the old jousting tournements were popular for a reason, even if the music they had wasn't rock'n'roll.

    and Medieval peasants could certainly be a rowdy bunch. So it in perverse way, this may actually catch some of the energy and excitement of the tournaments even if it is otherwise sheer fantasy.

    Check out the Vinny the Vampire [eplugz.com] comic strip

  • It's funny - there's a group even more loserish than people who sit around arguing over who 0wns wh0 on f1rs+ p0s+....

    Guys, if ya wanna pose, buy a skateboard.
  • I don't know a hell of a lot about Mr. Katz, but that illustration is Super Cool. Incredibly funny, even without context.
  • It can't be any worse than "First Knight". We still owe the Brits and apology for that one.
  • It would seem to me that this film would balance precariously on the edge of a nerd film - or at least, the subject matter would. Would you as strongly protest a review of Excalibur or Lord Of The Rings? Probably not.

    It's only because you know that A Knight's Tale is teen dreck that you oppose its review. What if you knew only that it was a vaguely Arthurian film? Would that interest the "nerd" side of your sensibilities? Wouldn't you then appreciate a review telling you that it was anything but a compelling artwork?

    Many these days consider overt appreciation for the Arthurian legend to be a trait of the nerd/geek. The same can be said for LOTR, D&D, Excalibur - even Conan The Barbarian (if you find yourself repeating either the "lamentation" or "Tree of Woe" lines, you are a geek).

    Of course, none of this excuses the review of "The Mummy Returns". Reviewing that move just makes no sense whatsoever. :)

    -- Sinistar

  • I saw enough from their advertisement on the side of a bus to know that this movie was going to suck big time. First of all the main character does not know how to ride his horse too well, you never ride a horse like he did, one hand on the reigns up in the air, and he was scrunched forward, all this leads to being unbalanced.

    Yes of course it was not meant to be serious, but come on even when I was a teen I detested movies like this as an insult.

    A good story with good effects that does not want to seem stupid will appeal across far wider age groups, from the very young to the very old. Why did the Knights Tale limit itself to one group?
  • Wrong!!!
    Europeans, with the exception of Brits, drive on the right side of the road...

  • A sure hit this one (Score:4)

    by ishrat ( 235467 ) on Sunday May 13, 2001 @06:53AM (#226186) Homepage
    It's a silly movie, but knowingly silly, and it's also entertaining and -- even, at moments -- inventive.

    Most movies that have been hits in recent times have been silly. It's proibably because to many serious things are happening around us and we haven't been able to afford to be silly in our social lives.

  • I was surprised... (Score:4)

    by GeneralEmergency ( 240687 ) on Sunday May 13, 2001 @09:48AM (#226187) Journal

    I took my teenage daughter to see this film Friday ONLY because the movie I had hoped to see was not going to screen for a few more hours, fully expecting to be revulsed by the usual teen formula picture.

    I enjoyed this picture.

    Furthermore, I think "A Knight's Tale" is one of those rare occurances where Hollywood has found just the right balance for this age group. As a parent, I resent movies that promote out of context, graphic sexual irresponsibility and senseless (or worse, fashionable) violence. This film handled both with kid gloves, and in many ways, this film reminded me of the horse opera films of the 60's which I grew up on.

    The one, small flaw I found in the film was a product of the pop culture injection. While this worked well during the opening "We Will, We Will Rock You" segment because it was a clever extention/integration of the sountrack into the on-screen action, during the post-joust dinner dance sceen they revert to period music and then try to jump 400 years musically in mid dance. I felt that this came off awkwardly.

    With the MPAA being what I percieve to be an immoral and oppressive force in our society today, I'm careful about how and when I give my money to Hollywood (I don't and will not own a DVD player). The makers of "A Knight's Tale" should feel good about this effort, right up to point where they release on DVD. Then they can go to hell.


    "A microprocessor... is a terrible thing to waste." --

  • Yup... it was... but his best acting role so far has been in "Two Hands" - an Australian movie, but if you can find a copy in the US, see it, 'coz it shows a darker side of Australia than the world normally sees...

    Cheers,
    Richard
  • I think Hell just froze over, I actually agree with one of Jon Katz's reviews!

    Help Help! I'm being repressed!
  • ish.

    The Wife of Bath, the Cook with the running sore, really, good ole Geoff was aiming for middle-brow yucks just as much as the Farelly brothers do.

    Undoubtably, the high born of Chaucer's age were publically aghast at his lewdnes and vulgarity (while enjoying him in private,i'm sure).

    So, A Knights Tale is just another middle-brow targeted tale.

    TG
  • Could someone please stop Jon Katz from reviewing movies here? There are at least 2 reasons why he shouldn't be:

    1) Quite a few of the movies have nothing what-so-ever to do with 'nerd news'. I'm a movie fan myself and see quite a lot of movies, and I do like to read reviews. By why oh why would a movie like Knight's Tale be reviewed on Slashdot? Seriously, Slashdot editors, you need to stick to the nerd-niche that has made this site famous, otherwise you cheapen the Slashdot 'brand'. There's plenty of sites that cater specifically for those looking for movie reviews. Katz' inane blathering can't compete with them, so don't try. If Katz wants to review Anti-Trust or even the Matrix, or other such movies that have at least some geek-bent, I wouldn't have such a problem, but why these other flicks, why on Slashdot?

    2) Katz is a terrible reviewer. As others have pointed out, he liked Knight's Tale for a lot of the same reasons he seemed to hate Mummy Returns, and he didn't adequately explain why. Also, the factual error regarding Heath Ledger's first American appearance shows that he is incapable of even simple fact checking (20 seconds on IMDB would have cleared this up.)

  • It's Plantagenet London, not Tudor London (Score:3)

    by Cobalt Box ( 300357 ) on Sunday May 13, 2001 @09:28AM (#226192)
    See, that just totally ruined for me whatever credibility this review had.
  • I mean come on, it's a movie about a pre-industrial society. Not all reviews are unworthy of ./ discussion, but if it has nothing to do with modern times, don't even bother us...
  • Thank God for a harsher review.

    This is the first movie I have ever walked out of. There was little or no plot, the attempt to inject modern rock and pop into the storyline was pathetic, awkward and unnecessary, and it was simply an attempt to 'modernize' the movie so that little teen girls can squeel over the pretty faces.

    Yeah, it had a few funny moments, but they're all at a superficial level and require absolutely no understanding of the characters or the storyline. You could walk into the movie to see one joke, get it, and leave. My girlfriend and I chose the latter - we left and had an intelligent, deep conversation in the parking lot.
  • First off, I am not a scatian.
    Second off, I have not seen, nor have any plans to see this particular movie.

    Ok, got that out of the way. Well, yes, american audiances will buy almost anything. But, despite my willingness to ignore huge inaccuracies, I cannot reconcile the image of a lower (or even middle class) person breaking into the noble's jousting. (not to mention the whole no armor thing) The guy would be dead on sight. I can only suspend my disbelief so far. Perhaps if it had marketed itself as fantasy (ie not placed itself in a historical context) it would be different. But by placing itself withing the context, [I feel that] it is obligated to obey certin basic rules. If you just want to see another formulaic holywood 'underdog gets the girl' romance, sure, go see it. I am kind of boored with that theme myself.
    -CrackElf
  • Yeah, I thought this was a review of Shrek. Curses!

  • I really liked that, and started browsing your site. Very cool suff.

    BTW, the correct way to kill someone is to use a *runcible*.

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