The following is a review of King Arthur: Legend of the Sword – Directed by Guy Ritchie
I’m not one of those people who is an expert on Arthurian mythology, but I do quite enjoy the story as a whole. As a matter of fact, back when this film was referred to as ‘Knights of the Round Table,’ I was extremely excited for the film.
But when the film was pushed to 2017, I sort of lost interest in it, to be honest with you. Now, I’ve seen King Arthur: Legend of the Sword, or, as I’d like to call it, Guy Ritchie’s Gods of Egypt, if Gods of Egypt included Arthurian mythology.
King Arthur: Legend of the Sword, presents Guy Ritchie’s vision of the legend of King Arthur. It is the story of how Arthur (played by Charlie Hunnam) pulled a magical sword from stone and, eventually, fought his uncle Vortigern (played by Jude Law), the King of Britain.
The age-old tale as told by Guy Ritchie is an interesting idea, but it is, perhaps, only interesting in theory, if we are to take this film as the sole evidence of his ability to tell the story to a mass audience.
In Legend of the Sword, you can definitely sense that this is a Guy Ritchie movie. It looks and feels like a Guy Ritchie movie. The style is there, but the movie is, frankly, really boring. Ritchie’s interpretation of Arthurian mythology, King Arthur: Legend of the Sword, is overlong, overcomplicated, and, to be honest with you, peppered with so much flair and stylistic flavor that I became disinterested in the film time and time again.
It, essentially, was supposed to be the origin story for King Arthur, so that audiences would be prepared for a large Arthurian mythology cinematic universe from Warner Bros., but Ritchie is not able to make this world exciting at all. In fact, the first hour made me question why I ever looked forward to this movie in the first place, and the final hour didn’t manage to convince me of its greatness either.
There isn’t really much to praise about the world in it, or the characters that inhabit it. Minor characters are, at times, indistinguishable from one another, and David Beckham’s cameo is really just joyless. Charlie Hunnam, who plays the eponymous character, gives a disappointingly dull and bland performance. Jude Law is, at the very least, a little bit fun to watch.
But there is nothing exciting about King Arthur: Legend of the Sword, and once the movie was over I didn’t think about the exciting stylistic touch of director Guy Ritchie. Instead, I thought about the bad video game cutscene graphics that I had seen in the final act, and I was shaking my head at how awkward the ending of the movie was. We get it. They are building a round table. You’re not being clever.
As much as I want to admire the audacious way Ritchie bends the story to serve his sense of style, I, honestly, do think King Arthur: Legend of the Sword is a waste of time and money. It just does not work.
4.5 out of 10
– Jeffrey Rex
I'm Jeffrey Rex 