'' is a film first released in the
United States on
June 28 ,
2004 , dubbed as "The Untold True Story That Inspired The Legend" by
Touchstone Pictures .
The makers of the film claim to present a historically accurate version of the
Arthurian Legend s, supposedly inspired by new archaeological findings. The accuracy of these claims is subject to debate, but the film is unusual in representing
Arthur as a
Roman soldier rather than a
Medieval Knight .
This historical approach to the Arthurian legends had already been showcased in film once - in ''
Arthur Of The Britons '', a
1972 -
1973 British
TV Series , and ''King Arthur, The Young Warlord'', a movie-length compilation of some of its episodes. (In this version, Arthur is a
Celt ic
Chieftain .)
Arthur , also known as ''
Artorius '' (
Clive Owen ), is portrayed as a Roman cavalry officer, the son of a Roman father and a
Celt ic mother, who leads a military force of
Sarmatian Cavalry in
Britain at the close of
The Roman Occupation in 452 A.D. He and his men guard
Hadrian's Wall against the "Woads", a
Celt ic people who resist Roman rule roughly based on the historical
Picts , led by their mysterious leader
Merlin . He is not the first Arthur - over the years, many of his ancestors have manned the Wall, leading Sarmatian auxiliaries.
As the film starts, Arthur and his remaining men
Lancelot ,
Bors ,
Tristan ,
Gawain ,
Galahad and
Dagonet - are expecting to be finally discharged from the service of the Empire after faithfully serving for 15 years. However, they are dispatched on a final and possibly suicidal mission by
Bishop Germanus Of Auxerre to rescue an important Roman family from impending capture by the invading
Saxons , led by their chief
Cerdic and his son
Cynric . This rescue has to be done by the knights because Rome is retiring from Britain, by now considered an indefensible outpost.
(
Mads Mikkelsen ) and
Dagonet (
Ray Stevenson ).]]
In the course of this mission, Arthur encounters and rescues
Guinevere (
Keira Knightley ), a Woadish princess, from the imprisonment and torture of the Roman citizen he is charged with rescuing. It is also revealed that Guinevere is Merlin's daughter and Arthur himself is actually half Celt (by
His Mother ). His famous sword,
Excalibur , is also revealed to be originally his
Father's , which he drew from the
Tombstone on his
Burial Mound as a boy (thus the legend of the
Sword In The Stone ).
The Roman family is rescued and the knights fight with the Saxons on a frozen lake (losing Dagonet in the process) before they can make it back to the Wall. Struck by Rome leaving its subjects to the mercy of the Saxons, Arthur is further disillusioned when he learns that
Bishop Pelagius , whose teachings about the equality of all men inspired the brotherhood of his
Round Table — has been executed as a
Heretic .
In due course, Arthur and his remaining men forsake Roman citizenship and form an alliance with the
Woads to fight the invading Saxons. In the climactic battle, the
Battle Of Badon Hill , the Saxons are defeated and Cerdic and his son are killed — at the cost of many lives, including Lancelot's and Tristan's.
The film ends with Arthur and Guinevere's marriage. Merlin then proclaims him to be their king. King Arthur and his remaining knights promise to lead the Britons, now united after Roman leave, against future invaders.
.]]
It would appear that the Arthur depicted in the film is based most closely upon
Ambrosius Aurelianus , the Romano-Briton who fought against the Saxons in the
5th Century , and was probably the leader of the Romano-British and Celts at the
Battle Of Mons Badonicus . However, Arthur's full name in the film is ''Artorius Castus'', suggesting a connection to
Lucius Artorius Castus , a historical Roman active in Britain in the
2nd Century . It is specified he was given the ancestral name of a legendary leader.
The movie was produced by
Jerry Bruckheimer and directed by
Antoine Fuqua ; David Franzoni, the writer for ''
Gladiator '', wrote the screenplay. The historical consultant for the film was John Matthews, an author known for his books on
Esoteric Celtic spirituality and teaching connected with
Taliesin and other aspects of the Arthurian legend, some of which he co-wrote with his wife Caitlin Matthews. Despite a promising cast and production team, the film opened to mixed reviews.
A
Director's Cut of the film has been released; it has extra footage of battle scenes as well as more scenes between Lancelot and Guinevere, whose traditional love triangle with Arthur is only hinted at here.
Oddly, several scenes are also omitted from the Director's Cut, including one where the Knights sit around a camp fire asking about their intended Sarmatian life, in which one reveals that his children don't even have names, most simply have numbers. In addition, the sexual scene between Guinevere and Arthur is shifted to be chronologically after he is informed of the incoming Saxons towards Hadrian's Wall.
This seemingly minor change arguably helps the story flow more smoothly, as in the original film he is seen in full battle armor, contemplating the broken image of Pelagius on his floor, and then is disturbed by the call to come outside. When he comes outside, he is wearing a hastily put on shirt, and ragged hair, thus if he was due to "come at once" as he was urged, he would have gone through a series of disheavelements just to go outside. However, in the Director's Cut, after an intimate moment between Arthur and Guinevere explaining Arthur's morals, they carry on into their sexual encounter, and are thus disturbed so that Arthur can be briefed on the Saxons. During the sexual encounter, he is wearing the same outfit he wears during the briefing, and the scene where he is examining Pelagius's image is removed.
Positive reviews of the film praised the "battle on the frozen lake" sequence, among other scenes, and the effort made by the filmmakers to present a new take on the Arthurian legend as it may have actually happened (but some dispute this; see below). Among the cast, many have praised Gruffudd's Lancelot and Winstone's Bors, among others. Also, fans of the film particularly praise Mikkelsen's portrayal of Tristan, giving intensity to a minor character; these fans also like the film for the
Sex Appeal of its leads. Those who dislike the film for its historical inaccuracies (see below) concede that it may help get viewers interested in early
British History .
On the other hand, ''King Arthur'' has been heavily criticized for its historical inaccuracies — especially since it claims to be close to or even be ''the'' original story, as evidenced by its tagline. Some examples include:
- The film has the Withdrawal of the Roman Legions from Britain take place after Arthur rescues the Pope's godson. In reality, it was completed in 410 AD, ''42 years'' before the movie is set. By 452 AD, there were no legions left in Britain, which was now a patchwork of territories ruled by local warlords.
- Sarmatian cavalrymen (mercenaries, not conscripted soldiers), led by one Lucius Artorius Castus , did come to Britain in the 2nd Century . But despite the film's suggestions, the evidence for them remaining there until the 5th Century is very slight. There is no evidence for the continued importation of Scythian -born immigrants to late Roman Britain.
- In the film, the Picts are called " Woad s". This is a reference to the plant they used to make their blue paint; historical Picts were never known by this name.
- Archbishop Germanus' second and last mission to Britain was twenty years before the year the movie is set.
- Pelagius is believed to have died decades earlier, and was not burned at the stake. The Pelagian Heresy is misrepresented as well - it denied Original Sin , and was not about individual freedoms.
- The capital of the Western Empire at the time was Ravenna instead of Rome because of ongoing wars with the barbarians.
- The movie implies that the Pope was in control of the Western Empire, though it was actually controlled by the Emperor . The Pope did, however, have significant influences over the Empire's foreign affairs.
- The Saxon leaders, Cerdic and Cynric , did not die at Mount Badon (see below).
- The Saxons would have made their annual invasions of British territory in the spring, not in the dead of winter when conditions were most difficult.
- The Saxons are shown attacking Hadrian's Wall from Scotland . It is not clear why a seaborne invasion force would choose to make landfall on the wrong side of the heavily fortified wall. In reality the Saxons were already occupying parts of Britain at the time (the Saxon Shore ), and never invaded Scotland. (The pseudo-historical '' Historia Regum Britanniae '' has the High King Vortigern introducing the Saxons to Britain as his mercenaries, fighting against the Picts.)
- In the film, Cerdic stops a warrior from raping a woman because it would lead to less-than-pure Saxon blood. This is a reference to the long-held belief that the Anglo-Saxons eradicated the Romano-Celts from the eastern part of the island. This contention, largely based on linguistic evidence, has been challenged by modern genetic analysis.
- In the film Guinevere is portrayed as a warrior maiden who joins Arthur and the knights in battle. While there was historical precedent for this portrayal (for example Boudica ), no source, early or late, describes Guinevere in this way. Nor is there any evidence for her depiction as a rustic Celt; in fact, in Geoffrey Of Monmouth 's '' Historia Regum Britanniae '', which contains one of the oldest accounts of the character, Guinevere has Roman blood while Arthur is an indigenous Celt.
- The Sarmatians have French and Celtic-based names. Though these do appear in medieval romance as the names of Knights Of The Round Table , they are not accurate to either history or the stories from which they are taken. For instance, Bors, portrayed in the film as a loud-mouthed boor and father of a huge number of children, was something of a Boy Scout in the legends, whose celibacy allowed him to witness the Holy Grail . Similarly, Dagonet, the film's resident quiet warrior, appeared in romance as the king's insane Court Jester . The un-Christian Galahad may raise eyebrows when compared to his holy counterpart in romance who achieved the Grail Quest, and Tristan is bereft of his Isolde .
- The Saxons use Crossbows in the movie; however, they historically used Bow s (to a limited extent) and Spear s instead during that time period. Indeed, Saxon spears are all but absent in the film, all the more telling since they use their famous Shield Wall tactic on Arthur's knights. Though there is evidence for the use of some form of crossbows among Greeks (actually more like hand-held catapaults, which they called '' Gastraphetes ''), Romans (which they called '' Manuballistae '') and, some claim, the Picts — the weapon was still not widely used in England until much later. However, a Woad scout does present a knife called a '' Seax '' to Merlin - the weapon that the Saxons are named for. They are not featured much, though.
- Similarly, the Woads use a Trebuchet -like weapon to hurl flaming missiles at the Saxons, though the trebuchet was not introduced to Britain until the siege of Dover in 1216.
- The Sarmatian costumes and weapons are inaccurate - they should be armored in the manner of ''.
- Aside from the knights' weapons, some of their fighting styles are also inaccurate or at least unaccounted for. Lancelot uses two swords, possibly of the '' Gladius '' variety; though attractive it may be to the viewer, there is no evidence for two-weapon fighting in that area. Bors uses a pair of Katars — weapons found in Persia and India , not in 5th-century Britain. However, Tristan is depicted as a cavalry archer, and indeed some Sarmatian troops were cavalry archers.
- Tristan has a pet hawk. However, the hawk flown in the movie is a Harris' hawk, which ranges from the southwestern US to Argentina. Additionally, the computer-generated hawk shown soaring overhead later in the film, while supposed to be the same individual hawk, appears to be a red-tailed hawk rather than a Harris' hawk.
Viewers also took issue with the film's stereotyping of the
Catholic Church as evil and by implication, pagans and paganism as good, as shown by the unscrupulous Germanus and the priests who help the
Roman landowner exploit the British peasants and who lock up Guinevere in prison, as contrasted by the un-Christian knights (especially Lancelot, an atheist) and the freedom-loving Woads. It is notable that it is
Merlin , rather than a Christian priest, who marries
Arthur and
Guinevere at the end, and that
Arthur , one of the film's few "good" Christian characters, is shown as a follower of a sect deemed heretical by the Roman pope.
Others have simply found ''King Arthur'' derivative of other films like ''
Braveheart '' and ''
The Lord Of The Rings ''; others could not accept the changes made to the traditional story, like making
Merlin an enemy of Arthur and having
Lancelot die at the end.
- Cerdic and Cynric actually existed. They were the first kings of Wessex .
- Lancelot and Galahad are portrayed as having similar ages while according to traditional versions they are father and son respectively.
- This is possibly only the second Arthurian film in which Lancelot dies at the end while Arthur does not. The first was Robert Bresson 's '' Lancelot Du Lac '' (1974). In all other films, either Lancelot survives, as in '' First Knight '' (1995), or they are both killed at the end, as in '' Excalibur '' (1981).
- Ironically, the film does not feature Kay and Bedivere , who, along with Gawain, are the most likely of Arthur's knights to have really existed (if they ever existed at all). The three appear as Arthur's companions in very early sources, like '' Culhwch And Olwen '' in the '' Mabinogion ''. The portrayal of Bors, however, is much closer to the traditional depiction of Kay than to the knight whose name he shares.
