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  1. - Top - End - #1
    Bugbear in the Playground
     
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    Default The Green Knight ... and Gawain

    There's a new Arthurian movie that just came out, The Green Knight, based largely on an anonymously-written Middle English poem known as "Sir Gawain and the Green Knight", which I went to see in the theater yesterday. This is the first time I've been in the theater since the pandemic hit, but as it's a relatively obscure movie, and I've been vaccinated, I figured it worth the risk for a matinee showing. I think there were about 10 people in total, in well-separated groups.

    J.R.R Tolkien had done a translation of the poem into Modern English, replicating the alliterative verse structure of the original, and I had read this as preparation. The setup is that, during the Christmas holidays at Camelot, a huge knight, all in green, and green himself, rides into the feast, and offers a challenge to a game of sorts. He will accept a weapon-stroke from one of Arthur's knights, and in a year's time, that knight will visit him, and accept a return stroke. Arthur's nephew Sir Gawain accepts the challenge, and cuts the knight's head off, whereupon the knight picks up his own head, and calls on Gawain to honor the agreement, and visit him at the Green Chapel, and accept a similar blow, at the appointed time.

    As the trailer for the movie showed, it follows this setup, and some of the rest of the poem, but it has some major differences. I think the uncertainty of what will happen, following Gawain's own uncertainty (is he just going to get his head cut off and die? Should he?) is a major part of the film, so plot details belong in spoilers.

    But a few things can be mentioned here outside. First is that this film is R-rated, introduces the main character in a brothel, and has some not-very-revealing sex scenes, which is a bit of contrast to the determined purity of Sir Gawain in the poem. Second, some people have had issues with Arthur's nephew being played by a British actor of south Asian ancestry, but I think this was handled fairly well, with Gawain's mother also being played by a British actress of south Asian ancestry. We are left to imagine either that she is Arthur's half-sister with a parent who traveled from the east, or that, contrary to the usual legends, it is Gawain's father who is Arthur's brother. Gawain's father, traditionally King Lot of somewhere in Scotland, does not appear in the movie.

    Also, there is a fox here that joins Gawain's journey, acting in a very dog-like fashion. I have seen a suggestion that the fox came out of a medieval Dutch story, the Roman van Walewein.

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    I was mildly disappointed that the giants that appeared in the trailer turned out to be 'shroom visions. (Conveniently, the fox also ate the mushrooms.)

    I think the game between the Lord (Bertilak in the poem) and Lady and Gawain could have been run without Gawain cheating from the start, not yielding anything he received each day. Though it also could easily have ended up as a porn scenario. I notice that their manor house seemed a lot more modern than Camelot, with the Lady even engaging in a primitive form of photography.

    I was confused by the green belt. It appeared to be the same belt Gawain received from his mother, was stolen by robbers, and given by the Lady. Why didn't Gawain recognize it?

    The lengthy false ending also had me deceived, thinking that they had made up an ending completely different from anything in the legends. (At least Malory has Sir Gawain pre-decease King Arthur.)

    And I just don't get Gawain's mother's motivation. Does she want her wastrel son to die? Even if she is Morgan le Fay, rather than the usual Morgause.


    I'm certainly glad I saw this movie (assuming I didn't catch any terrible diseases in the theater), and I think it warrants re-watching to try to pierce its mysteries, but not in the theater.

  2. - Top - End - #2
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    Default Re: The Green Knight ... and Gawain

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    I really liked how ambiguous the plot was in this movie.

    I think that Sir Gawain's mother's motivations echo what Arthur (I think) said. "Is it wrong to want greatness for you?"


    I recommend the movie immensely, but from what I remember the trailer was very deceiving. I thought I would be watching what I'd call a typical fantasy series, with swordfights and adventure. This movie is not that. The conflict is almost entirely emotional, not physical, though there are certainly physical trials.

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    Default Re: The Green Knight ... and Gawain

    So, I...did not like this movie. Not in the slightest. I can confidently say it's the worst film I've seen in a decade, and I watched Boss Baby in theaters of my own free will. Twice. I hate this film, and everyone involved in the making of it.

    Rant below:
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    First off, if anyone knows the director of this film, I feel it's important that he never be allowed near a camera again, not even if he begs, pleads, and says that now he knows how to use it.

    The advertising for this film describes it as an "epic fantasy adventure." This is an admirably concise way to list lies, though brevity was clearly forgotten before actual filming started. Nothing about this is epic fantasy in any reasonable sense. There's not much scale, the actors have not the faintest bit of chemistry for one another, and most of them never speak. The original legend this is based on is fairly short, so it is helpfully summarized for you about five times by way of puppets in case you forgot what you were watching, or attempted brain damage to dull the pain.

    The entire thing is relentlessly somber, with a range of color that would make Snyder suggest perhaps going a bit less dark. There is a ten minute period where they apparently left a strong yellow filter on the lens, so everything in that bit is extremely yellow instead. There is also a brief bit, at night, underwater, in a swamp, that is all red. For, uh, reasons, I guess. Other than that, non stop sepia tones.

    When the actors do speak, it is almost entirely in expository monologue. Even this becomes a welcome reprieve from the unending shots of landscape, or someone staring at nothing. Some of these sequences run a full five minutes long. There is one excruciating slow 360 degree pan of the woods in which nothing is, which, upon ending, they reverse direction and do the whole thing again.

    Most plot elements, regardless of if they were part of the original legend, are wholly abandoned once shown. Giants are a thing, kind of, I guess. A fox talks to them. You can't understand the fox or the giants. The giants continue doing what they were doing, and nothing happens. People the size of mountains could be cool, sure, but there is literally no change in this, or most scenes.

    About three quarters of the way through, dutch angles suddenly start being used to...mix the landscape shot up, I guess. No, nothing happens there either. They literally take this to the extreme of just filming upside down, though it is still just a dude walking, like always. Nothing comes of this.

    Apparently critics loved this pile of garbage for, uh, breaking the mold or whatever. Yes, I'll grant you that is certainly unusual to replace action with an on-screen shot of the aftermath of a handjob, but that doesn't make it any good. The former is not, by the way, mere descriptive crudity, but something that is actually in the film.

    It's a shame, the legend is fun, it could genuinely be the core of a great fantasy tale, and you can see a couple of elements that, were they not abandoned, could have been fascinating. I'd quote what the theater said immediately after the film ended, but most of it is wildly unprintable. If you've ever been in a popular movie where everyone laughs together or what not, this'd be the exact opposite experience, with shared annoyance, confusion, or rage at this example of everything not to do when making a film.

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    Default Re: The Green Knight ... and Gawain

    This is something that I should be interested in, but reading some of the reviews, and seeing how remorselessly sepia tone the bloody thing is, I don't think I'll be seeing this.

    Also, Gawain doesn't sound anything like Gawain from what I'm seeing, and that annoys me.
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    Default Re: The Green Knight ... and Gawain

    I went to see this the other weekend when the girlfriend was out of town, and loved it. It probably helped that the last thing I watched was Black Widow, which aggressively average, but I'd have loved it regardless.

    For starters it was just plain beautiful to look at. The colors were somber for the most part, but exceedingly rich, and just pulled me into the imagery. After watching Black Widow, which had about the same color depth as a hunk of particularly bland concrete, I just drank this up.

    I'm not sure I'd listen to the soundtrack outside of the movie, but it was quite something to listen to during the movie. Consistently unsettling, pretty engaging, and somehow appropriate for the weirdness on screen.

    Mostly though, I think I liked that it had a theme, and stayed on that theme, but with enough ambiguity that it demanded intellectual involvement and left space for audience interpretation. I had read a couple reviews beforehand, and went in knowing I'd have to pay attention, and that attention was rewarded.

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    I figured out that the sequence with bad King Gawain was a vision of what would be because it used the same revolving shot as when he was tied up in the woods. This also serves as a rather interesting contrast, since in the forest he's choosing to take action to live, while in the Green Chapel he's choosing inaction to die.

    I thought the green sash suggested could be read as a symbol of Gawain's desire for emotional safety and retreat from genuine engagement and vulnerability. In the moments of the film when he doesn't have it, he's generally kinder and more engaged with other people. Contrast his behavior with the headless saint with, well, basically any other point, and particularly the bad king sequence at the end. And of course his removal of the sash is symbolically him being gutted, and losing his head, which is metaphorically how we tend to talk about being emotionally hurt. Just the sort of thing a terminally noncommittal brat like Gawain is, ultimately, utterly terrified of.

    I also thought it was kind of clever how the movie basically inverted the original story, in that Gawain is no longer a nearly perfect knight but a complete failure of a non-knight, and but somehow keeps the overall same idea of commitment, honesty and courage.


    Overall it was pretty much everything I was hoping for. I think I'm gonna be watching this on long slow evenings alone for a lot of years to come.
    Blood-red were his spurs i' the golden noon; wine-red was his velvet coat,
    When they shot him down on the highway,
    Down like a dog on the highway,
    And he lay in his blood on the highway, with the bunch of lace at his throat.


    Alfred Noyes, The Highwayman, 1906.

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    Default Re: The Green Knight ... and Gawain

    Quote Originally Posted by Blackhawk748 View Post
    This is something that I should be interested in, but reading some of the reviews, and seeing how remorselessly sepia tone the bloody thing is, I don't think I'll be seeing this.

    Also, Gawain doesn't sound anything like Gawain from what I'm seeing, and that annoys me.
    I'd say give it a try, and don't be too taken in by the reviews. It's rather hard to capture how this movie does (and occasionally doesn't) work, so I'm not surprised many are down on it; I'm honestly not completely sure I liked it myself, but it definitely caught my attention such that I feel I have to go see it a second time. It's one of those films where you can tell it was adapted from a much older work, because it goes places that are weird in a way that a modern person wouldn't think of.

    Gawain the character is definitely more in the classical anti-hero tradition: good-hearted, but weak-willed and easily led astray. He's certainly not the same figure from any Arthurian myth I've seen, but that's not necessarily a bad thing. Patel does some excellent work with the role; the character could have seemed whiny and insufferable in less capable hands, but I thought he lent a very strong sense of conflict and temptation to the role.

    But the real thing for which I think this movie needs to be experienced (in theaters, if your judgment allows) is its sensory elements. The movie uses rich sound design, heightened cinematography, and some striking compositions to give a real atmosphere of dread, uncertainty, but also alien beauty, especially in the scenes surrounding the eponymous Green Knight. It's really hard to describe, so I hope you'll see it. Sepia is a wholly inaccurate word to describe the coloration of this movie; its colors are hardly saturated, but there are places where strong colors are made to stand out, and generally I'd say the lighting is more towards the cold and green than washed-out.

    If you do go see it, think of it less like a modern fantasy and more like a medieval allegorical poem or mystery play, and you're more likely to enjoy it.
    Last edited by Catullus64; 2021-08-08 at 10:28 PM.
    The desire to appear clever often impedes actually being so.

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    Pixie in the Playground
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    Default Re: The Green Knight ... and Gawain

    I watched the version with Sean Connery a few weeks ago on TV again, so I think I will get this as soon as possible.

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    Question Re: The Green Knight ... and Gawain

    Does it use any shaky cam? (I don't watch movies that use shaky cam.)

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    Default Re: The Green Knight ... and Gawain

    Quote Originally Posted by RedCloakLives! View Post
    Does it use any shaky cam? (I don't watch movies that use shaky cam.)
    As a general thing, the camera motions are very steady and deliberate, almost dreamlike. Very little of what seemed like handheld camerawork, and nothing I would characterize as shaky-cam.
    The desire to appear clever often impedes actually being so.

    What makes the vanity of others offensive is the fact that it wounds our own.

    Quarrels don't last long if the fault is only on one side.

    Nothing is given so generously as advice.

    We hardly ever find anyone of good sense, except those who agree with us.

    -Francois, Duc de La Rochefoucauld

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    Default Re: The Green Knight ... and Gawain

    I liked it a lot, even though it didn't really capture my heart. My son really liked it, which is surprising to me, as he generally enjoys his narratives either a lot more direct or a lot less direct. I think he was really engaged in pulling out some of the themes as they emerged, whereas I found there were almost too many strands, too many disparate kinds of things going on, and it distracted me from the immediate experience.

    But I very much enjoyed it. Career best from Dev Patel. It was like what would happen if Guillermo del Toro tried to imitate a Terry Gilliam movie.
    (Avatar by Cuthalion, who is great.)

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    Default Re: The Green Knight ... and Gawain

    Just got back from my second viewing of the film. On first viewing, I was certain that it was a gorgeous and potent film before, but wasn't really sure how much substance there was beneath that gorgeous gloss; but now I think I can say with confidence that it's actually a pretty meaningful film as well as a beautiful one, just one that trusts the audience's intelligence enough that it takes some digestion to really pick up on its themes. My girlfriend must be cleverer than I, because she picked up on things on our first viewing together that I didn't get when I saw it alone.

    Don't want to offer any spoilers, but to anyone who goes to see it with fresh eyes, watch and listen attentively. I think the first time I saw the film I was looking in the wrong places; my attention was heavily on the dialogue and the sequence of the plot episodes (which is where you would expect a narrative poem like the source material to come to life), but the sensory experience is what really carries the themes of the movie, and I think I understood it better when I was focused on savoring the richness of its moments. The story leans heavily on lighting, musical motifs, and distinctive camera movements to link characters and scenes together; as George Lucas once said, many of the scenes rhyme. Watch for those rhyming moments, and you'll piece things together alright, although it may take some thought. The movie does something I've seldom seen done before, which is to meld grounded psychological drama with a real sense of mythic grandeur and enchantment. I'm delighted I was able to see it in theaters, and shake my fist at the studios for dumping this real treasure of a movie in August.

    Spoiler: I lied; here's one (MASSIVE) Spoiler
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    If I'm allowed one spoiler and opportunity to act all clever, I love how Gawain's final line in the film, after he throws away the magic belt, is literal poetry: "Now I'm ready, I'm ready now."; a near-perfect chiasmus. It's cleverly hidden behind Patel's halting, naturalistic delivery, but to have have the character's final words, as he comes to peace with his journey and his fate, possess such a fine musical structure.
    Last edited by Catullus64; 2021-08-10 at 09:09 PM.
    The desire to appear clever often impedes actually being so.

    What makes the vanity of others offensive is the fact that it wounds our own.

    Quarrels don't last long if the fault is only on one side.

    Nothing is given so generously as advice.

    We hardly ever find anyone of good sense, except those who agree with us.

    -Francois, Duc de La Rochefoucauld

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    Default Re: The Green Knight ... and Gawain

    Well, the movie critic I rely the most on, Moviebob, really liked it. So I will give it a go and simply adjust my correlation of Moviebob's opinion to my tastes afterward.

    But everything about "its not like the original myth" or "its anachronistic" is really not the sort of argument that make or break a movie. A movie has to stand by its own.

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    Default Re: The Green Knight ... and Gawain

    I would like to see this when it comes out in the UK, but it doesn't look like that will be any time soon.

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    Default Re: The Green Knight ... and Gawain

    Quote Originally Posted by truemane View Post
    Career best from Dev Patel.
    This disrespect to The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel can not stand!

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    Default Re: The Green Knight ... and Gawain

    Quote Originally Posted by Murk View Post
    This disrespect to The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel can not stand!
    I love that movie so much. And I can watch Slumdog Millionaire a million times and never get bored. But I still this was the best I've ever seen him.
    (Avatar by Cuthalion, who is great.)

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    Default Re: The Green Knight ... and Gawain

    Quote Originally Posted by Murk View Post
    This disrespect to The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel can not stand!
    That movie's great and Patel's great in it, but this movie hinges on his performance to an incomparable degree. He is the audience's viewpoint character in a profoundly surreal and uncomfortable landscape, and his acting is our primary emotional guide for orienting ourselves in it. He has to do that while keeping us sympathetic to a character who is honestly kind of a feckless idiot. I don't think it's much of an insult to say this is the most impressive single piece of acting he's done so far, at least in a major release (I'm not familiar with his entire body of work).
    The desire to appear clever often impedes actually being so.

    What makes the vanity of others offensive is the fact that it wounds our own.

    Quarrels don't last long if the fault is only on one side.

    Nothing is given so generously as advice.

    We hardly ever find anyone of good sense, except those who agree with us.

    -Francois, Duc de La Rochefoucauld

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    Default Re: The Green Knight ... and Gawain

    So, as part of the movies media campaign, they released a BECMI looking TTRPG based on the movie.

    I surprised I didn't here about this earlier. I don't know if the game is any good but I like the look of it.

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    Default Re: The Green Knight ... and Gawain

    Quote Originally Posted by Cikomyr2 View Post
    But everything about "its not like the original myth" or "its anachronistic" is really not the sort of argument that make or break a movie. A movie has to stand by its own.
    While true, when it's an adaptation how you change things can very much affect how a film feels when you're familiar with the source material.

    I might have been interested in two things but this thread has convinced me that I won't like it. I don't care if the cinematography is great or three performances are amazing, Gawain and the Green Knight is possibly my favourite part of the Arthurian canon, and I really don't like attempts to add flaws to the KotRT.

    But that's just me. Maybe I'd appreciate it more if I didn't like the story so much. Maybe I'm just missing out on a great film. But I won't keep an eye out for it releasing over here.
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    Quote Originally Posted by Anonymouswizard View Post
    While true, when it's an adaptation how you change things can very much affect how a film feels when you're familiar with the source material.

    I might have been interested in two things but this thread has convinced me that I won't like it. I don't care if the cinematography is great or three performances are amazing, Gawain and the Green Knight is possibly my favourite part of the Arthurian canon, and I really don't like attempts to add flaws to the KotRT.

    But that's just me. Maybe I'd appreciate it more if I didn't like the story so much. Maybe I'm just missing out on a great film. But I won't keep an eye out for it releasing over here.
    I dunnow man. Every time I stopped myself from liking a movie or Series because "it wasn't like the original " I always ended up regretting that decision on the long run.

    Different retelling are not worse or better in of themselves. Sure, some of them were crap, but they were crap before the story changed. And also, some of them were crap despite being extremely faithful to the source material.

    A subpar movie who is faithful to the source material only diminishes the original telling, while a quality reimagining who diverge from canon will only rise interest in the original tale by popularizing the entire mythos.

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    Default Re: The Green Knight ... and Gawain

    Quote Originally Posted by Cikomyr2 View Post
    I dunnow man. Every time I stopped myself from liking a movie or Series because "it wasn't like the original " I always ended up regretting that decision on the long run.
    I dunno, the Hobbit was, while still certainly enjoyable in parts, definitely the lesser for its divergences in the film adaptation, while LotR is generally agreed to be a pretty great and faithful set of films.

    Creativity and divergence can be superior to faithfulness at times, but it is certainly not always for the better. As another example, take a look at the Sonic film. The fan reaction was taken to heart, and the studio changed the film to be more like what the fans wanted/closer to the source, and the result was definitely an improvement.

    While my...overtly hostile reaction to the film is most definitely due to a great deal more than merely the degree of faithfulness, I have to say that I did not find the interpretation of Gawain as a womanizing chap of no great courage to be a very unique or creative interpretation. We have tales like that by the bucketload, and it makes the story less unique, not more so. A tale that stayed closer to the original Arthurian spirit would have been more unique in this era, I believe. The different tone would likely have also alleviated a few other complains. Sure, keep the sense of mysticism, and you can have him be flawed, certainly...but having him be more clearly good hearted would help.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Tyndmyr View Post
    I dunno, the Hobbit was, while still certainly enjoyable in parts, definitely the lesser for its divergences in the film adaptation, while LotR is generally agreed to be a pretty great and faithful set of films.
    The hobbit was weak not because of its divergence from the source material but because there was no proper pre-production work made for it. Del Torro had done all the work for a 2-part movie and when the studio asked him to strech it to 3 parts he refused and got fired. Peter Jackson had to improvise the entire streching to a 3-part, and this is by far what ruined the movie.

    Compared to the original Lord of the Rings, where Peter Jackson meticulously prepared the entire trilogy in one go. It took 2 years of hard work.


    People imagine movies are just "you put actors in front of the camera and... ACTION" but there's a ****ton of pre-production.

    Also, I have a large contingent of angry Tolkien fans who will dispute Lord of the Rings movie as being "faithful adaptation", and who will refuse to enjoy the movie on the sole basis that it was altered from the original.

    Again: this goes back to my original point. Whether or not something is close to the original is irrelevant to the quality of the movie. A good movie is a good movie, a bad movie is a bad movie.

    demonstration: the best adaption of "The Shining" happens to be the less faithful. Because that's what happen when you have a genius movie director working on a script and takes liberty with the original story to make the best movie possible.

    Lord of the Rings is a better movie by not including Tom Bombaldil.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Tyndmyr View Post
    I dunno, the Hobbit was, while still certainly enjoyable in parts, definitely the lesser for its divergences in the film adaptation, while LotR is generally agreed to be a pretty great and faithful set of films.
    The LotR films put elves at the battle of Helm's Deep. This was reasonable, in that it stopped him from having to also show the elven and dwarven settlements also defending themselves from the orcs of Orthanc and Barad-dûr, but it eliminated the narrative framing of humanity having to fight for their own survival by themselves (plus one elf and one dwarf, of course).

    Whether this is a big deal or not depends on how much of a purist you are, but my main point is that it isn't the faithfulness to the original that made or broke the LotR trilogy. It was just a well-made set of films. The Hobbit was... acceptable (mostly). Where it failed, in my mind, wasn't specifically because of the divergences from the book. Mind you the state of affairs of stretching it into 3 movies required divergence from the book, but I don't think it was the divergences per se that were the actual problems in the film.

    While my...overtly hostile reaction to the film is most definitely due to a great deal more than merely the degree of faithfulness, I have to say that I did not find the interpretation of Gawain as a womanizing chap of no great courage to be a very unique or creative interpretation. We have tales like that by the bucketload, and it makes the story less unique, not more so. A tale that stayed closer to the original Arthurian spirit would have been more unique in this era, I believe. The different tone would likely have also alleviated a few other complains. Sure, keep the sense of mysticism, and you can have him be flawed, certainly...but having him be more clearly good hearted would help.
    We certainly have had, how shall we say, so many 'subversion' films as of late that they themselves aren't really subverting the norm so much as becoming it. Although I ended up liking this film on its own merits, I can get behind the notion that it might be seen as lesser if taken as part of an overdone trend. I certainly had that with superhero movies -- By the time Avengers: Endgame rolled around, I didn't bother seeing it in the theaters, saying 'it doesn't matter how good it is, I won't enjoy it because I've just seen too many of these in the past decade.'

  23. - Top - End - #23
    Ogre in the Playground
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    Default Re: The Green Knight ... and Gawain

    Quote Originally Posted by Willie the Duck View Post
    The LotR films put elves at the battle of Helm's Deep. This was reasonable, in that it stopped him from having to also show the elven and dwarven settlements also defending themselves from the orcs of Orthanc and Barad-dûr, but it eliminated the narrative framing of humanity having to fight for their own survival by themselves (plus one elf and one dwarf, of course).
    You know, I was thinking about this large divergence from the story.

    Yes, in the original books, it's about "humanity standing alone". That's the theme being explored, and the movie completely ruined that thematic.

    However, this alteration created a new thematic that is more organically exposed when crossing over The Return of the King: kindness begets kindness

    Theoden was bitter. Alone. He didn't believed in his allies, he thought nobody would ever risk their hide for him and his.

    Until the Elves came. The Immortal elves who had only to flee to the sea for eternal life, came to sacrifice themselves to help him at the battle of Helms Deep.

    And then, when Gondor called for help.. All doubts were erased. Theoden had realized how easily it was to fall to despair and thinking your friends wouldn't come to your help. And he knew, when Aragorn came clamoring "Gondor calls for Help", that he would ride out to their help.

    Sure, it's not "humanity stood alone". But "one act of friendship only begets more" is a solid theme around which to make your geopolitical set pieces. You allow your micro adventure movie to have a Macro geopolitical plot that is still about character.

    This is why divergence from the original material is not a sin in of itself. You have to ask what are you bringing with this change. What you are making better for this movie.

  24. - Top - End - #24
    Bugbear in the Playground
     
    GnomePirate

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    Default Re: The Green Knight ... and Gawain

    So, I decided to see this as well.
    I do not get it.
    Other than that, I enjoyed it.

    Pros:
    - It's very pretty
    - The symbolism seems clever
    - The world is magical and weird not because of any particular reason, but just because that's what the world is like in old stories
    - Alicia Vikander with a pixie cut

    Cons:
    - I find it hard to enjoy a movie I do not understand. Turns into "yeah, OK, sure" very quickly.
    - Dev Patel does a very good upset face, but I would like to see some other faces as well.

  25. - Top - End - #25
    Ettin in the Playground
     
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    Default Re: The Green Knight ... and Gawain

    Hoo boy, this movie. You won't understand any of it if you haven't at least read a summary of the original story, but at the same time, it changes a lot. That bugged me a little... it felt like the movie didn't bother explaining most of what was actually happening because you can infer most of the broad strokes if you know the story, but then it also changed enough that I still wasn't sure.

    Spoiler
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    So if Gawain's mom summoned the Green Knight at the beginning (that's how I interpreted the scene, anyway, although it was pretty confusing), then was Gawain's mom also the blindfolded old woman in the lord's castle? Because in the story that's supposed to be Morgan le Fay, but if Morgan wasn't behind the whole Green Knight prank then that doesn't make sense... or maybe they were working together? Or maybe Gawain's mom and Morgan are supposed to be merged into one character? Apparently conflating Morgause and Morgan in some interpretations isn't uncommon, but who knows.


    Anyway, I felt like the plot was very muddy, but in theory that's fine. The problem is, the characters were also pretty flimsy. Everyone except Gawain himself is too mysterious or doesn't get enough screen time to feel particularly invested in, and while I really liked Dev Patel's performance, Gawain just wasn't all that interesting of a character for me. It felt like the movie was so focused on showing that Gawain wasn't a virtuous/honorable/brave knight that it didn't really show me much of what he was.

    Good acting, good aesthetics, but it just felt unfocused and dull. Maybe it's just over my head.
    Avatar by araveugnitsuga.

  26. - Top - End - #26
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    Default Re: The Green Knight ... and Gawain

    I know it is based on Arthurian but I keep thinking a character from Warhammer Fantasy, which Bretonnia is based on King Arthur but French and dirt-poor peasants.
    Badly drawn helmet avatar drawn by me.
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    Miko Miyazaki, Thanh, Durkon- Order of the Stick
    Krunch- Looking For Group
    Bill- Left 4 Dead
    Soap Mactavish- Modern Warfare 3
    Sandman- Modern Warfare 3
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    Default Re: The Green Knight ... and Gawain

    So I went to see this movie this weekend and it was terrible.

    I am familiar with the story of the Green Knight from college. Granted that was 20 odd years ago, but still, passably familiar.
    I wanted to see this movie because of the striking visuals from the trailer. It looks fantastic and surreal and beautiful.

    Well most of the pretty visuals were in the trailer. Other than what was there, its a lot of gorgeous empty landscape and ethereal woods and garbage.

    I will also admit that I didn't wear my hearing aids and the sound quality on the dialog was so terrible I couldn't follow most of the sparse dialog. So that will color my opinion because I made some assumptions based on flimsy evidence.

    Here's how I described it to my wife afterwards:

    Spoiler
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    Okay, Gawain is a drunken souse and womanizer living in, I guess Camelot. He's not a knight yet. He lives with his Mom and some other old ladies who, I'm pretty sure, are a circle of witches. Gawain has a sort-of girlfriend who is a whore he spends time with.

    Gawain goes to the round table for Christmas dinner.. There, the ancient and decrepit Arthur invites him up to the throne for a conversation. I couldn't hear the conversation but It felt like Gawain was Authur's bastard son with his witch-mom and Arthur is now telling him. He seems shocked. Queen Guenivere seems fine with this. It's fine. Everything is fine.

    While this is going on, Gawain's witch mom and her coven are casting an evil spell that summons the Green Knight. So i guess she's Morgon le Fay and Gawain is now Mordred? Dunno. Maybe they are combining characters.

    The Green Knight appears at the banquet and makes his challenge: One of your knights faces me in a brawl. Whatever touch they lay upon me is fine, but one year from now they have to come to my green chapel and have the same laid upon them. Oh also you get my cool axe!

    So any sane knight would go tap him on the head or pat his back in friendship or, i dunno, give him the deed to their lands expecting to get his better lands next year. I mean, the Green Knight isn't even being a **** or coming across as aggressive here.

    But Gawain, perhaps eager to impress his new daddy, steps up to the challenge. The green knight does down on one knee and offers his neck like "huh? huh? c'mon son, do it"

    Gawain takes Excalibur from the king and lops off his head. The Green knight picks up his head, says "see ya next year chumpo" and rides off. They take his axe and wrap it up and put it in a box.

    I'm not really sure what Gawain's Mom's plan here was exactly. Did she expect her son to rise to the challege? did she expect him to do this? or expect him to be smarter about it? We will never find out because it NEVER COMES UP AGAIN.

    A year passes, as told by the worst puppet show ever. Gawain's whore-girlfriend wants to be his real girlfriend and gives Gawain a bell for a charm of good luck.

    Gawain suits up, takes the axe, and heads out a week ahead of the deadline to ride to the green chapel. The lands outside Camelot are just terrible. Barren and Bleak and dark and swampy.

    On the way he comes across a battlefield with a scavenger. The scavenger strikes up a conversation and when he finds out where Gawain is going, gives him the most obvious sinister fake directions ever. Then demands payment from Gawain who gives him a coin. What a cheap-o.

    Of course the directions lead him into a trap where he is easily taken down by some forest kids with animal ear hats like toddlers wear. They tie him up and divide up his stuff and the scavenger takes the axe and seems overcome by something. he tells Gawain he will continue his quest and rides off with the axe. The rest of them scatter after him.

    Gawain frees himself and wanders through the woods with no gear.

    he comes across a cottage and goes in and takes a nap in the bed. When he wakes up, the bad guy from Falcon and Winter Soldier is there, and tells him that she was killed and her head was thrown into the pond outside. Gawain is like, Uh, I can see your head. She's like "don't tell me where my head is." Gawain's like "OK, what are you goign to give me if I go get it for you." She rolls her eyes and glares at him. He sighs and dives in and finds the skull. When he comes back up, she's gone and her skeleton is laying in the bad he slept in. He puts the skull with the rest and, when he turns around, the axe is there. Ta-da. Thanks Saint Ghost-head Flag-Smasher.

    So he goes wandering some more and finds a Fox. He tries to get the fox to go away, but it won't go so he's like "okay, bros for life" and they begin travelling together.

    They both eat some shrooms and get sick and hallucinate naked giants travelling through the mists. He tries to get a Lyft, but that goes nowhere real slow.

    Next He comes across a Hunter who invites him to his huge hunting lodge where his hot wife lives. Uh oh. We see where this is going. There's also a blindfolded mother-in-law who, in the story is Morgon-Le-Fay, so maybe this is his mother in disguise? Maybe anyone who puts on a blindfold becomes Morgon Le Fey. Who knows.

    The Hunter tells him the Green Chapel is only 1 day away and its only december 21st, so why not stay a while and pork my hot wife... uh I mean... be my guest. wink wink.

    He also makes a deal with him. I will give you whatever Game I catch when i go out each day to go hunting. You give me whatever you get from my house. Gawain is confused but says cool bro.

    the fox, BTW, has disappeared. I assume the Hunter is out looking for him during the day.

    So, predictably, Gawain lusts after the hot wife and, in an excruciatingly terrible scene, she gives him a hand job with a magic green sash she made for him that will protect him from harm, even at the axe of the green knight.

    With his semen-splotched green sash, Gawain hotfoots it out of there toward the green chapel but he is found by the hunter. The hunter is like "I see you are on your way. All this game is yours. Do you have somethign for me?

    Gawain is like "Nah"

    The Hunter's like "You Sure? wink wink?"

    Gawain is like "Nope. All good."

    the Hunter holds up a sack with the flailing fox in it. "So I found this fox you might want. You SURE you don't have anythign for me?"

    Gawain is like "Dude, I said no."

    The Hunter sighs and unpends the sack, letting the fox goes and rides off in a huff. Seriously. Gawain suffers NO repurcussions for going back on his deal. The Hunter just gives up like a sad DM dealign with players who won't follow the narrative.

    Gawain and the fox find a boat. The fox tries to tell Gawain to not get on the boat and it SPEAKS for the first time. I have no idea what it said, couldn't understand it. But Gawain is unmoved and tells the fox "Dude, i never wanted you on this trip in the first place."

    The Fox takes off. We will never see it again. WTH?

    Gawain takes the boat to the chapel where he finds the Green Knight sleeping. He sits down for a night and a day until the Green Knight wakes up. "Oh. You are actually here? Come to finish the game"

    Gawain says yes and the Knight picks up his axe and goes to cut off his head. Gawain flinches. The Knight says "Hey, what the hell, I didn't flinch" Gawain should rightly point out, dude you are an immortal tree-man who knew he wouldn't be hurt. I'm not.

    After a few start stops, Gawain gives up and runs away apologizing. Bravely run away away, bravely run away.

    The rest of the movie is mostly dialog free.

    Gawain finds his horse and rides home. His mom cleans off the dirt of his travels. Arthur is on his deathbed and knights him. When he dies, Gawain becomes king. Gawain's whore-girlfriend gives birth to a son and Gawain takes the son from her and gives her a handful of coins. Cold dude. Cold. Gawain marries a redhead princess and has a daughter. His son grows up and dies in a War King Gawain starts with some neighboring kingdom. The war is lost and Gawain and his family wait in the throne room as the enemy pounds at the gate. Gawain looks down at his magic sash and thinks "man, this was bull****" and takes it off. His head falls off.

    Suddenly he's back in the Green Chapel. The Green Knight asks him if he's ready. He says "Wait" and takes off the sash and throws it away. "Now I am ready."

    The Green knight smiles and kneels down and pats him on the back "Well done Son."

    The End.


    Literally, Go to end credits.



    So... yeah.... that was terrible.

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