Worst historical drama film of the 21st century thus far?
A lot of people point out the obvious flaws and historical inaccuracies in recent movies like 300, but to me almost nothing holds a candle to King Arthur (2004), which I shall nominate for worst historical drama film of the 21st century. At least movies like 300 are up front about being based on a comic by Frank Miller more than they are based on real history, like the Greco-Persian Wars in The Histories by Herodotus.
Directed by the rather quirky Antoine Fuqua, with an otherwise stellar cast including Clive Owen, and a phenomenal musical score as always by Hans Zimmer, this movie is so stupid it is painful to watch. It is by leaps and bounds way more stupid than other recent flawed movies about Roman Britain, including Centurion (2010) and The Eagle (2011). Don't get me wrong: it's not simply more stupid by focusing on a mythological figure (Arthur, King of the Britons) over, say, an actual Roman legion (i.e. Legio IX Hispana). Yet by making a movie about Arthur in the first place, the movie is basically setting itself up to satisfy silly nationalistic and fantastically anachronistic notions of what it meant to be a Briton in the 5th century AD. I could spend a good amount of time writing about how historically inaccurate the vast majority of costumes and soldier's gear, outfits, armor, and weaponry are (including Lancelot who wields two swords at onceor Saxons with crossbows), but simply pointing out all the ridiculous crap in the script and plot alone can suffice.
I almost fell out of my chair laughing in the beginning of the film, when Lancelot (a Sarmatian) is taken from his village in the steppes to serve in the military of the Sarmatians' patron state of Rome. His father gets all emotional and pounds his chest, affirming the ethnic pride of their people by calling out "Rus! Rus!" This line is repeated later as well. That would be all fine and dandy, was it not for the fact that the Sarmatians were an Iranian people, and the much later medieval Rus were Slavic.But I digress; let us get on to the substance, the meat and potatoes of all the terribly wrong things committed by this film.
Two things actually surprise me somewhat:
1) the portrayal of the invading Saxons, the progenitors of the English, as absolutely evil and immoral villains who would rather kill native British women than rape them and sully their pure Saxon blood by making half British half Saxon babies.
2) the movie's endorsement via Arthur's fawning for the Romano-British theologian Pelagius (fl. 390 - 418 AD), whose doctrine of free will over predestination doesn't exactly fit at all with today's ethos of the Protestant Anglican Communion (or any Protestant church based on Luther's ideas of predestination).
For starters, the movie takes this premise so far that the Saxons basically just kill every person in every village they come across in systematic genocide, burning every village to the ground because...that makes perfect logical sense for supporting the ongoing logistics of feeding and housing their invasion force?Already the Saxons are given a bad rap whereas historically the Saxons actually ruled over those they conquered, as opposed to annihilating them to a man. Even in Geoffrey of Monmouth's 12th-century fairy tales masquerading as history (since it's pretty clear he cooked up about 90% of the Arthurian legend from his own imagination), the Saxons, who are enemies of Arthur, a native Celtic Briton (made half Roman in the movie, even though it is Guinevere who should be of Roman blood), are certainly not given the same portrayal as bloodthirsty butchers of every civilian in their warpath.
I get it, the film needs antagonists (in this case Stellan Skarsgård and Til Schweiger), but this is just too much to bear. That and all the uber-evil tactics of their chieftain Cerdic (i.e. Skarsgård), like cutting his own son's face when he lost a battle, relieving him of his command, and letting his son kill one of his father's companions in an emotional outburst. I'm sure that sort of thing was a ritual among the Saxons.
As for Pelagius, even though his teachings don't jive with Anglicans today, the fact he was "excommunicated" by the Church as explained in the movie by a twisted and corrupt Roman papacy would certainly earn their posthumous approval of him. In fact, the movie is just littered with stuff that is obviously anti-Catholic, showing its leading adherents as nearly as bloodthirsty as the Saxons as they punish people for sins and stuff. There's the bizarre fact that a bishop from Rome is given the authority to interfere in the discharge of Sarmatian warriors serving Rome so that they can go on some mission to rescue a Roman boy who is basically in line to become the next pope should he play his cards right. This is all used as a plot device to show that Rome, which is officially abandoning Britain as announced by the bishop,
That brings me to another stupid aspect of the movie: it takes place in 467 AD! Historically the Romans evacuated from Britain in 409 AD, yet the movie shows them manning the length of Hadrian's Wall in force. Even dumber, for some odd reason the Roman boy Arthur had to save from the marauding Saxons was actually living in some monastery / plantation NORTH of the defensive wall for no apparent reason other than "the pope gave us this piece of land." Apparently that was seen as the perfect place to send a prospective young man seen as a potential future pope. I'm speechless.
You know what? All of this I might have forgiven, but then came that unholy scene where Mads Mikkelsen (playing the role of Tristan) shoots an arrow from like, a thousand miles away, and happens to hit dead center in the chest the Roman turncoat working for the Saxons as he's holed up in some tall tree on the opposite side of Hadrian's Wall. I laughed so hard at this that I think I may have woken some neighbors up.
I could continue, but I think you get the point. Please do feel free to counter my arguments here or argue for a movie that you think is even worse! Even dumber!There are plenty of historical dramas produced in the last decade and a half to mule over.
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Originally Posted by Roma_Victrix
