King Arthur (2004 film)

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King Arthur
Movie poster king arthur.jpg
Theatrical release poster
Directed by Antoine Fuqua
Written by David Franzoni
Produced by Jerry Bruckheimer
Starring
Cinematography Slawomir Idziak
Edited by Conrad Buff
Jamie Pearson
Music by Hans Zimmer
Production
companies
Touchstone Pictures
Jerry Bruckheimer Films
World 2000 Entertainment
Green Hills Productions
Distributed by Buena Vista Pictures Distribution
Release date
  • 7 July 2004 (2004-07-07)
Running time
126 minutes
142 minutes (Director's cut)
CountriesUnited States
United Kingdom
Ireland
LanguagesEnglish, Scottish Gaelic
Budget$120 million
Box office$203.6 million

King Arthur is a 2004 epic historical adventure film directed by Antoine Fuqua and written by David Franzoni. It features an ensemble cast with Clive Owen as the title character, Ioan Gruffudd as Lancelot and Keira Knightley as Guinevere, along with Mads Mikkelsen, Joel Edgerton, Hugh Dancy, Ray Winstone, Ray Stevenson, Stephen Dillane, Stellan Skarsgård and Til Schweiger.

Contents

The film is unusual in reinterpreting Arthur as a Roman officer rather than the typical medieval knight. Several literary works have also done so, including David Gemmell's Ghost King, Jack Whyte's Camulod Chronicles, and perhaps the strongest influence on this film, Bernard Cornwell's Warlord series. The producers of the film attempted to market it as a more historically accurate version of the Arthurian legends, supposedly inspired by new archaeological findings. The film also replaces the sword in the stone story with a darker and more tragic backstory of how Arthur claimed his sword Excalibur. The film was shot in Ireland, England, and Wales. [1]

King Arthur was released by Buena Vista Pictures on July 7, 2004. The film received mixed to negative reviews with critics criticizing the setting, violence and battle sequences while praising the musical score, directing, performances and cinematography and grossed $203.6 million against a production budget of $120 million.

Plot

In the 5th century AD, the declining Roman Empire is withdrawing from Britannia, where the native Woads, led by Merlin, stage an insurgency. A group of Sarmatian knights and their half-British Roman commander Artorius Castus, known as "Arthur", have served their obligatory 15-year term fighting for Rome and are preparing to return home. Arthur himself plans to continue his career in Rome until Bishop Germanus orders them to complete one final mission: evacuate an important Roman family from north of Hadrian's Wall, saving them from an advancing army of invading Saxons led by the ruthless Cerdic and his son, Cynric. Alecto, the son of the family patriarch, is a viable candidate to be a future Pope. Arthur and his remaining men – Lancelot, Tristan, Galahad, Bors, Gawain, and Dagonet – reluctantly accept the mission.

Arriving at their destination, they find that the Roman patriarch Marius, who refuses to leave, has enslaved the local population, enraging Arthur. He discovers a cell complex containing several dead Woads and two tortured survivors — a young woman named Guinevere and her younger brother Lucan. Arthur frees them and gives Marius an ultimatum — leave with them willingly or otherwise be taken prisoner. He and his knights commandeer the homestead and liberate its exploited people. The convoy flees into the mountains with the Saxons in pursuit. Marius leads an attempted coup but is slain by Guinevere. Arthur learns from Alecto that Germanus and his fellow bishops had Arthur's childhood mentor and father figure Pelagius executed for heresy. This further disillusions Arthur with the Roman way of life, a process that matures when Guinevere and Merlin remind Arthur of his connection to the island of Britain through his Celtic mother.

Arthur leads the pursuing Saxons, led by Cynric, through a pass crossing a frozen lake. As battle ensues, Dagonet sacrifices himself to crack the lake ice with his axe, disrupting the Saxon advance. The knights safely deliver Alecto and his mother to Hadrian's wall and are officially discharged. Arthur, having concluded that his destiny lies with his mother's people, decides to engage the Saxons despite Lancelot's pleas to leave with them. The night before the battle, he and Guinevere make love, and on the following day, Arthur meets Cerdic under a white flag of parley, vowing to kill him. He is soon joined by Lancelot and his fellow knights, who decide to fight. In the climactic Battle of Badon Hill, the Woads and knights whittle the Saxon army. Guinevere engages Cynric, who overwhelms her. Lancelot aids her and kills Cynric but is fatally wounded. Cerdic kills Tristan before facing off against Arthur, who kills the Saxon leader, condemning the invaders to defeat.

Arthur and Guinevere marry and Merlin proclaims Arthur as King of the Britons. United by their defeat of the Saxons and the retreat of the Romans, Arthur promises to lead the Britons against any future invaders. Three horses that had belonged to Tristan, Dagonet, and Lancelot run free across the landscape, as the closing narrative from Lancelot describes how fallen knights live on in tales passed from generation to generation.

Cast

Production

The film was produced by Jerry Bruckheimer and directed by Antoine Fuqua; David Franzoni, the writer of the original draft script for Gladiator , wrote the screenplay. The historical consultant for the film was John Matthews, an author known for his books on esoteric Celtic spirituality, some of which he co-wrote with his wife Caitlin Matthews. The research consultant was Linda A. Malcor, co-author of From Scythia to Camelot: A Radical Reinterpretation of the Legends of King Arthur, the Knights of the Round Table, and the Holy Grail, in which possible non-Celtic sources for the Arthurian legends are explored.

The film's main set, a replica of a section of Hadrian's Wall, was the largest film set ever built in Ireland, and was located in a field in County Kildare. [2] The replica was one kilometre long, which took a crew of 300 building workers four and a half months to build. [3] The fort in the film was based on the Roman fort named Vindolanda, which was built around 80 AD just south of Hadrian's Wall in what is now called Chesterholm in Northern England.

Fuqua was reportedly dissatisfied with the film which he attributed to interference by Disney. [4] Fuqua said of the experience: “Did I get to make the movie I wanted? No and no,” he says of both versions. “I started out making the movie I wanted, but that was before they (Disney) started to police me. They said, ‘Try not to show so much blood.’ If you agree to make a gritty, dark, realistic film, then everything should be like that. I mean, it's set in the Dark Ages, when people were inconsiderate and decided to bleed everywhere.” [4]

Relationship with Arthurian legend

Cinematic versus traditional portrayal

Guinevere's warrior persona is closer to the ancient Queen Medb (romanticised above by J. C. Leyendecker, 1911) of the Irish Tain Bo Cuailnge than the Guinevere of Arthurian legend Maev.jpg
Guinevere's warrior persona is closer to the ancient Queen Medb (romanticised above by J. C. Leyendecker, 1911) of the Irish Táin Bó Cúailnge than the Guinevere of Arthurian legend

The film's storyline is not taken from traditional sources but is a work of creative fiction. The only notable exception to this is the inclusion of the Saxons as Arthur's adversaries and the Battle of Badon Hill. Most traditional elements of Arthurian legend are dropped, such as the Holy Grail and Tristan's lover Iseult. The film barely includes the love triangle between Arthur, Lancelot, and Guinevere; while Guinevere and Arthur are romantically involved, only a few sequences depict a possible relationship between Lancelot and Guinevere. Sir Lucan is generally described as Bedivere’s younger brother, rather than being Guinevere’s brother, as in the film.

The knights' characterizations in Arthurian legend are also dropped or altered. For example, the film's portrayal of a boorish and lusty Bors, the father of many children, differs greatly from his namesake, whose purity and celibacy allowed him to witness the Holy Grail. The cinematic portrayal of Bors is closer to the traditional depictions of Sir Kay and Sir Pellinore than to those of his legendary namesake. Lancelot and Galahad are portrayed as having similar ages in the film, though in texts like the Vulgate cycle they are father and son, respectively (the film's approach is also found in modern Arthurian fiction — such as Bernard Cornwell's The Warlord Chronicles , in which they are brothers).

The cinematic portrayal of Guinevere as a Celtic warrior who joins Arthur's knights in battle is a drastic contrast to the "damsel in distress" found in many courtly romances. [5] Although there is historical and mythological precedent for "sword-swinging warrior queens", such as the British Boudica of the Iceni, Gwenllian ferch Gruffydd of Wales, or the various Celtic war goddesses, the film's portrayal of Guinevere is actually closer to the Queen Medb of the Irish Táin Bó Cúailnge . [5] No source describes Guinevere as either a warrior or 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. However, in some Welsh sources, Gwenhwyfar is attributed supernatural strength; and in one later Irish text, her daughter Melora is a trained warrior; so this portrayal is not entirely without textual precedent.

Though Merlin and Tristan are thought to have originated outside of the Arthurian legends (as did Lancelot, a French interpolation added by Chrétien de Troyes in the 12th century), they are frequently included in Arthurian texts and their presence is reflective of the broader Arthurian tradition. Some other traditional characters who are featured in the film, such as Galahad, were invented later. On the other hand, some of the most prominent Arthurian characters are not featured, such as Kay and Bedivere, both of whom are prevalent in early Arthuriana.

Differences between the film and the Arthurian legend

In the film, Arthur's father is a Roman general from the Imperial Roman army and his mother is a Celtic woman. In the historical notes of the legend, Arthur's father is Uther Pendragon, a famous Romano-British commander and one of Britain's earlier kings, and his mother is Igraine, a beautiful young woman who was once the wife of Gorlois, the Duke of Cornwall and one of Uther's loyal subjects.

Arthur's knights are described differently in the film and the legend. In the film, Lancelot, Tristan, Bors and the other Knights of the Round Table are Sarmatian knights fighting for the glory of the Roman Empire. In historical notes, the Knights of the Round Table are Britons, knights of Romano-Celtic Britain fighting for the freedom of Britain against the Saxons. A round table is briefly present in the movie, where Arthur's knights regularly meet in equality, and which flummoxes bishop Germanus when he cannot find a place at the table to distinguish his stature.

Other references to Arthurian legend

Dagonet, a self-sacrificing warrior in the film, has Arthur's court jester as his namesake. The character appears in Le Morte d'Arthur and Idylls of the King . Also in the film, Lancelot fights using two swords. This may be a reference to the ill-fated Sir Balin, the "Knight with Two Swords", but this epithet refers to his cursed sword rather than his fighting style. Sir Palamedes is also sometimes noted for carrying two swords.

Tristan has a pet hawk, which may be a reference to Le Morte d'Arthur, in which Tristan is noted as being skilled at falconry.

The role of the traitor, often ascribed to Mordred, is given a smaller part in the form of a young British scout, played by Alan Devine, who betrays his people to the Saxons. The character is unnamed but called "British Scout" in the credits. Tristan kills the traitor with an arrow from the other side of Hadrian's Wall during the climactic battle.

Relationship with other works

Italian historian and novelist Valerio Massimo Manfredi claimed that the movie was almost a plagiarism of his 2002 novel The Last Legion, due to several similarities between the two works. [6] These similarities include the reuse of some tropes and happenings present in the book and, especially, the attempt to give historical reliability to the main characters with the concept of King Arthur having Roman origins. Indeed, the events of the movie suggest a theory that is largely different from the one on which Manfredi's novel is based, in which Artorius Castus isn't even mentioned, and neither is the Sarmatian auxiliary army. According to Manfredi, King Arthur's release and its commercial failure were among the main causes of the problems related to the movie adaptation of his novel, which was in development hell until its release in 2007.

Reception

Box office

King Arthur grossed $15 million on its opening weekend in third place behind Spider-Man 2 and Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy . It eventually grossed $51.9 million in the United States and Canada and $151.7 million in other territories for a worldwide total of $203.6 million, against a production budget of $120 million. [7]

Critical response

On Rotten Tomatoes King Arthur has an approval rating of 31% based on 190 reviews being positive with the critics consensus being "The magic is gone, leaving a dreary, generic action movie". [8] On Metacritic the film has a score of 46 out of 100 based on reviews from 41 critics, indicating "mixed or average reviews". [9] David Edelstein of Slate called the film "profoundly stupid and inept" and added, "it's an endless source of giggles once you realise that its historical revisionism has nothing to do with archeological discoveries and everything to do with the fact that no one at Disney would green-light an old-fashioned talky love triangle with a hero who dies and an adulterous heroine who ends up in a nunnery." [10] A. O. Scott of the New York Times further remarked that the film was "a blunt, glowering B picture, shot in murky fog and battlefield smoke, full of silly-sounding pomposity and swollen music (courtesy of the prolifically bombastic Hans Zimmer). The combat scenes, though boisterous and brutal, are no more coherent than the story, which requires almost as much exposition as the last Star Wars film. Luckily there is an element of broad, brawny camp that prevents King Arthur from being a complete drag." [11]

Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times had a more positive response to the film and awarded it three out of four stars, writing, "That the movie works is because of the considerable production qualities and the charisma of the actors, who bring more interest to the characters than they deserve. There is a kind of direct, unadorned conviction to the acting of Clive Owen and the others; raised on Shakespeare, trained for swordfights, with an idea of Arthurian legend in their heads since childhood, they don't seem out of time and place like the cast of Troy . They get on with it." [12]

Robin Rowland criticised critics who criticized the film for its Dark Age setting. [5] Rowland pointed out that several Arthurian novels are set in the Dark Ages, like Rosemary Sutcliff's Sword at Sunset and Mary Stewart's Merlin trilogy ( The Crystal Cave , The Hollow Hills and The Last Enchantment ). However, these works have little in common with the film's story and Sarmatian angle. In response to criticism of the setting, a consultant on the film Linda A. Malcor said: "I think these film-makers did a better job than most could have done when it comes to giving us something besides knights in tin foil and damsels in chiffon.... [they] deserve a lot of praise for the effort that they made." [13] Fellow Arthurian scholar Geoffrey Ashe's opinion was unfavorable. [13]

Later director Antoine Fuqua said:

“When I first signed on to the movie it was to shoot an R movie, and then halfway through it - that changed, for all sorts of reasons. Obviously, it's always money...That was very difficult for me and I had a tough time adjusting to that. I had to change a lot of my shooting style that I had set up because it just wouldn't have been possible to do certain things and get a PG-13 rating, just because it would have been more graphic. Like I said, tonally, I had a whole different mindset. So once that happened, while I was filming, it made it difficult.“ [14]

Director's cut

An unrated director's cut of the film was 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 in the theatrical version. The battle scenes are also bloodier and more graphic.

Several scenes are also omitted from the director's cut, including one where the knights sit around a campfire asking about their intended Sarmatian life, in which Bors reveals that his children do not even have names, most simply have numbers. In addition, a sex scene between Guinevere and Arthur is shifted to be chronologically before he is informed of the incoming Saxons towards Hadrian's Wall. This seemingly minor change arguably helps the story flow more smoothly. In the original film, he is seen in full battle armour, contemplating a broken image of Pelagius on his floor, and then is disturbed by a call to come outside. When he comes outside, he is hastily putting on a shirt, and his hair is disheveled. 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. The scene where he is examining Pelagius's image is removed.

Marketing

Despite these many drastic diversions from the source material (including the Welsh Mabinogion), the producers of the film attempted to market it as a more historically accurate version of the Arthurian legends. Other liberties were taken with the actors' appearances: Keira Knightley's breasts were digitally enlarged for the US theatrical film poster. [15]

Video game

See also

Related Research Articles

Cynric was King of Wessex from 534 to 560. Everything known about him comes from the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle. There, he is stated to have been the son of Cerdic, who is considered the founder of the kingdom of Wessex. However, the Anglian King-list and parts of the West Saxon Genealogical Regnal List, instead says that Cynric was the son of Cerdic's son Creoda. Similarly, the paternal genealogy of Alfred the Great given in Asser's The Life of King Alfred, includes the name Creoda, while the account of the king's maternal ancestry in the same work calls Cynric son of Cerdic.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Guinevere</span> Arthurian legend character

Guinevere, also often written in Modern English as Guenevere or Guenever, was, according to Arthurian legend, an early-medieval queen of Great Britain and the wife of King Arthur. First mentioned in literature in the early 12th century, nearly 700 years after the purported times of Arthur, Guinevere has since been portrayed as everything from a fatally flawed, villainous, and opportunistic traitor to a noble and virtuous lady. The variably told motif of abduction of Guinevere, or of her being rescued from some other peril, features recurrently and prominently in many versions of the legend.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Lancelot</span> Arthurian legend character

Lancelot du Lac, alternatively written as Launcelot and other variants, is a popular character in Arthurian legend's chivalric romance tradition. He is typically depicted as King Arthur's close companion and one of the greatest Knights of the Round Table, as well as a secret lover of Arthur's wife, Guinevere.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Mordred</span> Character in Arthurian legend

Mordred or Modred is a major figure in the legend of King Arthur. The earliest known mention of a possibly historical Medraut is in the Welsh chronicle Annales Cambriae, wherein he and Arthur are ambiguously associated with the Battle of Camlann in a brief entry for the year 537. Medraut's figure seemed to have been regarded positively in the early Welsh tradition and may have been related to that of Arthur's son. As Modredus, Mordred was depicted as Arthur's traitorous nephew and a legitimate son of King Lot in the pseudo-historical work Historia Regum Britanniae, which then served as the basis for the following evolution of the legend from the 12th century. Later variants most often characterised Mordred as Arthur's villainous bastard son, born of an incestuous relationship with his half-sister, the queen of Lothian or Orkney named either Anna, Orcades, or Morgause. The accounts presented in the Historia and most other versions include Mordred's death at Camlann, typically in a final duel, during which he manages to mortally wound his own slayer, Arthur. Mordred is usually a brother or half-brother to Gawain; however, his other family relations, as well as his relationships with Arthur's wife Guinevere, vary greatly.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Galahad</span> Character in Arthurian legend

Galahad, sometimes referred to as Galeas or Galath, among other versions of his name, is a knight of King Arthur's Round Table and one of the three achievers of the Holy Grail in Arthurian legend. He is the illegitimate son of Sir Lancelot du Lac and Lady Elaine of Corbenic and is renowned for his gallantry and purity as the most perfect of all knights. Emerging quite late in the medieval Arthurian tradition, Sir Galahad first appears in the Lancelot–Grail cycle, and his story is taken up in later works, such as the Post-Vulgate Cycle, and Sir Thomas Malory's Le Morte d'Arthur. In Arthurian literature, he replaced Percival as the hero in the quest for the Holy Grail.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Lady of the Lake</span> Enchantress and sorceress in Arthurian legend

The Lady of the Lake is a title used by multiple characters in the Matter of Britain, the body of medieval literature and mythology associated with the legend of King Arthur. As either actually fairy or fairy-like yet human enchantresses, they play important roles in various stories, notably by providing Arthur with the sword Excalibur, eliminating the wizard Merlin, raising the knight Lancelot after the death of his father, and helping to take the dying Arthur to Avalon after his final battle. Different Ladies of the Lake appear concurrently as separate characters in some versions of the legend since at least the Post-Vulgate Cycle and consequently the seminal Le Morte d'Arthur, with the latter describing them as members of a hierarchical group, while some texts also give this title to either Morgan or her sister.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Tristan</span> Cornish knight of Arthurian legend

Tristan, also known as Tristram, Tristyn or Tristain and similar names, is the folk hero of the legend of Tristan and Iseult. In the legend, his objective is escorting the Irish princess Iseult to wed Tristan's uncle, King Mark of Cornwall. Tristan and Iseult accidentally drink a love potion during the journey and fall in love, beginning an adulterous relationship that eventually leads to Tristan's banishment and death. The character's first recorded appearance is in retellings of British mythology from the 12th century by Thomas of Britain and Gottfried von Strassburg, and later in the Prose Tristan. He is featured in Arthurian legends, including the seminal text Le Morte d'Arthur, as a skilled knight and a friend of Lancelot. He is also a Knight of the Round Table.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Knights of the Round Table</span> King Arthur and order of chivalry in Arthurian romance

The Knights of the Round Table are the legendary knights of the fellowship of King Arthur that first appeared in the Matter of Britain literature in the mid-12th century. The Knights are an order dedicated to ensuring the peace of Arthur's kingdom following an early warring period, entrusted in later years to undergo a mystical quest for the Holy Grail. The Round Table at which they meet is a symbol of the equality of its members, who range from sovereign royals to minor nobles.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bors</span> Legendary Arthurian knight

Bors is the name of two knights in Arthurian legend, an elder and a younger. The two first appear in the 13th-century Lancelot-Grail romance prose cycle. Bors the Elder is the King of Gaunnes (Gannes/Gaunes/Ganis) during the early period of King Arthur's reign, and is the brother of King Ban of Benoic and the father of Bors the Younger and Lionel. His son Bors the Younger later becomes one of the best Knights of the Round Table and participates in the achievement of the Holy Grail.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Gaheris</span> Fictional character

Gaheris is a Knight of the Round Table in the chivalric romance tradition of Arthurian legend. A nephew of King Arthur, Gaheris is the third son of Arthur's sister or half-sister Morgause and her husband Lot, King of Orkney and Lothian. He is the younger brother of Gawain and Agravain, the older brother of Gareth, and half-brother of Mordred. His figure may have been originally derived from that of a brother of Gawain in the early Welsh tradition and then later split into a separate character of another brother, today best known as Gareth. German poetry also described him as Gawain's cousin instead of brother.

Dagonet is a Knight of the Round Table in Arthurian legend. His depictions and characterisations variously portray a foolish and cowardly knight, a violently deranged madman, to the now-iconic image of King Arthur's beloved court jester.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Lancelot-Grail</span> 13th-century French Arthurian literary cycle

The Lancelot-Grail Cycle, also known as the Vulgate Cycle or the Pseudo-Map Cycle, is an early 13th-century French Arthurian literary cycle consisting of interconnected prose episodes of chivalric romance originally written in Old French. The work of unknown authorship, presenting itself as a chronicle of actual events, retells the legend of King Arthur by focusing on the love affair between Lancelot and Guinevere, the religious quest for the Holy Grail, and the life of Merlin. The highly influential cycle expands on Robert de Boron's "Little Grail Cycle" and the works of Chrétien de Troyes, previously unrelated to each other, by supplementing them with additional details and side stories, as well as lengthy continuations, while tying the entire narrative together into a coherent single tale. Its alternate titles include Philippe Walter's 21st-century edition Le Livre du Graal.

<i>Enemy of God</i> (novel) 1996 novel by Bernard Cornwell

Enemy of God: A Novel of Arthur is the second novel in The Warlord Chronicles trilogy by Bernard Cornwell. A sequel to The Winter King, it was first published in the UK in 1996. The trilogy tells the legend of King Arthur through the eyes of his follower Derfel Cadarn.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Sagramore</span> Fictional character

Sagramore, also known as Sagramor and other variations of this name, is a knight of the Round Table in Arthurian legend. He appears in many standalone and cyclical chivalric romances and other works, including some where he is the titular protagonist. Sagramore's characterisation varies from story to story, but generally he is characterised as a virtuous but hot-tempered knight who fights fiercely and ragefully.

<i>Lancelot and Guinevere</i> 1963 British film by Cornel Wilde

Lancelot and Guinevere is a British 1963 film starring Cornel Wilde, Jean Wallace, and Brian Aherne. This lesser-known version of the Camelot legend is a work shaped predominantly by Cornel Wilde, who co-produced, directed, co-wrote, and played Lancelot.

<i>Adventures of Sir Galahad</i> 1949 film by Spencer Gordon Bennet

Adventures of Sir Galahad is the 41st serial released in 1949 by Columbia Pictures. Directed by Spencer Gordon Bennet, it stars George Reeves, Nelson Leigh, William Fawcett, Hugh Prosser, and Lois Hall. It was based on Arthurian legend, one of the very few serials of the time with a period setting that was not a western.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">King Arthur in comics</span> The fictional British monarch in printed narrative art

King Arthur(Arthur Pendragon) is a legendary figure used commonly in comic books.

References

  1. ↑ "King Arthur (2004) Filming Locations". IMDB. Retrieved 20 February 2018.
  2. ↑ Ryan, Dermot (1 July 2008). "Hollywood heavyweights fly in for a reel taste of Shakespeare". Evening Herald. Retrieved 21 September 2010.
  3. ↑ 'Making of' featurette on the DVD release of the film
  4. 1 2 "In pic-to-DVD shift, 'unrated' rates high". Variety . Retrieved 23 July 2021.
  5. 1 2 3 Rowland, Robin (2004). "Warrior queens and blind critics." CBC News
  6. ↑ "Introduction to the movie "The Last Legion" hosted by Valerio Massimo Manfredi and Lorenzo Baccesi". YouTube . Archived from the original on 22 December 2021. Retrieved 4 January 2016.
  7. ↑ "King Arthur (2004)". Box Office Mojo . Retrieved 15 March 2020.
  8. ↑ "King Arthur". Rotten Tomatoes . Retrieved 11 November 2019.
  9. ↑ "King Arthur". Metacritic .
  10. ↑ Edelstein, David (7 July 2004). "Arthur: On the Rocks – The once and future king, in his dreariest picture yet". Slate . Retrieved 26 May 2015.
  11. ↑ Scott, A. O. (7 July 2004). "The Once and Future Fury: Knights Go for the Jugular". The New York Times . Retrieved 26 May 2015.
  12. ↑ Ebert, Roger (7 July 2004). "King Arthur review". Chicago Sun-Times . Retrieved 26 May 2015.
  13. 1 2 Youngs, Ian (2004). "King Arthur film history defended." BBC News Online.
  14. ↑ "Antoine Fuqua - King Arthur".
  15. ↑ "Enlarging Keira Knightley's Breasts". Posterwire.com. 18 July 2006. Retrieved 29 May 2012.
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