Les aventures du roi Arthur

Made on the cheap, as lively as it is grimy, this little-seen film is surprisingly effective...for once the most likely period of Arthur's legendary existence is portrayed in the gritty and grubby way it must surely have have been. If you're looking for a lovely and romantic Hollywood version with colorful costumes, plumes, armour and beautiful ladies (set in a never-was gallant and chivalrous century anywhere from the 12th to the 14th) this Arthur is not for you. There is no Round Table (only a daring plan to unite deadly, traditionally squabbling enemies.) There is also no Lanceclot and Guenivere. But there is an actually plausible contest to pull the sword from the stone which is crucial to Arthur's plan. Though this film is on a rather small scale and an all too apparent smaller budget, it succeeds where larger and more expensive efforts have failed. It gives a lot of down to earth character to these legendary men and makes them understandably human and believable. Tobias makes a great young Arthur, but Gothard should have been given more and Blessed a bit less. He tends to dominate the film in his crude portrayal of Mark of Cornwall. It is surprising that this film didn't spawn an immediate sequel. It would have been interesting to see this kind of earthy realistic treatment of some of the later events in Arthur's life.

1st watched 3/5/2022 - 4 out of 10 (Dir - ???): Documentary-style beginning of a telling of a young King Arthur who tries to bring together warring lands into one peaceful union of southern part of what we now call England. He uses unusual means including the tactful retreat(run-away per Monty Python fame), and other shrewd methods that are not the most noble. This movie is actually a compilation of BBC television programs pasted together into a movie, and it comes across that way sometimes with each episode intertwined by dialogue. Arthur begins the movie as a chieftain with a few loyal friends. The other lands are feuding with them initially, and he brings them together to fight one enemy. His methods are at many times deceitful, which kind of turned me against him. Examples include one episode where he messes up a marriage to get more land, and another one where he promises treasure where there isn't any to get help to rescue his friends. This may work for a sitcom, but not a historical movie. This one is to bypassed if you don't want to learn terrible ways to be a leader.

No flashing steel-armored knights and dazzling pageantry, this is a telling of the Arthur tale as he probably was - a British warlord struggling to maintain order and civilization after the withdrawal of the Roman legions in the fifth century. Arthur is mentored by Ambrosius Aurelianus, the "last of the Romans" in war and diplomacy, and together they fight against the barbarians pressing down on the remnants of Roman Britain.

I saw this years ago (the early 80's) on The Movie Channel and was hooked on it. Decades later, they've put it out on DVD and I've found it to be almost as good as I remembered thinking it was back then.

The only drawback that some might find with this movie is that it was never really a movie and doesn't play like one. Like with some of Gerry Anderson's shows, this was a "movie" that was pulled together for international release by using stand alone episodes from the TV series Arthur of the Britons and covers a fair stretch of that show's run. This means that the movie, if looked at as a whole, seems to bounce around a bit because it is made up of several story arcs that begin and end in under 30 minutes before jumping into the next one. It also suffers from the same budget issues that many shows coming out of England from the early 70's faced.

Beyond that, it's actually very well done. The stories stand up well and they pulled some good episodes from the series to make this. The wedding story alone, and Brian Blessed's fantastic work in it, are worth the price of the DVD.

You can find the DVD all over the web for low prices. Grab it, it's worth it.

The "true account" of the tribal wars of ancient England. In minuscule budget.

King Arthur fights saxons, picts and whatnot in this watchable little flick. Lots of effort has been put into sets, mainly in pouring shedloads of mud on the ground. It's not the great adventure you'd expect, but as it delivers it's peaceful message towards the end at least I wanted to believe it.

Released on video in Finland in the early eighties.