Movie Review, Knights Of The Round Table (1953)

Tonight’s movie was Knights Of The Round Table, one of the first movies made in Cinemascope in 1953. Filmed in Ireland and England in godawful Eastmancolor. Starring Robert Taylor (as Lancelot) and Mel Ferrer (as King Arthur) and Ava Gardner (as Guinevere) and a bunch of other people whose names I’ve already forgotten.

The movie has a lot of horses and bright colored costumes for the people riding them and some occasionally nice scenery. Everybody gets to wear bright colors and the castles are all very clean and tidy. Also they put an unbroken Stonehenge on a hill (it isn’t, I’ve been there) and … oh, never mind.

I’m sure there must be other nice things to say about this movie, but I can’t think of any.

There are some silly sword fights . And a cliff overlooking some convenient quicksand. And a script so laden with self-conscious significance, I wondered if the filmmakers thought they were seeking the holy grail. Oh, yes — that’s in the picture too. It’s not a carpenter’s cup tho.

I suppose I could recommend this film to anyone interested in the history of Cinemascope and Eastmancolor, but you’d probably be better off with the one that starred Tony Curtis. “Yonda is the castle of my fadda.” Remember that one? (The Black Shield of Falworth)

I’m not even sure I can excuse this film for being a product of its time. 1953 gave us Singin’ In The Rain, The Greatest Show On Earth (a guilty pleasure), Julius Caesar, From Here To Eternity, Shane, Stalag17 — so it’s not like there was any shortage of good writers and directors that year.

There was, however, a shameless pandering to religion. The Robe ended with its lovers gloriously going to heaven — apparently via torture in the arena. And even War Of The Worlds, a marvelous SF film had a religious subplot.

This must have been a reaction to the perceived threat of communism — that pouring God over everything like ketchup over a burnt meat loaf would protect Americans from the Russian threat. The backlash to that showed up in 1955 with a play called Inherit The Wind, made into a movie in 1960. Spencer Tracy and Fredric March were great in it, Gene Kelley was not. It was about the fanaticism attendant to religion and how religion could only survive by denying evidence. Go watch that instead. That’s a picture that’s nothing less than brilliant.