MAKSQUIBS CINEMATHEQUE: KNIGHTS OF THE ROUND TABLE (1953)

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Thursday, May 22, 2008

KNIGHTS OF THE ROUND TABLE (1953)

Lightning didn’t strike twice for KNIGHTS OF THE ROUND TABLE, M-G-M’s inaugural CinemaScope pic, meant as a follow up to their remarkably sturdy IVANHOE, and using much the same Brit crew. One of the first 'Scope pics out of the gates, it made big bucks, but it’s dramatically inert with a real stiff in Robert Taylor’s graceless Launcelot du MidWest, Mel Ferrer ’s pallid King & a stunning but unengaged Ava Gardner. The Arthurian legend usually tanks onscreen (Jon Boorman’s EXCALIBUR excepted) and not even watching Taylor toppling a large bit of Stonehenge in a studio mock-up offers proper recompense. Even reliable Miklos Rozsa seems out of musical ideas after three superb scores on historical British subjects released over the past few months: IVANHOE, PLYMOUTH ADVENTURE and the wildly underrated YOUNG BESS.

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A last thought before we go.

Well, enough from me. But before we sign off, here's a great quote from Emile Zola's L'OEUVRE (THE MASTERPIECE), which is about painting rather than the yet to be invented medium of film, but which points a fine critical eye toward the whole idea of art criticism. It's a good, if chilly, thought to keep in mind, especially when you surf the net.

"Has it ever struck you that posterity may not be the fair, impartial judge we like to think it is?

"Suppose the artist's paradise turned out to be as nonexistent as the Catholics, and future generations prove just as misguided as the present one and persisted in liking pretty pretty dabbling better than honest to goodness painting. There are some accepted masterpieces for which I myself wouldn't give a twopenny damn.

"Classical training has given us a wrong view of everything and forces us to acclaim as geniuses a lot of fellows who are no more than well-balanced, facile painters, while what we might really prefer is the work of more emancipated but less even artists known only to an initiated few. Immortality at present depends entirely on the average, middle-class mind and is reserved only for the names that have been most forcibly impressed upon us while we were still unable to defend ourselves...

"Perhaps that's the sort of thing that's best left unsaid. It's certainly the sort of thing that gives me the shudders!"- Emile Zola

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Thursday, May 22, 2008

KNIGHTS OF THE ROUND TABLE (1953)

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A last thought before we go.

DROP ME A LINE