The King Arthur legend is one of the greatest stories ever told. Curiously, I've found any written or filmed adaptation unsatisfying. Sir Thomas Malory started it all in 1485 with
Le Morte d'Arthur. I gave up on it halfway through, finding it artless, merely a catalog of whom had slain whom.
Still,
it inspired many to take a crack at it.
The Once and Future King by T. H. White, first published in 1958, is bloated and over the top, at least to my taste.
The Mists of Avalon (1993) by Marion Zimmer Bradley is the tale from the point of view of the female characters. I was annoyed by her changing many of the names of the characters, although she may have done it to correspond to the language of the era. The thought once crossed my mind to do my own version, but I'm not thrilled by the prospect of doing a work that isn't mine. The screen versions have also been lacking, although
Excalibur (1981) comes the closest to greatness of any of the Arthurian incarnations I've sampled. Still, whenever I view it, it feels as if something is missing. Last night I watched Guy Ritchie's take:
King Arthur: Legend of the Sword (2017), which goes only as far as Arthur ascending to the throne - no Lancelot, no Guinivere, hardly any Merlin. Since I'm not an expert on the legend, I'm not sure if the character identified as The Mage (a magician or learned person) is supposed to be Morgan le Fay. Although this latest version has good moments and great effects, it also comes up short. Charlie Hunnam, who did 92 episodes of
The Sons of Anarchy, which I've never seen, is adequate as Arthur. Eric Bana is perfectly cast as Uther Pendragon, the future King's father. Jude Law lends his considerable talent to the villainous Vortigern. Although the character of The Mage is woefully undeveloped, I liked what Astrid Berges-Frisbey, a Spaniard, did with it. Ritchie and four others wrote the screenplay. They included black actors and a martial arts expert, Asian. I hope the director's motivation wasn't political correctness. There were two aspects I really enjoyed, made possible by CGI: a huge eagle, and The Lady of Lake. The battle sequences are what one would expect in the modern age of film-making. There is some bloodletting, but it doesn't go overboard. 128,000+ users at IMDb have rated the film, forging to a consensus of 6.9 on a scale of ten. It was a disaster at the box office. Made on a budget of $175 million, it returned only $140 million. That's a lot of ground to make up in DVD sales and rentals, and streaming. Its appeal is probably restricted to fans of the legend and to those completely unfamiliar with it. So far, a sequel hasn't been announced. Given the disappointing returns of this version, it is unlikely one will be made.
RIP Sue Grafton, 77, author of the popular alphabet mystery series, which feature private detective Kinsey Millhone. She was inspired by her dad, a lawyer, who loved the genre and wrote at night, managing to get four novels in print. According to her page at Wiki, Grafton began writing at 18. Only two of her first seven manuscripts were published. They attracted little attention. She turned to screenwriting, adapting one of her novels, The
Lolly-Madonna War, to the big screen, and writing several TV movies. She created the series
Nurse, which ran one season, shooting 25 episodes. She even contributed one script to
Rhoda. But it was the alphabet series that made her a literary star. Those books have sold millions and been translated into 26 languages. Alas, she will not complete the alphabet, having ended with
Y Is for Yesterday earlier this year. She refused to sell the film and television rights to those books, her time in Hollywood having quelled her desire to have her work on the big screen. Grafton threatened to haunt her children if they sold the film rights after she died. Well done, madam.
The floating book shop was again sidelined by unfriendly weather.
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