| He Will Rock You A KNIGHT'S TALE Release Date: 31/08/2001 Certificate: PG Official Website Director: Brian Helgeland Producers: Todd Black, Brian Helgeland & Tim Van Relim Screenplay: Brian Helgeland |
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| A Knight's Tale wins you over almost immediately with the opening joust. As the competitors prepare themselves, the audience bang the railings and clap along to Queen's We Will Rock You. As the excitement mounts a mexican waves follows. Three squires are not having such a good time, however. Their master has died while taking a pre-match dump. Young William Thatcher (Heath Ledger) dons the armour instead, and romps to victory, fulfilling his life's dream. |
| This is not enough for him, and he persuades his mates Wat (Alan Tudyk) and Roland (Mark Addy) to be his vassals as he travels round Europe entering tournaments under the guise of Sir Ulrich Von Lichtenstein of Gelderland (for only nobles can compete). Writer, director and producer Helgeland has taken the sport of jousting, popular with both nobles and commoners in medieval Europe, and fused it with the imagery and discourses of modern sports, to spectacular effect. The actual jousts are excellent, as the horses thunder towards each other and the lances smash into armour sending the rider flying. |
| At each match "Sir Ulrich" is introduced like a prize-fighter by one Geoffrey Chaucer. Encountering Chaucer stark bollock naked on the road the trio adopt him into their ranks because he can forge the documents necessary to make the judges believe Will is a knight. Paul Bettany threatens to steal the show in the role however, outshining both the hero of the piece and the obligatory sneering English bad guy. He's French, but he's still a sneering English bad guy. Encountering a good and noble knight in William, salt of the Earth squires in Wat and Roland, and some corrupt clergy in the form a |
| summoner and a pardoner, there's a nice link to Chaucer's Canterbury Tales, of course, even in the movie's title. And it is little touches like this that make A Knight's Tale such a pleasure to watch. As the gang arrive back in London for the Jousting World Champinships to the strains of The Boys Are Back In Town, there's a medieval London Eye in the nice Olde World CGIed capital, Will's Nike armour and so many blink -and-you-miss-them sight gags. What lets the movie down is the amount of cheesiness towards the end, threatening to drown the whole endeveour in sentiment. Which is shame, because the whole thing was so tongue-in-cheek until then. A very entertaining movie nonetheless. 9/10. |
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