The Green Knight (Dev Patel, Alicia Vikander, Joel Edgerton)

Did nobody else find the first 5 mins painfully bad? Im assuming it got immeasurably better since so many people liked it, but those first 5 was rushed nonsense. The dialogue intro was abysmal

Fandymo

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117797026#Comment_117797026

I tried to watch this a few weeks ago. Painful in the opening scenes. Got bored after the lad came into the great hall and the slumdog lad said he'd go and fight him. Turned it off.

Tusky

This was one of my most anticipated films of the year and I really, really wanted to love it. But I just didn't. It looks absolutely gorgeous and it's worth a watch for the cinematography alone. The acting is solid and there are some great moments. But overall I just had a feeling that I didn't "get" it. Afterwards I went and read up on the source material (I didn't know the story) and interviews with the director. Turns out I did get it - there just isn't that much to it and it doesn't really make sense.

The original story is nothing special. What's so honourable about agreeing to have your head chopped off?

0ph0rce0

Dogshit for me, turned it off after 30 mins, now watching Home Alone (masterpiece in comparison)

billyhead

Thought it was muck myself. It was very weird.

McFly85

Some parts looked very nice, but definitely didn’t enjoy the whole experience.

Fine for people who want a purely visual experience I think, narratively there’s really not much there at all.

hollypink

Oh and I watched at the weekend on Amazon Prime and both found it intensely boring. Everything after the scene with the green knight in Arthur's Court to the green Chapel happens painfully slowly and barely anything is happening anyway! I found it excruciating at times. OH stopped watching just as Gawain arrived at the chapel, the supposed climax of the story!

Maybe it's a better experience on the big screen but I don't think that for me, even then, the visuals and atmosphere would be enough to overcome the ponderous pace and lack of narrative. The critics seem to all be giving glowing reviews so I was surprised to find it so awful. I read up afterwards about the poem and the way the film subverts the character of Gawain as portrayed in the poem and that was all very interesting but the film didn't work in that regard for me.

There is an interesting discussion of the poem on BBC's In Our Time from a few years ago and one of the points made was that the poem contains a lot of humour. The film though takes itself very seriously and I thought the painfully slow pace eliminated any sense of the tension that needed to be present to hold my interest.

stooge

Same as above, couldnt wait for it to end..... and it went on for far too long.

Visuals were good, some great scenery but the terrible dialogue, the slow pace and the lack of cohesion between scenes and actors was very frustrating.

So called 'professional' film critics will love it and praise it but general public will not. As someone called out earlier... its pretentious nonsense...which will probably win oscars

Fysh

I suppose it probably should've had a warning in the marketing about being a David Lowery film - maybe "From director David Lowery, who brought you A Ghost Story aka the film with 10 minutes of Rooney Mara eating a pie". ;)

sydthebeat

i loved " a ghost story" so really looking forward to this

pixelburp

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117953247#Comment_117953247

Yeah, there's a degree of "well, what did you expect from this?" on my mind; I wasn't exactly enamoured with the film myself and said as much, but the sledging feels a little disproportionate to the type of film being talked about. I'd be curious to know what were peoples' expectations here before they turned on the film. Just a rollicking Authurian adventure?

Sad Professor

I thought it was great but I was familiar with the director and the production company so I knew what to expect. Some of the marketing was probably a bit misleading. Not so much the trailer but the first teaser which made it look like a horror film. So some people may have been expecting something along the lines of The Witch, which was hardly conventional either but had some mainstream appeal that this probably doesn't.

Dades

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117953402#Comment_117953402

Agreed. This was never going to be First Knight.

I really enjoyed the weirdness and visuals. A definite change of pace from F9, and a film I'll remember far longer than that juggernaut.

Fysh

I wouldn't fault anyone for not enjoying this, particularly if they were expecting something straightforward. I've had my own issues with slow-paced light-on-narrative films myself (still can't get past about 20 minutes of Only God Forgives, no matter how many of its fans tell me they love it), and I know how much that looking-at-your-watch feeling will kill any enjoyment you might get from parts of a film.

It would still be great if we could move beyond "oh, it's pretentious" as the sum total of comment from someone who doesn't like it. Doesn't have to be an essay, but at least say what you didn't like and why.

silverharp

The RT audience score is 50% so its only going to be for a niche audience, its only a $15m budget film and thats going to show. Having one of the robbers having an Irish accent seemed strange

pixelburp

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117953532#Comment_117953532

To be fair a few folks have expanded upon why they didn't gel with the film; these reasons broadly matching the misgivings of those of us who did like the film. But yeah; it'd be nice if something this deeply cinematic gained a little more discussion than various drive-bys and snark over having the nerve to write some thoughts on a film.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117954587#Comment_117954587

These days I'm finding letterboxd a much better, more reliable yardstick for chasing numbers or broad audience feelings; I've rattled on about the inherent flaws of aggregators before but letterboxd - by accident or design - attracts more thoughtful, but no less honest, opinions on film - but without the varying degrees of screaming hyperbole and 1-line "reviews".

And its community aren't "snobs" either; be it trash or art, good movies get the plaudits I've found. Plus, each film's page gives a better sense of how said audiences breaks down across its 5-star rating system. So by way of example:

https://letterboxd.com/film/the-green-knight/

Wombatman

Incoherent nonsense posing as high art. Themes and symbolism have little meaning or worth because of the jumbled nature of the storytelling. If you want to see a surreal, visually stunning movie, with a sense of purpose and direction watch The Fall (2006).

kerplun k

F**k me, that was an experience. I’ve no idea what I’ve seen, but Holy Moley, what a watch. A song that springs to mind is Talking heads Once in a Lifetime , You may find yourself in a beautiful house, with a beautiful wife. You may ask yourself, "Well, how did I get here?"

well, how did we get here? or to be precise, how did Dev Patels Gawain get there?. For me that’s basically the film. Life is a game, with a hierarchy telling us how to play it. Does it really matter when we come to a cross roads what road we take? is our destiny predetermined by those who guide us? At the end of the day Is all we really have to truly offer is our integrity while we walk our own predestined quests of yonder? so much to unpack here. I haven’t had this much fun since Charlie Kaufmans I’m thinking of ending things.

I’ll be devastated if I find out parts of this weren’t filmed in the Dublin and Wicklow mountains. Back in the olden days, before parenting, I was in a Sunday walking club and this took me right back. Also, I have to mention Barry Keoghan, listen, everyone here is fantastic, but Keoghan just lights up the screen when he’s around. For such an ordinary guy, he carries so much charisma. Fair play to him.

IMO TGK is a masterpiece and just generally a captivating watch.

Need a Username

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117956838#Comment_117956838

The Fall is a movie I have had on my “to watch list” since it was first released but I haven’t had an opportunity to see it.

Need a Username

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117961304#Comment_117961304

I was looking forward to The Green Knight but it’s release at my nearest cinema was cancelled - by the distributor apparently.

I will watch on Prime over Christmas I think.

Hard to believe Barry Keoghan is fantastic or lights up the screen - he is the same personality in each movie and his facial expression never changes. Fair play to him (as you say) for his success in the business so far but I honestly can’t understand it - Ireland has a lot of very talented young actors and actresses that should be where he is. I wish someone would explain how this lad has managed it.

skimpydoo

I don't know how I managed to last 40 minutes, it was awful. I would rather watch a Steven Siegel marathon than continue watching it. Avoid at all costs.

SuprSi

I agree, it was terrible!! Slow, non-sensical and just stupid. We gave up with an hour to go and I went back to watch the remainder to see if it would help but it didn't. So disappointing - a clear case of the trailer being better than the movie.

Loafing Oaf

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117950773#Comment_117950773

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117951620#Comment_117951620

These posts sum up my experience, great visual spectacle but there barely seemed to be any story to it.

Although I'd still say it was worth making for generating this IT headline😛

https://www.irishtimes.com/culture/film/the-green-knight-gawain-you-good-thing-1.4679836

An incredible movie imo, lush visuals and sounds, incredible performances

No plot as such but still cleaves to the poem it's based on so not going to lose marks there

A total trip through a medieval culture's legend that has the balls to commit to that

If the trailer was cut to entice an action crowd then fair enough i myself didnt get that from it at all

kerplun k

I wasn’t overly familiar with the source material myself, but for me that was part of the fun.

I enjoyed the experience of this film, and then going back to do a deep dive on the source material and further analysis of the film itself. Normally I’ll watch a film once, form an opinion and then forget about it, so it’s great when a film like this comes along that not only is a great experience but encourages further analysis as well.

r3nu4l

The only thing I knew about this film was that Cahir Castle was one of the locations used to film it. The castle scenes are spectacular and Weta Digital did a reasonably good job with the additional digital elements.

I believe the film follows the story closely but all in all, a slow, plodding piece that drove me to switch off after an hour had passed. Despite a Hollywood budget and looks, this reminds me of a final year project by some third-level media course students. Some relatively short scenes with interesting dialogue and minor action are interspersed with long, drawn-out scenes where nothing happens or the character just plods about on his horse with some scenery in the background. The production team could have cut a good 15 minutes of footage, from the film in the first hour and nobody would have noticed, such is the lack of anything happening.

A yawn-fest for me unfortunately. Did not finish. I had really hoped for more.

p to the e

I was drawn to this as soon as I saw the first trailer. I was aware of the poem upon which it's based so I was ready for a weird outing to the cinema. Alas, I had to make do with the small screen which probably didn't help my overall opinion.

The first appearance of titular knight was outstanding and although most seem to be commenting on the look of the film I thought it sounded amazing. Every snap and crack of the knight's movement painted a picture of power through nature. Finchy's voice had the unique combination of menace and kindness to portray such a complex character. Bloody good rep aswell!

As I said, I was aware of the poem so I was a bit perplexed why it was never brought up about how Joel Edgerton's character was supposed to be the green knight. Maybe we'll see it in the "Lowery Cut". It was quite interesting to read up on a some of the plotlines and their sources afterwards. For example, Saint Winifred being included because of Saint Winifred's Well being mentioned in the poem, the skeleton in the cage being a nod to Willow, mongo head's appearance being a nod to Barry Lyndon. Still not sure about the naked giants though.

Overall I enjoyed the first half more than the second. The end product was intriguing and definitely needed some knowledge of the poem whether beforehand or after but ultimately I can't help but be disappointed.

Watched it recently and taught it was rubbish too, the only reason I watched it until the end was I needed to know what happened, even though it was killing me. Wasn't aware of that about Joel Edgerton's character though.

Need a Username

I watched this last night and really enjoyed it. Somebody had told me it was really slow going but I didn’t think that at all.

A lot of the “arty” shots (like the long ride out of the castle, the ground turning upside down during the March of the giants, etc. ) I suspect had no meaning except to be arty shots for the sake of it but it made the movie quirky.

Edgerton and Vikander second character stole the show.

Need a Username

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118190808#Comment_118190808

I was familiar with the story but it has been a decade or two and the details were hazy but I was surprised that Edgerton wasn’t the Green Knight. When his character appeared it hit my memory that this was the guy.

Were they using the correct pronunciation of Gawain ? Arthur sounded like he was saying Gar-win and everyone else seemed to say Gaa-win but I always thought it is Gaw-wane.

Also is there a reason why Arthur, Merlin and Guinevere are only King, Magician and Queen in the credits and not named?