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Friday, May 11, 2001
Knight's regale - review
By BOB THOMPSON
Toronto Sun
Surely, you'll have a jest at the jousting movie. Even if you don't joust, you should appreciate Brian Helgeland's winking post-modern take on the medieval sport in A Knight's Tale.
It's like the parry-on gang with rapier like wit.
There's action, adventure, outrageously hip in-jokes, stick work, horseplay, and that yucky, mushy love thing.
Down Under hunk Heath Ledger, Mel Gibson's co-star son in The Patriot, is the centre of this quirky universe. How peculiar is it?
In the beginning, Queen's We Will Rock You provides the theme music for a jousting tournament. Later, the dudes and damsels shake it up to David Bowie's Golden Years -- wup, wup, wup, wup. Think rock of middle ages.
Okay, some might feel the popster pandering is just outside of Foolish Cool, really close to Dumbville County. This is no Ivanhoe, after all, and Ledger is no Robert Taylor. For the rest of us goof-adoring, genre-busting souls, there are lots of opportunities to sit back and enjoy a refreshingly guileless bit of entertainment.
Ledger, especially, revels in the playfulness. He plays William, a former squire turned pretend knight who initially poses as a jouster when his 'sir' dies unexpectedly.
Victuals, not victory, is the object of the exercise. Sad but so. Unsure William will work for food.
Verily, as William becomes adept as a fancy lancer, he and his band of low-life gypsies get a taste for the good life. That rascal, William, even falls for the unattainable Jocelyn (Shannyn Sossamon) who turns up at all of William's tournaments, which brings a new meaning to the term lady in waiting. Smooching follows.
The required villain comes in the dastardly guise of a curly-head Rufus Sewell. He portrays the mighty mean champion jouster Count Adhemar with two sneers for every leer. Comeuppance a possibility.
Suitably supporting efforts come from William's buddies. The Full Monty fat guy Mark Addy is good as Roland, the worried. Paul Bettany scene steals as the gabbing, gambling writer Chaucer, who apparently uses his Knight's Tale experiences, we are told, as fodder for some scribblings. Alan Tudyk, the hot-tempered Wat, is a perfect comic foil.
Let's not forget Helgeland, who earned an Oscar for his L. A. Confidential screenplay. As writer-director of A Knight's Tale, he should be commended for the whimsy and the smart pacing.
Pardon his meaningful moments, like the ye-olde cornball father-son reunion, and the rise-up common man hero-worship. Helgeland should let his people go-go.
That semi-serious stuff doesn't belong, but it didn't hurt. Let's face it, if We Will Rock You's fine, how could the drivel drive you to distraction?
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