Excalibur (1981)

Title: Excalibur (1981)

Director: John Boorman

Cast: Nicol Williamson, Nigel Terry, Nicholas Clay, Helen Mirren, Gabriel Byrne, Liam Neeson, Patrick Stewart

Review:

I’ve always found the legend of King Aurthur and the Knights of the Round Table interesting because it  is a layered story that branches out into many themes. It covers many aspects of the human condition and augments how selfish we can be, how imperfect we truly are and how uncontrollable human emotions can be. This is exemplified in the story by the raging passions that permeate throughout every generation portrayed in the film. From father to son, to grandson, wild passions overtake logic and reason, leading most of the time to tragedy. It is a story that urges us to control our passions and listen to reason, because often times uncontrolled passions can destroy entire lives. This is demonstrated through the character of Lancelot, one of King Arthur’s most trusted knights. Lancelot falls in love with King Aurthur’s wife, Lady Guenevere. In this story, Lancelot cares not for the catastrophic results of his secret love affair, he only cares for satisfying his passions and lust. Every time someone falls in love in Excalibur, the results are catastrophic. In many ways, love, lust and passion are demonized in this story, which of course demonstrates how this story is meant to propagate Christian ideals and mentalities, which of course rubs me the wrong way. I’ve always hated how the bible demonizes sexuality; at the end of the day sexuality is one of humanities strongest and most natural traits. But what the hell, I still love this story, I always root for Merlin the Magician who always comes off as the wisest of the bunch. He tells one of the passionate lovers “You are not listening. Well, your heart is not. Love is deaf as well as blind” Funny how it is Merlin, a follower of the old ways, a magician, who ends up being the wisest character in the film.

This battle between the old religions and Christianity is at the crux of Excalibur. This is a story of the battle between pagan religions, which are centered around magic and old gods, and the new ways of Christianity which are centered around the teachings of the bible. It’s true, this story can be seen as Christian propaganda in some ways, yet, I find it fascinating how it has always demonstrated that Christianity wasn’t always there, it had to shoehorn its way into society. Once upon a time things weren’t about Jesus and going to heaven, a whole other slew of beliefs comforted people. Fascinating how humanity has always needed that psychological support in life, something to make us think we are not all alone in this universe. It’s the idea that something is watching over them that humanity has always found themselves lulled into. At one point in the story, when Arthur’s kingdom is in shambles and going through a particularly rough time, the solution is to go and find “the holy grail” the cup that Christ drank from during the last supper. Supposedly, this cup will bring peace and happiness to the kingdom. But of course, we all know what this cup really exemplifies: the idea that society needs religion and its established morals to function properly.  The idea being that without Christianities values and ideals, we are lost. I of course don’t agree with this side of the story because as the story demonstrates, no matter how much you have Christ in your lives, human passions are always stronger, the human side dominates. Mistakes are made, but these are mistakes we can learn from. And call me old fashion, but I like to believe we are better then that, I like to believe humanity is essentially good at heart, with the exception of a few rotten apples. But, I also recognize that no matter how idealistically we look at humanity, there’s always the ideal of what we want to be, and then there’s what we are. A continually learning, evolving race of beings.

This is also a story that deals with politics and power, and the importance of learning to hone that power properly, not abuse it.  The sword, Excalibur, represents power that when used wisely is meant to “unite all men”. I thought it was so interesting how in this film, John Boorman’s Excalibur, King Arthur actually breaks the sword in half because of his uncontrollable rage, his abuse of power. Merlin tells him “You have broken what could not be broken. Now hope is broken” showing once again what happens to people when they see their leaders abuse power; a feeling of hopelessness takes over the land. This is also exemplified in the story with King Uther, who was also obsessed with owning the sword of power. At one point Uther tells Merlin “The sword, you promised the sword! I need the sword to be king!”  and Merlin tells him “And you shall have it, but to heal, not to hack” letting us know that the true nature of power is to bring peace to its people, not to obliterate them or abuse them which is what often times happens with those in power, they end up using it against those they are supposed to protect and serve.

The story of Arthur and his knights has been told many times, each version focusing on whatever part of the story they want to focus on, some focus more on the magical side of things while others focus more on the romance between Guenevere and Lancelot, for example Jerry Zucker’s First Knight (1995) is like that. It stars Richard Gere as Lancelot and Sean Connery as King Arthur and it was more of a romantic story of how the passion between Lancelot and Guenevere destroys a kingdom. One of my personal favorite versions of this story has always been Merlin (1998). On this television mini-series Sam Neil plays Merlin the Magician and Miranda Richardson plays The Lady of the Lake and an extremely memorable Queen Mab. In this mini-series directed by Steve Barron, the story is told from the perspective of Merlin himself; we actually get to know the magicians origins. This time around, it’s his story and since it’s a mini-series, the filmmakers really elaborated on the tale and even expanded it. Merlin is an extremely fun film with great visual effects and amazing performances from an equally great cast, highly recommend you check that mini-series out.  John Boorman’s Excalibur is one of the best versions of the story as well, it’s an epic and lush production, hell, it even gets a bit surreal with its dream sequences and visions. But knowing Boorman, this shouldn’t surprise anyone. After all, this is the director who gave us Zardoz (1974), one of the trippiest movies ever made. On this version of the story Boorman chose to diminish the focus on the magical aspects. If there is magic, it is a subtle thing and handled through the use of practical effects, which is a breath of fresh air in this CGI dominated world. A lot of the magical aspects were handled through the use of imaginative lighting and old school effects, it was a smoke and mirrors type of production.  

I have to give props to John Boorman for the look of the film, an aspect of it that got many accolades from critics when it was first released. Excalibur also gave Liam Neeson his first shot at acting in a full length feature film. Patrick Stewart also plays one of Arthur’s knights. And speaking of the knights, they all wear these shiny armors that give them a god like feel which by the way, is one of the other themes that the film also touches upon, man thinking themselves gods end up needing Christ because they couldn’t handle the power of godhood. As you can see, this is a story and a film that touches upon many relevant themes dealing with the human condition, but above all it augments the ugly side of human nature, our worst qualities, it does this to hopefully stimulate us into being better human beings.

Rating:  5 out of 5  

Cool World (1992)

Title: Cool World (1992)

Director: Ralph Bakshi

Cast: Brad Pitt, Kim Basinger, Gabriel Byrne

Review:

I remember going to the theater back in the late eighties to see Robert Zemeckis’s Who Framed Roger Rabbit (1988). Now this was an event film, it was the kind of film that people went to see more than once, it was that entertaining. Also, it was ground breaking in many ways. The technique of mixing live action with animated characters had been used before in the past, but director Robert Zemeckis used this filmmaking technique in ways that had never been seen before. I remember being completely blown away by it. Not only was it a successful amalgamation of animation and live action, it was a great story, with great actors and to top things off, it had heart. Technically speaking (as is the norm in a Robert Zemeckis film) it had shots and filmmaking techniques that made you wonder “how in the hell did they shoot that?” Another plus was that the animated characters had personality, these cartoons performed, you felt like they were alive. I remember being a bit frightened by the ‘Judge Doom’ character played by Christopher Lloyd. Roger Rabbit was a rampant success; it won awards and accolades left and right. It’s success gave birth to similar films that hoped to duplicate Roger Rabbit’s success. Don Bluth’s Rock a Doodle (1991) is one example, so is the low budget horror spoof Evil Toons (1992), Space Jam (1996) and yet another notable example was Ralph Bakshi’s Cool World, the film we’ll be talking about today. I guess Bakshi saw this sudden interest in animated films as an opportunity to revitalize his animation career, which had been dormant up to that point.

Bakshi on the Cool World set

Cool World tells the story (or tries anyways) of Jack Deebs an ex-con who spent his years in jail creating a comic book called ‘Cool World’. The comic book is an underground success, and when he gets out of jail he learns that people worship him for his comic book. But something weird happens one night, Deebs somehow ends up inside of the world he created himself! Nevermind how it happens, but it does! Not only that, Deebs ends up falling head over heels for one of his own creations: the super hot ‘toon Holli Would. Some of the toons living in Cool World want to cross over to the real world, so they can be truly alive; one of these doodles is sexy Holli. Will she ever get her wish to cross over to our world?  

Believe it or not, writing a synopsis of Cool World is not an easy task because the film is a real mess story wise. This film being a mess is not big surprise for me because many of Bakshi’s films are this way, messy and convoluted. In fact, it’s something I’ve come to expect of is work. Check out Fritz the Cat (1972) or Wizards (1977), two very interesting animated films, unfortunately when it comes to telling their story, they are not very clear films. But in spite of all that, the animation and the themes of these films make them watchable. Unfortunately, Cool World is Bakshi’s sloppiest stab at storytelling. Too many questions are left up in the air with no answers in sight. Why do Dweeb and Frank end up in Cool World? Why can’t toons have sex with humans? Why is Frank so hell bent on stopping toons and humans from having sex? Why is there such a thing as a spear that can make Cool World spill into our world?  Why does Holli want to go to the real world to “feel” when she so obviously feels in the cartoon world? And why does she want to turn the real world into the cartoon world she was trying to escape from? I thought she wanted to be real? Why does Frank’s mother’s death cause him to appear in Cool World? And why does he apparently forget about her as soon as he is in Cool World? So many questions and absolutely no answers.  This friends is a major flaw in this movie. Reportedly, this film is supposed to speak about the “dangers of casual sex” but honestly, I couldn’t pick up on anything this film was trying to say. The film said nothing to me!

But this wasn’t necessarily Bakshi’s fault, the film he had planned was not the film we ended up seeing on the silver screen.  He had a better film planned, more structured. In fact, Bakshi’s original concept was something closer to a horror-comedy film. The characters were darker, more adult oriented; something closer to Frank Miller’s Sin City. You can actually pick up a bit of that “film noir” vibe in Cool World.  Unfortunately after the studio decided to finance Bakshi’s film, producer Frank Mancuso Jr. took the script and had it changed to the point where it was not what Bakshi had originally intended. Reportedly, Bakshi was so furious at this that he punched Mancuso Jr. in the face! Don’t know how much truth there is to that story, but damn, an action like that one could certainly be justified. The studio bought Bakshi’s pitch for the film, but then they twisted it around until we got the messy film we ended up getting. The studio threatened to sue Bakshi if he didn’t finish the film, so Bakshi had no choice but to finish a film he really didn’t have his heart in making, and it shows. According to Bakshi himself, he ended up trying to have as much fun with the animation process as possible, but that’s about it. One look at the film and it’s clear, Bakshi’s heart was not on this one. The animation feels unfinished, unpolished, rushed. Now, most of Bakshi’s animated films have that sketchy nature to them, but here it seems even more so. If this was supposed to be “Roger Rabbit on acid” as Pitt said in an interview, the animation had to at the very least be as good as Roger Rabbit. Unfortunately, you don’t feel like the cartoons are there with the actors, you feel like the cartoons were added in. Sadly, what is most important in this kind of film -the interaction between actors and animated characters- was not pulled off convincingly. This is one of the crucial elements that breaks this film.

But not everything is gloom and doom in Cool World, the film does have a couple of good things going for it. Number one, the background art, the way Cool World looks, was pulled off by this great artist known as Barry Jackson. He achieved the twisted nightmarish look of Cool Worlds buildings and architecture; honestly it’s pretty cool looking if you pardon the pun. Buildings have mouths and faces, the buildings are twisted and contrived…loved it. These paintings really do give Cool World a bit of a horror look, closer to what Bakshi wanted. The soundtrack got more praise then the film did, it even includes a David Bowie song written specifically for the film called “Real Cool World”, too bad it’s a cool song for such a crappy movie! Another plus in the film is of course, the beautiful Kim Basinger, she just looks stunningly sexy on this one. I hear she was a big problem during the production, in fact, she was part of the reason why the film was “softened up” to become a PG rated film instead of the hard ‘R’ that Bakshi wanted. Apparently she thought since it was animated, it would be a film for kids and so she pushed for the film to be more family friendly. It seems she knew nothing of Bakshi’s body of work which always mixed adult themes with animated characters. Still, Basinger brings the film up with her bodacious curves, her acting, sadly isn’t all that, ditto for the rest of the cast.  This is one of Brad Pitt’s earliest performances, before he became the super star he is today. Gabriel Byrne plays the cartoonist who creates Cool World and falls for Holli. A pretty decent cast, the problem is that these actors seem to struggle to pull this movie off, the story is so convoluted, it seems even the actors where having a hard time making it all work.

Final words are that this isn’t a good movie; it’s extremely hard to follow and doesn’t make an iota of sense. At some point during its early stages, it had something worth doing, but then the producers decided to bastardize it and make something more family friendly, which they failed at doing anyways. Holli is too sexually suggestive for this to be a childrens film, she’s always talking in double entendres, always posing in alluring ways. Hell, this story is all about the follies of humans having sex with cartoons? How is that the basis for a family friendly film? This film suffers from that dreadful ailment some films suffer from: it’s a film that doesn’t know its target audience, a malady that many of Bakshi’s films suffered from.  Worst part is that the animation, which is basically the big draw with these type of films, is crude. Too bad, because the film offered an interesting concept, it just wasn’t executed very well. I recommend this film only to animation/Ralph Bakshi fans, as a curiosity, as a way to see a project gone horribly wrong, but not as a film you will enjoy.

Rating: 1 1/2 out of 5