I saw this 4-hour production in great anticipation since I have read many of the old Arthur texts and loved John Boorman's classic, Excalibur. However, this movie left a lot to be desired. It was kind of like the Lifetime Channel's version of the King Arthur story, complete with a sappy menage-a-trois with the handsome and clean cut Arthur and Lancelot getting it on with Gwynevere, which would probably constitute every woman's fantasy judging by the look of these two guys. I suppose if you want fantasy, this is it. Boorman's Excalibur was more graphic and the battle scenes appropriately barbaric. In that film the women characters, sadly enough, are reduced to what their social status was probably like during the Dark Ages, with the exception of Helen Mirren's Morgan le Fay. Another disappointment with this film is the central character of Merlin, who seems like he has been suitably whipped into his place by Vivian (the Lady of the Lake). He is reduced to a minor character in this production. The relationship in the books and Excalibur film between Merlin and Uther, and later, Merlin and Arthur, is the crux of the story (Nicol Williamson's Merlin in Excalibur is simply phenomenal). I suppose they were trying to develop a similar bond in this movie between Morgaine and Vivian, who in this tale are the two critical characters in the annals of the time. This actually could have worked with a grittier script, but for me the production was just a little too clean cut to represent life in the Dark Ages. Just my own opinion, I do hope others enjoyed this...I guess I'm too much of a purist to accept a cleaner, matriarchal re-telling of the story. However, I think I could have accepted it and perhaps enjoyed it considerably had it been a major European production effort, for example, without the limitations imposed by US censors.
Review of The Mists of Avalon
