The Mists of Avalon (2001)

This movie was tiresome, and extremely tragic. It provided the viewer with nothing to believe in besides himself, without any good reasons that that is a good thing to do. Guilt and fear run throughout the story, and an overly acute sense of heirlessness do not give enough oomph to produce a strong plot.The spiritual side of the drama provides no focus for the action, nor hope to give the movie heart. The conflict between the pagan religion and Christianity is in the forefront, but the viewer is confused as to which he should prefer. Should he love the old pagan religion, that curses the queen to childlessness, and makes an heir out of incest? Or should he love Christianity, which seems in this movie to be a guilt trip put on us by the priests? Being at a loss for an answer, it seems to leave us with the conclusion that we are left in this world to make what of it what we may (I dare say a theme far too common in adventure movies these days). On the one side, this is convenient, since then I do not need to be concerned for right and wrong. However, in practice this does not add up, since adultery is still really wrong, even if it was actually condoned by the king himself!? But the worst part of this godless world where one has to survive on his own, is that man does such a great job ruining his life, in this movie. Incest, death in the family, jealousy, adultery, barrenness, betrayal, curses, and an outrageous amount of focus on the lack of an heir seem to be all that he can produce in this life without any true hope in something eternal, or at least supernatural.Criticism aside, many other aspects of the movie, such as characters, acting, and effects, and music, these are all great, in my opinion. More than expected for a TV movie, for sure. This is why I have rated it with six stars, not with five.Something else which bothered me was the amount of focus on the intrigues surrounding the king's son. I think that focusing on this, and building so much drama around this point is in principle a wrong equation for suspense. It is sort of like having a story be not about wealth, but poverty. Because the heir was actually sort of the greatest form of equity, and real wealth, that a king could have. And then, when the negative suspense is resolved, of who is going to take the king's place when he is gone, the actual heir reveals himself to worse than no heir at all! A mixed signal to the analytical mind who could come up with this motto: Who wants to have kids, if they sometimes wind up betraying their own parents? So much emptiness, contrary to expectation. Although I normally like adventure movies, and don't need to have adrenaline rushing through me to enjoy a movie, for me, this movie lacked the driving motive of a compelling story, with too much focus on the mundane and the morbid, leaving me craving something which never emerged from the fog. Well done, with great acting, and good effects may be to its credit, but the raw materials of the story, and mainly the focus of the drama, is so tragic and hopeless, making this movie, at least for me, hard to enjoy.

I enjoyed this movie, but the book is even better. However, it does make you look at the Camelot stories in a different light. Morgaine was always made out to be an evil manipulative woman out to destroy King Arthur. This story gives a totally different perspective. You get to see how she was manipulated into having relations with Arthur without her knowledge. She had Mordred taken from her and raised by her sister to be a man who only wanted to destroy Arthur and Morgaine in order to take the throne and have power. In the end, Morgaine was the only person who truly cared about Arthur and made sure to take him home to Avalon at his death.

Even the historical documentary would be more entertaining than this 4-hour trash. I would use the word "ponderous" to describe this show, because watching it felt like a homework assignment, instead of fun.Also, this series can't seem to make up its mind: Is it telling a true history of Arthur? Or a fantasy about magical realms? It does neither job well.Instead I would recommend you pick up the miniseries "Merlin" which more accurately portrays the Arthurian legend - a world where magic exists (the Celtic Druid mythology), and provides the foundation for the non-realistic portions of that legend (like the magic sword Excalibur & the Lady of the Lake).Skip this miniseries. It's boring drivel.troy

It's been almost five years since I read the book, so my memory on the original story is a bit dim.The movie was a lot better than I believed it would be, and although the plot makes huge jumps and goes on really fast at times I was still very entertained the whole way through. Or maybe entertained isn't the right word to describe the experience, since the story isn't exactly a very happy one.Casting was mostly good. The actor of Morgaine did the role very well (hmm also being super hot all the while... ahem), as did Mordred's. It's amazing how much the actor managed to squeeze from the scant lines he was given in the movie. Arthur was also good as this somewhat gullible, very sincere person that was brought down by the people around him that he loved & trusted. Except that there wasn't really any air of command around him, he just didn't seem like this radiant personality he was supposed to be. Most others were at least fine, but I didn't like Anjelica Huston as Vivianne too much. Maybe if she didn't look like a burnt out hippie on crack for the whole movie, I could have concentrated more on the portrayal of her character. Now she just didn't fit in really.Obviously a lot was cut out, so there's not really any point in complaining about that... Well. In the end they DID make some rather awkward shortcuts, like the whole scene of Morgaine returning to Camelot with Mordred holding court there. Just horrible :PConsidering that this is a TV production, the audiovisuals in the movie are very acceptable. I also liked that the props were mostly quite down to earth and believable. No knights running around in shiny plate mail here :) And people do get old and get tired during the course of the story. Some parts were a bit suspect though... The Avalon priestesses with their silly tie-dye hippie new age gear were almost downright laughable, as were some of the female leads' gowns and stuff. The soundtrack was very good, and fit the new agey theme well with all the sarangis and other accidental occidental-isms... And gotta love Loreena McKennit anyway!I liked the first half better than the end, especially the last 20 minutes or so just didn't work. Somehow I was left with the impression that the director originally wanted one 60 minute episode more, but had to cut it and shoot through the whole second half of the story with way too much speed.I also liked the way how the personalities & relationships were the focus of the story. Yup, Zimmer Bradley's stories might be a bit of soap, but they still are refreshing when compared to these "Woman waits at home. Man goes out to kills orcs & goons. Man returns. And then they pork (except that we're spared this since the writer is some utter puritan)"-stories that Tolkien & co have churned out.But, really, how CAN you spoil this story? I've read a few versions of the story, and you really WOULD have to try to lose all the drama...OK, next I've just GOT to see King Arthur 2004 with Gwenhywfar (sp? goddamn welsh is sick) the warrior princess and whatnot ;D