The Green Knight Failed Only At The Box Office

I had seen the trailer for The Green Knight (2021), and it stuck with me that I really wanted to see it. Since in Romania we did not have it in any cinema, my only option was piracy. Before I saw it, though, I caught a glimpse of a few reviews and comments. The general impression was that of a terrible movie.

Then I watched it and realized that this piece of art is not for the average consumer. Moreover, when you create expectations, disappointment will still be there. No matter what you receive! That's because the expectation does not match reality, regardless of how good the received is.

Now, don't get me wrong! The Green Knight is by no means a masterpiece for the ages. But not one to be missed either. It's abstract, symbolic, and very different in so many ways. The Green Knight held my attention for 2 hours and delighted my senses with out-of-the-ordinary scenes, phantasmagorical even. And one in particular that I found hard to believe they actually had the guts to present that way. I won't say any more about it because of spoilers. I'll only mention that it takes place in the castle where our protagonist spends the night...

Blame it on the audience

My first note in this movie review is one for the audience. If you're not a native or good English speaker, you will miss even the fact that the film's title also refers to said protagonist. In the sense that he is green, inexperienced. Not just to the mystical apparition that throws the challenge to the Knights of the Round Table.

A challenge that is accepted by the young lady's man, Sir Gawain, King Arthur's nephew. Who, lacking in any heroic deeds to speak of, seems himself obliged to depart on a mission whose finale is already established - the chopping of one's head! Now I'd like to not say anything more about the script. I will leave it to you to deconstruct the message for yourself. Because this too is an endangered art, in a cinematographical way of speaking, at least.

And I see a couple of problems here. First, we do not want to do this. We only desire rapid gratification entertainment. And secondly, we also chastise any new types of presenting a story. In the case of The Green Knight, it's quite simple and has been done many times before - the young knight who goes on a quest of self-discovery, for courage and honor. The main theme here is the hero's journey.

The typical monomyth

In his adventure, he meets diverse characters, more or less dead or moral, human or beast-like, all towards the purpose of testing him. The primary gist of the movie is that the protagonist fails in a big way. So, not being a classical format type of movie, the outcome and moral of the story are also certainly different from what you'd expect. It's about failure, shame, and the loss of honor as opposed to the gaining of it.

You really don't have to be a genius to figure that out as much. Although it would help if, in the past, you had made an exercise of sometimes thinking in parallel, in abstract, obscure, metaphorical directions, even in nonsensical ways. It is your right not to do that, of course! But it is also your loss and, in all actuality, everyone's loss.

Denouncing the weird and propagating only the familiar truly is to the detriment of the consumer. The one who sells will push the superhero genre movie endlessly, and the ones like the one on today's microscope, bold and out of the ordinary, will disappear.

A 14th-century chivalric romance

If we Google around after we see the movie, we also find out that it is based on the Arthurian story Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. Perhaps the movie is not a perfect adaptation of this rhyme-y fourteenth-century story. But the effort alone deserves praise. And the fact that you can continue doing research and understand more after you're done watching, in the sense of general knowledge, adds to the experience. Of how many modern movies can you say this?

The Green Knight is also very rewatchable, giving the opportunity to better appreciate the ambiguous visual phenomena that are presented. Dev Patel was excellent in this role, mostly done with more or less confused looks. But always profound and powerful. The cinematography is very good too and exposes the inner happenings of the main character in an exaggerated, supra-realistic manner.

This movie reminds me of crazies such as Holy Motors (2012) or The Lobster (2015) and, to a lesser extent, Coriolanus (2011), The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus (2009), or even Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance) (2014). So, if you thought any of those were good, you know what to do.

Finally, I will say that The Green Knight is an excellent art movie that lures you toward depth and legend, but a depth that you have to uncover. It is an experimental movie that, by the end, you don't precisely know what you've just seen, and that is an extremely beneficial thing. See it, and if you're still very confused, this user-submitted spoiler review compares the book and film and clarifies the plot to a great extent.