Fantasy Movies--Merlin (1998)
January 28th 2009 01:28
It's always hard to tell whether we're talking fantasy, fable, myth, or fairy tale when we talk about Merlin and the larger King Arthur stories. Though this movie--made for TV and released on DVD later, with added scenes--draws heavly from Sir Thomas Malory's Morte Darthur, it also takes a lot of artistic liberties with Mab and Merlin and Morgan le Faye, changing some of their roles and enhancing them. In the original text, most of the stories were about King Arthur and his court--Lancelot, Gawain, Bedivere--and Merlin and his whole story were more in the background.
So, I take this movie to be part of the Fantasy genre for a couple reasons: it was made in modern times when everyone agrees that this type of story can't be true; it's not completely faithful to the original text--which was thought by many at that time (middle ages) to be historical--by adding in new themes and events; it's unclear whether anyone ever actually believed in these stories.
Despite its 'made for TV' status, this is a high-quality piece of film. The cinematography is gorgeously done with excellent use of colors and creative camera angles--along with some well-placed and well-timed CGI, albeit somewhat primitive compared to what we have now. It really captures the epic scope of this story, giving a well-thought-out and creative look at Merlin's history as well as an admittedly altered crash course through the story of King Arthur and Camelot.
The only problem, for some people, is the really long running time. It was broken into a miniseries for television, and the DVD version has all that and more. If you have a good attention span and a taste for Arthurian legend and well-done and well-acted movies, you should check out Merlin.
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