Boorman's Excalibur began development as an unproduced adaptation of The Lord of the Rings.[10] The film was shot entirely on location in Ireland and at Ardmore Studios, employing Irish actors and crew. It has been acknowledged for its importance to the Irish filmmaking industry and for helping launch the film and acting careers of a number of Irish and British actors, including Liam Neeson, Patrick Stewart, Gabriel Byrne and Ciarán Hinds.[6][obsolete source]
Reviewers praised Excalibur's visual style. It won the award for Best Artistic Contribution at the 1981 Cannes Film Festival,[11] and received an Oscar nomination for Best Cinematography and a BAFTA nomination for Best Costume Design. It grossed $35 million in the United States and Canada on a budget of $11 million.[7]
Plot
In the Dark Ages, the sorcerer Merlin retrieves the magical sword Excalibur from the Lady of the Lake for Uther Pendragon, who is declared king. In exchange for their future child, Merlin helps Uther seduce Igrayne, the Duke of Cornwall's wife, while the Duke dies in battle. Igrayne gives birth to Arthur, and Merlin takes the boy. Ambushed by the Duke's men, a dying Uther thrusts Excalibur into a stone, as Merlin declares that he who pulls the sword from the stone shall be king.
Merlin entrusts Ector to raise Arthur, who becomes squire to Ector's son Kay. As a young man, Arthur pulls Excalibur from the stone, proving he is Uther's rightful heir. Leodegrance pledges his allegiance to Arthur, but they are opposed by knights who dispute Arthur's kingship as a bastard. Defending Leondegrance's castle and his daughter Guenevere, Arthur defeats Uryens, whom he compels to knight him and swear fealty. Smitten with Guenevere, Arthur ignores Merlin's warning that she will one day fall in love with someone else.
Years later, the undefeated knight Lancelot almost bests Arthur, who calls upon the power of Excalibur to defeat Lancelot, breaking the sword. The Lady of the Lake restores the sword to a remorseful Arthur, and Lancelot swears allegiance to him. Unifying the land, Arthur and his knights create the Round Table and the castle Camelot. Secretly infatuated with each other, Lancelot escorts Guenevere to her wedding to Arthur, declaring that his loyalty to the king outweighs his love for her. Arthur's half-sister Morgana reveals to Merlin that she is a sorceress, and Lancelot brings Perceval, who hopes to become a knight, to Camelot.
Influenced by Morgana, Gawain drunkenly accuses Guenevere of betraying the king, and a duel over her innocence is set. Resolved to uphold the law as an impartial judge, Arthur cannot defend Guenevere's honor himself. When no champion will fight for the queen, Perceval steps forward, but Lancelot arrives and defeats Gawain, sparing his life. Retreating to the forest, Lancelot is followed by a deeply moved Guenevere, and they make love. Merlin confirms this to Arthur, who thrusts Excalibur into the ground between the sleeping lovers. Merlin's magical link to the land impales him on the sword, as Morgana traps him and steals his Charm of Making.
Taking Guenevere's form, Morgana seduces Arthur and gives birth to a son, Mordred, infecting the land with famine and sickness. Struck by a magical bolt of lightning, a weakened Arthur sends his knights to search for the Holy Grail, hoping to restore the land and himself. Many knights die on their quest or are bewitched into Morgana's service, but Perceval resists her attacks. Mordred reaches adulthood and demands Arthur's crown, vowing to take Camelot by force. Unable to save Uryens from Mordred, Perceval is attacked by Lancelot, who has renounced his knighthood.
Nearly drowned, Perceval is transported to the Grail and proves himself worthy, bringing the Grail to Arthur. He drinks from the Grail and is revitalised along with the land, calling upon Kay to rally their remaining forces against Mordred. Arthur finds Guenevere at a convent, and they reconcile before she gives him back Excalibur. At Stonehenge, Arthur's love liberates Merlin and they share a final conversation. Merlin tricks Morgana into speaking the Charm of Making, exhausting her powers and enveloping the battlefield in mist. Mordred discovers his mother's aged, true self and murders her in disgust.
Arthur and his men battle Mordred's forces, using the mist in their favour. Lancelot comes to Arthur's aid, reconciling with his friend and dying a true knight. Arthur kills Mordred but is mortally wounded, and commands Perceval to throw Excalibur into the water, knowing the sword will rise again for a worthy king. The Lady of the Lake catches the sword and disappears, and Perceval watches as Arthur is carried away on a ship toward Avalon.
Autographed armor from the movie Excalibur in a pub in Cahir, Ireland, 2004
John Boorman had planned a film adaptation of the Merlin legend as early as 1969, but when submitting the three-hour script written with Rospo Pallenberg to United Artists, they rejected it deeming it too costly and offered him J. R. R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings instead. Boorman was allowed to shop the script elsewhere, but no studio would commit to it. Returning to his original idea of the Merlin legend, Boorman was eventually able to secure deals that would help him do Excalibur. Much of the imagery and set designs were created with his The Lord of the Rings project in mind.[10]
Writing
Rospo Pallenberg and John Boorman wrote the screenplay, which is primarily an adaptation of Malory's Morte d'Arthur (1469–70) recasting the Arthurian legends as an allegory of the cycle of birth, life, decay, and restoration, by stripping the text of decorative or insignificant details. The resulting film is reminiscent of mythographic works such as Sir James Frazer's The Golden Bough and Jessie Weston's From Ritual to Romance; Arthur is presented as the "Wounded King" whose realm becomes a wasteland to be reborn thanks to the Grail, and may be compared to the Fisher (or Sinner) King, whose land also became a wasteland, and was also healed by Perceval. "The film has to do with mythical truth, not historical truth," Boorman remarked to a journalist during filming. The Christian symbolism revolves around the Grail, perhaps most strongly in the baptismal imagery of Perceval finally achieving the Grail quest. "That's what my story is about: the coming of Christian man and the disappearance of the old religions which are represented by Merlin. The forces of superstition and magic are swallowed up into the unconscious."[13][14]
In addition to Malory, the writers incorporated elements from other Arthurian stories, sometimes altering them. For example, the sword between the sleeping lovers' bodies comes from the tales of Tristan and Iseult; the knight who returns Excalibur to the water is changed from Bedivere to Perceval; and Morgause and Morgan Le Fay are merged into one character. The sword Excalibur and the Sword in the Stone are presented as the same thing; in some versions of the legends, they are separate. In Le Morte d'Arthur, Sir Galahad, the illegitimate son of Lancelot and Elaine of Corbenic, is the Knight who is worthy of the Holy Grail. Boorman follows the earlier version of the tale as told by Chrétien de Troyes, making Perceval the grail winner. Some new elements were added, such as Uther wielding Excalibur before Arthur (repeated in Merlin), Merlin's 'Charm of Making' (written in Old Irish), and the concept of the world as "the dragon" (probably inspired by the dragon omen seen in Geoffrey of Monmouth's account of Merlin's life).[15]
The Charm of Making
According to linguistMichael Everson, the "Charm of Making" that Merlin speaks to invoke the dragon is an invention, there being no attested source for the charm. Everson reconstructs the text as Old Irish.[16][17][18] The phonetic transcription of the charm as spoken in the film is Celtic pronunciation:[aˈnaːlnaθˈrax,uːrθvaːsbeˈθʌd,doxˈjeːlˈdjenveː]. Although the pronunciation in the film has little relation to how the text would actually be pronounced in Irish, the most likely interpretation of the spoken words, as Old Irish text is:[19]
Anál nathrach,
orth’ bháis's bethad,
do chél dénmha
In modern English, this can be translated as:
Serpent's breath,
the charm of death and life,
thy omen of making.
Casting
Boorman cast Nicol Williamson and Helen Mirren opposite each other as Merlin and Morgana, knowing that the two were on less than friendly terms due to personal issues that arose during a production of Macbeth seven years earlier. Boorman verified this on the Excalibur DVD commentary, saying he felt that the tension on the set would come through in the actors' performances.
Even though he was 35 years old, Nigel Terry plays King Arthur from his teenage years to his ending as an aged monarch.
Several members of the Boorman family appear in the cast: his daughter Katrine played Igraine, Arthur's mother, and his son Charley portrayed Mordred as a boy. Because of the number of Boormans involved with the film, it is sometimes called "The Boorman Family Project".[20]
Filming
Excalibur locations trail in County Wicklow, 28 years after filmingCahir Castle during the siege battle sequence
An early critical battle scene at a castle, in which Arthur is made a knight by Uryens while kneeling in a moat, was filmed in Cahir Castle, in Cahir County Tipperary, the Republic of Ireland, a well-preserved Irish castle. The castle's moat is the River Suir which flows around it. The fight with Lancelot was filmed at Powerscourt Estate's waterfall. Other locations included Wicklow Head as the backdrop to the battle over Tintagel, the Kerry coast as the place from which Arthur sails to Avalon, and a place called Childers Wood near Roundwood, County Wicklow, where Arthur comes on Excalibur in the stone. At the time, John Boorman was living just a few miles down the road, at Annamoe.[22] According to Boorman, the love scene between Lancelot and Guenevere in the forest was filmed on a very cold night, but Nicholas Clay and Cherie Lunghi performed the scene nude anyway.
According to Boorman, the film was originally three hours long; among the scenes that were deleted from the finished film, but featured in one of the promotional trailers, was a sequence where Lancelot rescued Guenevere from a forest bandit.
Release
The film opened in the United States on 10 April 1981 and in London on 2 July 1981, before opening nationwide in the United Kingdom on 5 July 1981.[23] The film was initially released in the United States with an R rating. Distributors later announced a 119 minute PG-rated version, with less graphic sex and violence, but it was not widely released.[citation needed] When first released in the United Kingdom, the film was classified as an "AA" by the BBFC, restricting it to those aged 14 and over.[1] In 1982, the BBFC replaced the "AA" certificate with the higher age-specific "15", which was applied to Excalibur when released on home video.[24] When Excalibur first premiered on HBO in 1982, the R-rated version was shown in the evening and the PG-rated version was shown during the daytime, following the then-current rule of HBO only showing R-rated films during the evening hours.[citation needed]
Reception
The "Sword in the Stone" sculpture, located at Cahir Castle, one of the filming locations. It was created by local stonemason Philip Quinn and bears the names of local people who appeared as extras.[25]
Excalibur was the number one film in the United States during its opening weekend, eventually grossing $34,967,437 in the United States and Canada, ranking as the 18th highest-grossing film of the year.[7] On review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes, it holds a 72% score based on 93 reviews, with an average rating of 7.0/10.[26] On Metacritic, it has a weighted average score of 56 out of 100 based on reviews from 10 critics.[27]
Roger Ebert called it both a "wondrous vision" and "a mess".[28] Elaborating further, Ebert wrote that the film was "a record of the comings and goings of arbitrary, inconsistent, shadowy figures who are not heroes but simply giants run amok. Still, it's wonderful to look at". Vincent Canby wrote that while Boorman took Arthurian myths seriously, "he has used them with a pretentiousness that obscures his vision."[29][12] In her review in The New Yorker, Pauline Kael wrote that the film had its own "crazy integrity", adding that the imagery was "impassioned" with a "hypnotic quality". According to her, the dialogue was "near-atrocious". She concluded by writing that "Excalibur is all images flashing by... We miss the dramatic intensity that we expect the stories to have, but there's always something to look at".[30]
Others have praised the entire film, with Variety calling it "a near-perfect blend of action, romance, fantasy and philosophy".[31] Sean Axmaker of Parallax View wrote "John Boorman's magnificent and magical Excalibur is, to my mind, the greatest and the richest of screen incarnation of the oft-told tale."[32] In a later review upon the film's DVD release, Salon's David Lazarus noted the film's contribution to the fantasy genre, stating that it was "a lush retelling of the King Arthur legend that sets a high-water mark among sword-and-sorcery movies".[33] A study by Jean-Marc Elsholz demonstrates how closely the film Excalibur was inspired by the Arthurian romance tradition and its intersections with medieval theories of light, most particularly in the aesthetic/visual narrative of Boorman's film rather than in its plot alone.[34]
Christopher John reviewed Excalibur in Ares Magazine #9 and commented that "Excalibur is a shockingly large film and an incredibly intricate and fascinating piece of cinema. It is a fine prologue for the spate of fantasy films waiting in the wings for release this year."[35] The film featured many actors early in their careers who later became very well-known, including Helen Mirren, Patrick Stewart, Liam Neeson, Gabriel Byrne, and Ciarán Hinds. For his performance as Merlin, Nicol Williamson received widespread acclaim. The Times in 1981 wrote: "The actors are led by Williamson's witty and perceptive Merlin, missed every time he's offscreen".
In 2009, filmmaker Zack Snyder said Excalibur was his favorite film, calling it "the perfect meeting of movies and mythology".[38] In his film Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice (2016), Bruce Wayne and his parents, Thomas and Martha, are walking home from seeing Excalibur when the latter two are killed by Joe Chill. The event later leads to Bruce becoming Batman. Moreover, the film parallels much of the film's major plot points, most notably Superman killing Doomsday with a Kryptonite Spear at the expense of his own life intended as a homage to Arthur killing Mordred with Excalibur at the cost of his.[citation needed]
During the shooting of the 2023 film Irati, inspired by Basque mythology and several medieval films including Excalibur, the crew nicknamed it Euskalibur, after euskal, ("Basque-language").[39]
The English heavy metal band Anaal Nathrakh took its name from Merlin's Charm of Making in this film.[40]
Documentaries
Neil Jordan directed a 1981 documentary on the making of Excalibur, entitled The Making of Excalibur: Myth Into Movie.
In 2013 another documentary entitled Behind the Sword in the Stone was released featuring interviews with director Boorman and many of the cast, such as Terry, Mirren, Stewart, Neeson, Byrne, Lunghi, and Charley Boorman.[41][42][43] Distribution rights were later acquired by PBS International, and the title was changed to Excalibur: Behind the Movie. As of June 2020, this documentary was made available in the United States through various online streaming services.
^ abCanby, Vincent (10 April 1981). "Boorman's 'Excalibur'". The New York Times. Retrieved 17 July 2014. Except for the performances of Nicol Williamson... and Helen Mirren... the movie seems to be a beautiful, uninhabited, primeval forest.
^"Indo-European etymology: *ane-". Retrieved 22 March 2011. Anál: to breathe, to blow *anǝtlo-: OIr anāl 'spiritus'; Cymr anadl 'Atem'; MBret alazn (Umstellung), Bret holan; *anǝtī-: MCymr eneit, Cymr eneid 'Seele'; *anamon-: OIr animm, gen. anman, Ir anam 'Seele'
^"Indo-European etymology: *nētr-". Retrieved 22 March 2011. Nathrach: Celtic: *natrī > OIsl nathir, gen. nathrach 'natrix, serpens'; Corn nader `Schlange', OBret pl. natrol-ion 'Basilisken', MBret azr 'Schlange', NBret aer ds., Cymr neidr, pl. nadroedd 'ds.'
^Bourgne, Florence; Carruthers, Leo M.; Sancery, Arlette (2008). Un espace colonial et ses avatars: naissance d'identités nationales, Angleterre, France, Irlande, Ve-XVe siècles (in French). Vol. 42 di Cultures et civilisations médiévales. Editor: Florence Bourgne. Presses Paris Sorbonne. p. 4. ISBN9782840505594. serpent's [dragon's] breath, charm of death and life, thy spell of making
^"Excalibur". Variety. 31 December 1980. Retrieved 17 July 2014.
^Axmaker, Sean. "Excalibur". Parallax View. Retrieved 19 March 2011.
^Lazarus, David (7 September 2000). "Excalibur". Salon. Salon.com. Retrieved 17 July 2014.
^Elsholz, Jean-Marc (3 March 2011). "Elucidations: Bringing to Light the Aesthetic Underwriting of the Matière de Bretagne in John Boorman's Excalibur". In Carruthers, Leo; Chai-Elsholz, Raeleen; Silec, Tatjana (eds.). Palimpsests and the Literary Imagination of Medieval England. New York: Palgrave Macmillan. pp. 205–26. ISBN978-0230100268.
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