20 - Towards a Modern Reception of the Lancelot-Grail Cycle

Summary

The large number of films either inspired by Arthurian themes (modern in scope) or drawn more closely from Arthurian works of literature is testimony to the continuing power of the Arthurian legends to fascinate and inspire, in the true spirit of the medieval tradition of continuation. The change of medium is not restricted to feature films, since television producers have adapted the cinematic art to the small screen with serializations and made-for-television movies. Kevin Harty lists 564 medieval movies produced since the first film was made in 1897, two years after the Lumière brothers invented the medium, to the present day, and a total of 79 Arthurian movies, the earliest of which were French. But if the sheer quantity of output is evidence of the modern vitality of the medium, a rapid breakdown of the films reveals that the English-speaking world has a proprietary hold, and in the words of a recent author, ‘overall quality does not seem to be on the upswing in Arthurian films.’ The medieval sources most frequently exploited for Arthurian film, insofar as sources can be adduced, tend to be of anglophone origin, especially Malory's Death of Arthur, but the Perceval story, based on Chrétien de Troyes's Le Conte du Graal or Wolfram von Eschenbach's Parzival, the Tristan and Isolde story, and Le Chevalier de la Charrette also have their place. Medieval Arthurian literature sprang from a common Celtic heritage – the matter of Brittany as well as Britain – which was actively exploited at a time when the English court's official language was the Norman variety of French, but in the domain of film, there is a linguistic and cultural divide. Anglophone directors understandably have a predilection for the English medieval tradition, French directors tend to take the French tradition, and German directors the German tradition, but it has been suggested that anglophone audiences view the Arthurian legends through a different lens from that of francophone audiences because of historically-determined differences in cultural perception. For native English speakers, King Arthur is not only a literary figure but also a historical figure, and this linkage influences the significance they would attach to Arthurian legends.