Home :: DVD :: Classics  

Action & Adventure
Boxed Sets
Comedy
Drama
General
Horror
International
Kids & Family
Musicals
Mystery & Suspense
Sci-Fi & Fantasy
Silent Films
Television
Westerns
Camelot

Camelot

List Price: $19.98
Your Price: $15.98
Product Info Reviews

<< 1 2 3 4 5 6 >>

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Goofy and silly sometimes...but it makes you smile.
Review: Now...i'm not going to say that this movie is Oscar worthy or anything of the sort...it isn't. But what it is is wonderfully enjoyable and fun to watch. The music is absolutely wonderful ("If ever I would leave you" is beautiful) and the sets and costumes are great. True, this is not exactly in the class with all the other Oscar winners...but its good fun, and the story is classic...what more could you ask for?

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: "Camelot" glows, shimmers and soars!
Review: This movie on DVD is a glorious achievement. It looks better now than it ever did in the theaters! When "Camelot" hit the roadshow movie circuit back in 1967, Warner Brothers hoped it would equal the success of "My Fair Lady" produced three years earlier. Critics were unkind, in general. In particular, the direction of Joshua Logan has been singled out as doing the most damage. Logan, a genius on Broadway, had very little success as a director of movie musicals. "South Pacific", in particular, might well be a movie masterpiece had it been directed by George Cukor or Vincente Minnelli. Nevertheless, "Camelot" had some splendid production values, a strong performance by Richard Harris as Arthur and the luminescent presence of Vanessa Redgrave. What is striking about the DVD presentation is the crystal clarity of the photographed images -- I've seen this movie many times and it never looked this wonderful before. The photography is sumptuous, the art direction (of which many words were deservedly written) is astounding and the musical presentation of the Lerner-Loewe score may well be the best adaptation of any score in the history of motion pictures. A bonus for music lovers -- and fans of Alfred Newman, the composer/conductor genius who adapted this film (as well as "South Pacific," "The King and I" and "Carousel") -- is that the entire score is isolated for players with 5.1CH capability. Not only is it isolated, but it is without solo vocals. All you hear is underscore and chorus. Best of all, the music does not increase/decrease in volume (because it underscored someone talking) as many such isolated scores do. There are some effects on the isolated tracks, notably the clanking of chain mail and swords. It will always be regrettable that the script shortened names to Lance and Jenny and offered so many opportunities to Arthur to say them. Lamentable is the blue eye shadow Arthur wears, as well as his direct address to the audience during "I Wonder What the King is Doing Tonight." Blame Logan. It does not diminish the splendor of this film on DVD -- it's ravishing.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: A True Classic
Review: For those of you looking to explore the range of human emotion in a simpler time, this movie will not disappoint you. The film has everything; romance,love,lust,betrayal,murder,greed, and a cast of the most concincing actors. Richard Harris is a most splendid King Arthur, portraying a gentle, strong, and wise man. Vanessa Redgrave gives Queen Gweniviere a playful, even lovable nature despite the destruction she brings to the Court. Franco Nero is the male perfected. His Sir Lancelot has been lusted after by many women over the years, due no doubt to his dashing good looks and incredibly intoxicating french accent. I first saw this film in 1968 at a theatre in Houston, Texas and was hooked immediately. The music alone will stir your soul and cause you to reflect on your own past loves. Many are the days in which you will find yourself mindlessly humming one or more of the provocative songs from this picture. This is one of the finest examples of musical moviemaking in the history of film. I truly hope that you enjoy it as much as I have over the years.

Rating: 2 stars
Summary: a dismal disappointment
Review: Is it that eleven songs are two few for a three-hour movie musical or does this only seem so wordy because Richard Harris as King Arthur mostly and Vanessa Redgrave as Queen Guinevere to a significant extent talk their songs? Do they talk their songs because neither one can really sing? (For that matter neither can Franco Nero as Sir Lancelot.) Is it also because none of three principals can really sing that they spend all their moments on screen furiously gesticulating, by way of compensation? (I remember thinking, "If Nero nods his head once more, I'm going to slap him." He was not deterred.) Regrave tries so very hard to look cute; Nero tries so very hard to look ernest; Harris seems to think he's acting a Shakespearian tragedy, bellowing banal bits of dialogue that can't bear the strain--as he hops about the stage. (He's wearing far too much eye make-up, by the way. He looks like a man in drag.) So the singing is awful, and the acting is obnoxious and smarmy. As if that weren't enough, Alan Jay Lerner's screenplay adaptation is riddled with holes, and director Joshua Logan thinks every other song needs to be adorned with MTV-like relentlessly spliced footage.

What's to do? Read "The Once and Future King" and listen to the Original Cast Broadway album version of "Camelot"--or buy the score, and sing the songs yourself.)

Rating: 2 stars
Summary: Slow, Weak
Review: If you are among those enchanted by everything relating to the legends of King Arthur, you will no doubt enjoy this screen adaptation of the famous stage play. The rest, however, will find little enjoy in this rather slow and frequently pretentious film which consistently implies more than it ever delivers. A remarkable cast is largely wasted, the famous score is performed with the smallest modicum of acceptable skill, and the story itself moves at the pace of drug-addicted turtle.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Far superior acting
Review: Some critics claim the Richard Burtoon/Julie Andrews stage version is better? No way. I've heard the soundtrack to the play and it is just that, a play. Burton shouts out the words (to be heard in a theatre setting), over-gestures, and you can't see the faces up close. The songs in the film are ACTED. The film version zooms in on our heroes' dynamic features and subtle glances. Superb acting from Harris and Redgrave. Nero is heroically handsome. When the queen drops to her knee before Lancelot my heart lept to my throat. I LOVE this movie!

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Drama tops everything
Review: I enjoyed this movie. It seems to pale in comparison with the play, but i never saw the play, so I viewed it without anything to compare it to. I thought it was good. The songs were good, though not great or espicially memorable (they seem to have been better in the play), the sets and costumes were good, and many of the performances, espicially Richard Harris', were great. Harris sings well (assuming he wasn't dubbed), he's great at playing the boy-turned-king, though he looks 40 (he was 35), and he handles the film's drama perfectly. Vanessa Redgrave is good, too, easily turning from innocent bride to flirtatious married woman to passionate lover. And it's quite obvious that, even though she saves her passion for Lancelot, she still loves Arthur. Franco Nero isn't as good, but he's suitably passionate. (Whose idea was it to have Lancelot and Guenivere making love in the pool? They wouldn't have done it, just like they wouldn't have done most of the "loverly" things shown, and the scene in the pool's too From Here to Eternity!) Over everything tops the film's dramatic scenes, the ones in which Arthur confronts the love between his wife and best friend, both of whom he loves and both of whom love him. As I've said, Harris really shines here, really showing us his character's torment. Redgrave holds her own, too, espicially in the scene where she cries at the thought of never seeing Arthur's forgiving eyes again. Maybe it would have been better if they'd cast Richard Burton and made better use of the songs, and it would have been interesting seeing Julie Andrews have an extramarital affair, given as how she was still considered sugary-sweet at the time. Still, this movie was good.

Rating: 3 stars
Summary: I was displeased with this film
Review: I prefer fiction. I wanted something to do with the sword. I mean come on, were talking about excalibur here! The greatest sword there ever was. I prefer either a mystical movie such as Legend, or an action movie like DieHard. That's what I thought about it anyway.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: great story, great music, great epic
Review: The film was remastered and hearing it on a AC-3 system is like watching it in 70mm with magnetic sound the way movies were once produced. It was great. The only thing that i don't like is why do they have to keep the word "Overture" at the beginning, are people really that stupid that they wouldn't know? There is no need for that, just a black screen with the music is all you need.

Rating: 3 stars
Summary: Widescreen version best available
Review: As with CAROUSEL, not many people liked the film version of CAMELOT. There were some superb actors in the cast, but only competent acting. The singing - in a "natural" style - toned down the grand tragedy aspect and as much confused audiences as alienated them. On initial viewing, the story and the songs are moving and impressive, but this is not a film that stands up to repeated viewings. The sets and costumes are singularly stunning - a combination of primitive and an emerging gold and jewel-encrusted aristocracy on the rise. The wide-screen version is the definitive one to own in that at least the grandeur of the spectacle and sweep of the action fill the eyes and ears when the dramatic content of a scene lets us down. Harris and Redgrave are quite fine. Nero can neither act nor sing but is a pretty Lancelot. Hemmings makes the most of his brief role as the destructive Mordred. This was Alfred Newman/Ken Darby's last scoring job for films and it won him his last Oscar. Also Oscared for Art Direction and Costumes. Additional nom for Cinematography. Worth seeing and even owning - but not one of the great film adaptations of a stage classic.


<< 1 2 3 4 5 6 >>

© 2004, ReviewFocus or its affiliates