I love me some medieval fantasy so this movie was a no-brainer. Not knowing the source material that the movie was based on, I felt I had the opportunity to witness something that I’d cherish forever. The trailer for this movie was one of compelling drama with sophisticated direction behind it. After about an hour I realized that the direction was green and my knight had been wasted. Without further ado, lets meet back in a year and I’ll tell you how I feel about this movie.

Gawain played by Dev Patel, is the nephew of King Arthur. He wants to prove to his uncle that he can be a great knight and accepts the titular character’s challenge of striking him down. The caveat of doing so is that he must allow the Green Knight to return the blow in one years time.

So like a reasonable person and as not to end his own life, Gawain simply cuts the Green Knights cheek with a flesh wound. Just kidding, he chops his head clean off, receiving much respect from his fellow lords in the process. So quickly enough, the movie gets going, which I always appreciate.

At first, Gawain is loving his new found fame. Slowly does it begin to dawn on him that he has to die for his temporary fame. Being a knight is his dream, and to fulfill his duty of being brave, he must visit the Green Knight and fulfill his side of the agreement.

I like this plot point a lot because it’s very similar to a drunken night out. You do and say things, that you wouldn’t normally do because its all in the heat of the moment. Then, the next day comes, and you might have to answer for those actions. That’s how the movie starts to play out. He wants to be brave, he acts as if he is, but we can see that he’s scared beneath it all. A very human moment and the film portrays this through isolated shots of Gawain and a quiet score/little dialogue.

This is where I feel the film kind of takes artistic measures and begins to either detract or enhance the lore of the original story. He ventures out to find the Green Chapel, which is the residence of the Green Knight, so that he can fulfill his side of the arrangement. On his way he meets a scavenger pretending to be the brother of a victim to King Arthurs army. Gawain, after witnessing the destruction that his side has caused, is avoiding comforting the boy. He chooses to use the boy for the location of the Green Chapel and only offers him a single gold coin in return. (Which is stingy in this world)

As he moves closer, we realize that the boy has set him up and attacks him from behind and steals his horse and belongings. It’s here where the experimental visuals start to take over the film. While Gawain is hogtied, the camera does a 360 around the forest, turning back to a skeleton hogtied in his place. The camera then snaps back to Gawain hogtied, as if he saw his future, and he untangles himself using a sword (why the thieves left his sword behind is bad writing).

He then moves on to an abandoned house, to which he sleeps in the master bedroom. A woman wakes him and instead of kicking him out, offers him the chance to find her head. The spirit reveals her head is at the bottom of the lake next to the house. Gawain asks what she would do in return for her lost head, and when she refuses to answer, he dives in anyway. The woman reveals that the Green Knight had previously been there. Symbolically foretelling Gawain’s fate at the end.

Then Gawain meets a fox and they bro down, leading to a pointless scene of them walking amongst giants, to which something happens and Gawain passes out. Awakened by a man, a blind women, and a woman played by the same actress as his girlfriend, they all shelter him until the date of his confrontation with the Green Knight. In return for passage to the Green Chapel along with free food, Gawain agrees to give the man whatever he receives in their house. An odd request, and no, the food he receives doesn’t count, but Gawain agrees. Slowly the woman makes a move on him to which Gawain tries to stay away. A true knight wouldn’t make a move on such a mans wife(?). Yet he crumbles to the pressure and does something with the woman and admits to her that he is scared of his fate.

She takes his virginity (basically) and offers him a green sash that would keep him safe from any combat. Scared, Gawain takes the sash. Then the woman reveals to him that he is no true knight because of their sexual relations and him trying to cheat his way out of death. Flustered and embarrassed, Gawain flees the home, only to meet the man of the house (in the woods). The man asks for what he received in the house, to which Gawain claims he received nothing. The man kisses him, revealing that he knew that Gawain received affection but no mention of the green sash. Which, I’ll make a joke about this later on lol.

So off to the Green Knights Chapel with his impervious green sash. He waits for the Knight, and as he rises and prepares himself to strike, Gawain quivers and runs away back home. Upon his return to Camelot, he is pronounced king, and lives a bleak but compelling life. One day, after losing his son and being ridiculed by his subjects, the door to his throne room is sieged by his enemies. In that moment, he takes off his green sash and is transported back in time to the Green Knights Chapel. He takes off the sash there and the Green Knight commends him for his honor, and the movie fades to black before the final blow is dealt.

Okay, so that’s the general plot elements, so what does it mean, and was it any good? I personally liked the movie. I wouldn’t recommend it to a general audience but to those that appreciate subtle story telling and medieval settings, I think its a no brainer.

The movie is trying to talk about death and how we avoid it, yet eventually succumb to it anyway. Death is not the enemy in this movie. Living without morals is. Yet we can’t have morals without ever testing them through conflict. So, while we all appreciate being a good person, it’s impossible to know who we are until faced with great adversity. How much are you willing to sacrifice to hold on to your morals? That’s my interpretation at least.

The big question is, does he live or die at the end of the movie? The book lore is that he is allowed to live by the Green Knight and goes on to be a great knight under King Arthur. This movie, however, I feel is a little bit different. I personally believe that he has to die in order for him to earn the moral at the end. If he is allowed to live, despite failing just about every challenge, I don’t think that creates a lasting feeling with the viewer. If he was wrong, came to terms with himself and paid the ultimate price, I think his arc would be complete and the lesson justified.

Gawain is a nice guy but he doesn’t really incapsulate what a knight should be in my opinion. He’s outsmarted by people, fortunate to live the life he does, and overall comes across as a poser trying to convince the world he’s capable. When he fails, he is given another opportunity. It felt like a game on easy mode, with Gawain replaying levels until he gets it right.

The movie is probably 30 minutes too long. It’s only 2 hours but even then its padded by nature and imaging shots. I didn’t hate them but there were far too many. The movie was trying to be deep but I felt that it only came up to my shins. The best parts are the anticipation that the Green Knight would resurface (which doesn’t happen until the end) and the creepy mood that the director gets right. My major critique is that for all the creepy set up, it never truly pays off.

Okay so when the man asks Gawain to give him whatever he receives in the house, the man takes a kiss from him. Gawain doesn’t really kiss the girl for one, and for two, he doesn’t give the kiss to the man. The man takes it. That’s not the agreement. He doesn’t give back the sash either. The funny part that I was thinking of is that the woman gives Gawain a hand job and so to fulfill the agreement, I found it funny to imagine our hero jerking the man off in the woods. That’s the knight that King Arthur deserves lol.

It’s clear to me that the trials along the way were all the Green Knight’s doing. The boy mentions the Green Chapel, then after its revealed that he lied about its location, he relays that the Green Chapel is all around them. I took this to mean that his interactions from then on will be subject to the Green Knights magic. So, the Green Knight robbed Gawain, kissed him, jerked him off, and then made him collect what would be his own head to spook him. Pretty funny in a sick, twisted, way.

Anyway, it’s a weird movie featuring odd cinematography, subtle acting, blurry morals and hidden meanings. If you’re a normal person, you’d probably get the ‘do the right thing’ moral, but to see anything past that, you might need a few viewings and a lot of mental gymnastics.