![]() ![]() Of course, we had to have a Shakespearean movie on our list, so we went straight to where every film fan goes when they hear Shakespeare, Kenneth Branagh. This is the quintessential Arthurian movie, directed by John Boorman and starring Helen Mirren, Nigel Terry, Gabriel Byrne, Liam Neeson, and Patrick Stewart. Not for the faint of heart.Īn often overlooked but highly regarded 80’s epic, Excalibur boasts a stellar cast and excellent production values.Įxploring the myth of King Arthur, the Knights of the Round Table and Merlin is a lavish and spectacular feature, played straight down the line, blurring the more mystical elements with a real sense of history. Almost ethereal in its presentation and filled with plenty of Eggers’ dream-like cinematography, this film was lost on its release but has garnered a solid fan base since then.ĭark, brooding, violent, and tinged with the supernatural, this evocative dive into the quest of Prince Amleth is both mesmerizing and haunting. The Northman (2022)ĭirector Robert Eggers brings his sense of imagery and atmosphere to this rollicking savage tale of vengeance and redemption. Partly inspired by the Canterbury Tales, this is a charming and entertaining film that plays fast and loose with its context, but we forgive it as it’s all done with flair and fun. In this light-hearted entry, he plays William Hatcher, a young squire who is, in turn, playing a knight who manages to fake it till he makes it in a series of jousting tournaments. This historical romp was an early film for the sadly missed Heath Ledger and helped propel him into Hollywood stardom. (films: Nibelungen Films, 1924, 1966, 2004)ĩ.10 Best Medieval Movies You Must Watch 10. (films: Condottieri, Luther, and Alexander Nevsky) The Birth of the Leader from the Collective ![]() (films: The Da Vinci Code, A Canterbury Tale, The Name of the Rose)ħ. ![]() (films: The Hunchback of Notre Dame, Copernicus, and The Adventures of Don Quixote) (films: The Secret of Kells, The Passion of Joan of Arc, Pope Joan, and Sign of the Pagan) (films: Hamlet, Lady Venus and her Devil, Dreamship Surprise, Abelard, Joan of Arc, Ferryman Maria, and The Immortal Heart) ![]() (films: Golem, Hard to Be a God, Waxworks, The Seventh Seal, and Siegfried) Filming the Middle Ages pays special attention to medieval animated and detective films and provactively demonstrates that the invention of cinema itself is considered a return to the Middle Ages by many film theorists and film makers.įilming the Middle Ages is ideal reading for medievalists with a stake in the contemporary and film scholars with an interest in the distant past. As Bildhauer explains, both art house films like The Seventh Seal and The Passion of Joan of Arc and popular films like Beowulf or The Da Vinci Code cleverly use the Middle Ages to challenge modern ideas of historical progress, to find alternatives to a print-dominated culture, and even to question what makes us human. Bildhauer provides incisive new interpretations of classics like Murnau’s Faust and Eisenstein’s Alexander Nevsky, and she rediscovers some forgotten works like Douglas Sirk’s Sign of the Pagan and Asta Nielsen’s Hamlet. In this groundbreaking account of film history, Bettina Bildhauer shows how from the earliest silent films to recent blockbusters, medieval topics and plots have played an important but overlooked role in the development of cinema.įilming the Middle Ages is the first book to define medieval films as a group and trace their history from silent film in Weimar Germany to Hollywood and then to recent European co-productions. ![]()
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