Official Synopsis:
For Honor. For Love. For Camelot. From director Jerry Zucker (Ghost) and writer William Nicholson (Gladiator) comes an original and compelling vision of King Arthur's Camelot. Lancelot (Richard Gere) is both a fighter and a lover. While traipsing aimlessly through England winning senseless battles, he finds himself saving the beautiful soon-to-be Queen of Camelot, Guinevere (Julia Ormond), from a kidnapping and is permanently smitten. When fate brings Lancelot to Camelot, he once again falls under Guinevere's spell and also finds a true life ally in King Arthur, played by Academy Award winner Sean Connery (Best Supporting Actor, 1987, The Untouchables). Once Lancelot is ultimately made a knight of the round table by Arthur, the plot thickens when a tender moment shared between Guinevere and Lancelot threatens to destroy Camelot entirely. Critics have hailed First Knight as "spectacular entertainment..." with "... all the elements of a crowd-pleaser."

  
Our Take:
I remember when First Knight came out in theaters; it was supposed to be a blockbuster summer smash. With Richard Gere, Sean Connery, and then-hot Julia Ormond in the cast, what could go wrong, right? Then the film came out, it was lambasted by critics, largely ignored by audiences, and has pretty much fallen off the cultural radar since. So I’m not sure what prompted Sony to create a new Special Edition DVD of the film, but here it is.

To be honest, I don’t think the film is really all that bad. There are some really enjoyable moments in it. The main problem is that it’s just not sure what kind of movie it wants to be. Fun, rollicking action adventure? Deep romantic drama? Honor-and-swords epic? In trying to be too many things at once, First Knight fails to find its own identity, and that’s why it doesn’t entirely work. But for my money, there are some really great moments in the film. It’s a shame that it couldn’t have come together a bit more and turned into a really great entry in the annals of Arthurian legend on film.

So what makes this edition so special? Well, the following bonus features are included, all of which are new to this DVD:

* Audio Commentary - With director Jerry Zucker and producer Hunt Lowry.
* Arthurian Legend Commentary – An academic discusses the more, well, academic aspects of the movie.
* The Quest For Camelot: Making-of First Knight (19 minutes) – A largely promotional making-of featurette.
* In Shining Armor: Knights in Training (19 minutes) – Focuses on the fight sequences.
* The Creation of a Kingdom (18 minutes) – A look at the film’s production design.

* Deleted Scenes (8 minutes) – Three excised scenes.

Love triangle movies are always a hit or miss proposition for me, and more often than not, they miss. First Knight suffers from that a bit. It would be easier to empathize with Julia Ormond’s Guinevere if she wasn’t cheating on King-freaking-Arthur! It’s not some womanizing, drunken lout that she’s stepping out on, but the most noble man in the land. That type of triangle always leads to mixed emotions, and I contend that films based in that conflict will never be 100% satisfactory. Still, for all its flaws First Knight isn’t a bad film, it just never equals the sum of its parts.

Overall Picture:
Movie: B-
DVD: B

- Mike Spring

Editor