Overrated

A Masterpiece!

This is one of the few movies I've ever seen where the whole audience broke into spontaneous, loud applause a third of the way in.

Strong acting helps the film overcome an uncertain premise and create characters that hold our attention absolutely.

(Possible Spoilers) As a fan of the eye-filling costume spectacle, I don't expect deep thoughts and careful characterization. I can even tolerate minor anachronisms. However, the story and the actions of the characters still need to make some sense, and that is where "The Black Knight" begins to fall apart.Several enormous castles are shown in this story, which implies a violent society requiring serious defenses. However, the castle of the hero's amour is invaded by Viking cavalry—horned helmets and all!—who ride in without significant resistance. There do not even appear to be any sentries watching for trouble; everyone is chowing down at the dinner table.The Vikings trash the place, and upon their retreat, the hero pursues their leader a few fields distant…to Camelot. In fact, all of the locations seem to be a horse-gallop away from each other, which is convenient, and easy on the horses.Returning to the ruined castle (thehero does a lot of to-ing and fro-ing along the same wooded trail. The horses must know the way.) the hero finds his former lord in a demented state, with only his daughter, the hero's would-be amour caring for him. The place is a smoldering pile of smoking debris; does the hero take the surviving pair to Camelot where they at least will have shelter and something to eat? NO!!! He leaves them there amid the ruins! What a guy! There are other lapses like this.There are some deeply strange scenes, most notably Stonehenge full of dancing pagans bringing Margaret Murray's theories to life. The hero—who in the course of a week or so learns all the fighting arts of a knight—disguised as The Black Knight, rescues his amour from pagan sacrifice. I must have dozed off, because she was wearing a wig as a would-be sacrifice, and I have no recollection why she was wearing the wig.King Arthur is miserably stupid in this movie, and there is no Guinevere. The Bad Guy is Sir Palomides, a Saracen knight who DID appear in some of the Arthur stories, but he wasn't in league with renegade Cornishmen or crazed Stonehenge pagans. Peter Cushing is fun to watch in this role.I love secret passages, and this movie has one roomy enough for the hero to run through! Following the passage, he eavesdrops on conspirators. Perhaps he is hard of hearing, because he doesn't just listen; he opens up a secret panel allowing nearly a full-length view of him with the Evildoers five feet away! The movie goes on and on and on—can someone tell me what a bunch of armed horsemen are going to do to attack a castle? And why the castle archers expose themselves to enemy fire? The painting of Camelot is a fantasy medieval castle on steroids. It is enormous, but we never see much of the interior. I would hate to have to pay the heating/air conditioning bills.The helmets of Arthur's knights are strange…possibly inspired by the helmets of the Teutonic Knights in "Alexander Nevsky." Just like Zorro, our hero sheds his Simple Blacksmith Clothes for the (unique) short-sleeved armor et alia of The Black Knight—more aptly The Big Black Bird Knight. He stashes his horse somewhere out of sight, too. Unlike Zorro, he does not have a plausible hidey hole for his changing room and horsekeeping headquarters. He just appears and rides for the next castle.Except for the crowns, which look like the paper crowns Burger King gives away, none of this looks cheap, but the writing and acting sink any chance this movie had. The Faux Old Timey English grates on the brain. Alan Ladd doesn't help.It is all exhausting, watching all the going back and forth between various castles and other hangouts. I think I would have found this one annoying when I was ten years old.

1954's "The Black Knight" marked the coming out for Peter Cushing's screen career, his top villain Sir Palamides outshining Alan Ladd's miscast hero John, serving King Mark of Cornwall (Patrick Troughton) as they perform their pagan misdeeds disguised as Vikings in trying to overthrow King Arthur (Anthony Bushell) and Christianity. In just his second feature, Harry Andrews appears all too briefly as the Earl of Yeonil, but Andre Morell shines as Sir Ontzlake, who teaches John the skills he needs to win, but to wait until they can confirm the treachery of the sly Palamides (actors Bryan Forbes and Dennis O'Keefe are credited with 'additional dialogue'). Wearing earrings, hair carefully curled, bearing a faintly Arabian accent that makes each line a cherished treasure, the bearded Cushing is a menacing, awesome sight, his blue eyes accentuated by his dark skin, certainly a match for his idol Basil Rathbone in either "The Adventures of Robin Hood" or "The Mark of Zorro." For an actor who loved Westerns and derring do, this would remain a cherished role that Christopher Lee would get to play far more often. This was only the first of six times that Cushing would be paired with Andre Morell, most memorably as Holmes and Watson in 1958's "The Hound of the Baskervilles." Like Cushing a future Dr. Who, Patrick Troughton was so prolific on television that he rarely strayed from horror on screen, working again opposite his evil cohort in both "The Gorgon" and "Frankenstein and the Monster from Hell." Though best remembered as an actor (appearing with Boris Karloff in both "Five Star Final" and "The Ghoul"), Anthony Bushell later directed Christopher Lee in 1960's "The Terror of the Tongs" (previously appearing with Lee in 1957's "Bitter Victory").

Ah the swords and shields movie, a once thriving genre of film from yore where big bucks was thrown at the productions, and spectacle was unleashed. There were one or two exceptions, mind...Directed by Tay Garnett, produced by Irving Allen and Albert R. Broccoli and starring Alan Ladd, Peter Cushing and a whole host of British thespians lining up for some costume shenanigans. Story is a reworking of Arthurian England, with Ladd as a brave blacksmith who reinvents himself as the Black Knight to foil a dastard plan to overthrow King Arthur, and of course to impress the Lady Linet (Patricia Medina) who he has the major hots for. Sword play, fights, swinging about, jousts and Royal machinations do follow.In the context of its budget it's hardly the awful stinker some have lined up to proclaim it as. Oh it definitely has problems, not the least that Ladd is badly miscast and Medina just isn't good enough, but there's a great sense of fun about the whole thing. One only has to look at Cushing's performance as the villainous Sir Palamides, he's having a great old time of it prancing about in tights and smothered in so much make-up he looks like a Satsuma! If you can get into Cushing's mindset then there's fun to be had here, intentionally or otherwise!It's very colourful, costuming is impressive and with Garnett the wise old pro not wasting any chance for an action scene - or to encourage his male cast members into macho posturing - it's never dull. True, the editing is shoddy, the script (Alec Coppel) poor and some of the choreography is amateurish, but this is medieval malarkey 101. A film for the forgiving genre fan whose after a simple hour and half of robust swordery and chastity belt tamperings. 6/10

I liked it only because I fancy swords and medieval armor. However, you're not going to learn anything factual nor fascinating about medieval combat here unlike in Robert Taylor's Ivanhoe or Knights of the Round Table.The character portrayed by Alan Ladd wears an abbreviated armor eschewing the greaves and other gear to protect the legs and arms. Save for the breastplate and chain mail (short sleeved at that!), there is little to suggest that he wears authentic knightly armor. Even his helmet covers only the top of his face (no doubt to display his handsome features.) Robocop is the same way. The reason for the light armor becomes apparent when Ladd performs acrobatics in combat unlikely to have been part of a knight's dueling or battle paces. Robert Wagner in Prince Valiant does similar things.The heroic Black Knight is actually a commoner and thus barred from bearing knightly arms and so has to keep his identity secret.The villains are a Saracen knight (Peter Cushing) allied with Cornishmen. Why the people of Cornwall who are as British as the English? Beats me.Cushing gives a luscious performance as a baddie. His quip after humiliating the blacksmith Alan Ladd before his lady love (Patricia Medina) is memorable. After failing to egg the meek Alan Ladd into fighting him, he turns to Patricia saying: "Please pardon this shameful exhibition."The photography and location shots are excellent.