2001 – A Knight's Tale

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A Knight’s Tale is one of those movies that you see on TV, and it’s just different enough that you’ll go ahead and watch it. It is also my best friend’s first DVD he ever owned, which made it one we watched many times over, over the years. Heath Ledger’s acting is good, and Alan Tudyk and Mark Addy have many great lines throughout the movie. But one of the reasons I love this movie is Paul Bettany’s portrayal of “Geoff” Chaucer.

Geoffrey Chaucer: the father of English literature. Chaucer is the fourteenth century author most famous for The Canterbury Tales is portrayed in A Knight’s Tale as fairly care free, and free-wheeling. Despite living well into his fifties, Geoffry Chaucer never finished The Canterburty Tales, but this movie plays on that concept by giving a re-telling or perhaps an alternate telling of The Knight’s Tale in the Canterbury Tales. Through the movie, “Geoff” is not the main character, but is rather just someone the main ensemble encounters, and he stays with their group and gains inspiration from them. You are to believe that these events unfolded in his younger life and inspired him to write The Canterbury Tales.

It’s fun, it mashes up modern and middle-ages in a way that is simply enjoyable. There aren’t the kinds of plot twists that make you think hard, there aren’t multiple simultaneous story lines, there isn’t even complex character development. It’s a very “what you see is what you get” kind of movie that moves quite linearly and doesn’t pretend to be anything than a funny adventure with a side of romance and a guaranteed happy ending. The characters are likeable, the soundtrack brings in that modern flare, and the visuals really are quite appealing to the eye.

All in all A Knight’s Tale is easy to watch, passes the time quickly, and is always good for a few laughs. It’s a good movie for a Sunday afternoon when there’s little else to do, but because of my long history with it, and having seen it so many times, I thought it deserved a nice mention here as one of those movies you should see if you haven’t.