Mark Twain's book had already inspired "a Yank at Oxford";both this movie and Tay Garnett's feature a gorgeous lady:Vivien Leigh in the former,Rhonda Fleming in the latter.
What a good idea to have the characters speak old English!For once ,it's not the easy way out.The myth of the Knights of the Round Table is given a rough ride:Merlin becomes the villain probably for the first and last time in the history of cinema,the fair knights shows a tendency to embroider the truth and to "invent" their exploits,king Arthur is an old white -bearded man who never stops sneezing and Lancelot is not even handsome. No Guinevere either.Unlike in "Brigadoon" ,in the Middle Ages ,they made it rough all over the place
The Yank has to expend a lot of energy and boundless ingenuity to escape from the stake and the block;the eclipse trick was also used by Hergé in the adventures of Tintin " Le Temple Du Soleil" aka "prisoners of the sun" which Spielberg will transfer to the screen in the years to come.The prologue and the epilogue make two of the characters "travel in time" without a machine .The colors are splendid and the best song is the last one who has this sublime line " trying to find things NOT to do".Good entertainment .
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