Talk about "Tristan & Isolde" here:
Review by: Breanne Derby
Plot Summary
Based on the classic medieval legend, Tristan & Isolde is about a young couple (James Franco and Sophia Myles) who, much like Romeo and Juliet are living out a forbidden love. Not only are they from opposing countries in a war (
England and Ireland), but Isolde eventually marries King Marke (Rufus Sewell), the man who has acted as Tristan's surrogate father since he was a young child, and moves to England to live in the castle with Marke and Tristan. Will Tristan & Isolde be able to cast their love aside, or will they end up committing a crime which they cannot make up for?
Review
It was very interesting to see the immense differences between the film and the folk-tale I know. There were numerous inconsistant characters and many little pieces of information that were dissimilar (for example, in the story I've heard, King Marke was Tristan's uncle.) I'm sure that there are many different versions of this tale, and whether or not it really happened, and what facts are accurate is more than likely up for debate.
Tristan & Isolde is definitely a "date movie". All of the other people in the theatre were divided into couples; many of them had their tongues down each other's throats before the previews were finished. The row in front of me was filled with people on a quintuple date (a.k.a. five girls who wanted to watch this love story and dragged their whipped boyfriends along). Surprisingly enough, there were parts of this film that the boyfriends liked much more than the girlfriends.
There were several battle scenes throughout the film. The English and the Irish (or what would later be the English and the Irish, as during this time they were still divided into tribes and etc.) were at war. There were numerous battle scenes throughout the film, one very early on in the beginning to jumpstart things, and one close to the very end to wind things down. During these scenes (as well as the many between them) it was very nearly impossible to tell what was going on. The cameras were handled in such a jerky and fast-moving way in order to make the viewer feel as though they were actually in the battle, that the viewer misses what actually happened during the battle due to an acute case of motion sickness.
There were also a number of times throughout the film when Tristan would have some sort of item or etc. and it was never explained where it came from. At one point in the film, Tristan just gets on a saddled and bridled horse that happened to be conveniently where he was (in the middle of nowhere with no people around) and he rides away.
The most disappointing factor of this film was that as a member of the audience, I did not feel connected to the characters at all. They were all built quite shallowly. All Tristan ever did was look sullen (which, I suppose fits his name well considering that it means "melancholy"); all Isolde ever did was mope. The characters had no depth and no personality outside of their supposed all-encompassing-love for one another.The actors didn't seem to meld well with one another on screen, and the passion they were supposed to express was nonexistent.
Conclusion
This really wasn't a very good movie. I probably wouldn't watch it again. What with the unfeeling actors and the fight scenes where the viewer might as well have been blind, it didn't leave much room to be a good film. Comparing this film to the legend I'd heard in the past showed it to be quite inaccurate, but it's difficult to say whether this is just an alternate version of the legend, or was made up entirely.
