8/10
A very, very good knights movie. In fact it´s excellent.
25 August 1999
I didn´t knew this was made as a television series. If it was, certainly doesn´t show, at least in the version i have on video. I don´t know what editing was done here, but it certainly works just fine.

This might look like a B movie, (and most certain it is), but in my view this story didn´t needed any more production values to be told. If this would look more produced, certainly it would have lost all his authentic look and feel and it would look like another knights movie, (or should i say, unrealistic adventures with knights, american movie)

PALADINI is just fine the way it looks, because it manages to create a very accurate depiction of the days it tries to portrait. And i live in the exact same area of the globe where those types of events occurred, 700 years ago more or less. The type of situations depicted in PALADINI are a part of the History in my country Portugal, (more exactly in the region where i live the Algarve), as well as they are part of Spain and the south of France.

I really like the story in PALADINI. It seems taken out of one of the many legends and historical events that i know from my History classes back in high school. True it´s a simple story, but many times these are the best, and this movie didn´t needed more to be a good depiction of those days of the Arabic invasions to the south of Europe a long time ago.

As a knights movie is probably my favorite ever. I liked EXCALIBUR for example (and it´s truly a superior movie), but it always feels a bit artificial. Specially when compared to the looks in PALADINI, which couldn´t feel more historically correct.

So, i don´t know, how many versions of PALADINI are out there, but the one i have is certainly very good, and it doesn´t feels like a television work at all.

Maybe people are mistaking the lack of an american style in this, for a bad B movie, wich it isn´t. It´s just European comercial cinema. And a very good one.

My version runs for about 100 minutes, by the way and i advise everyone to find it, if you want to finaly see a movie in which knights are depicted with a realistic feel. There aren´t even good guys and bad guys in this movie. just persons who live in a dangerous time.

An excellent movie.
11 out of 14 found this helpful. Was this review helpful? Sign in to vote.
Permalink

Recently Viewed