CRAZY KNIGHTS: THREE OFF-KILTER MEDIEVAL MOVIES

You silly, English, bedwetting types.

There have been films about medieval times since the beginning of film. Knights have managed to stay popular into modern times. You will find more sets of toy knights in a toy store over the once popular toy cowboys. The films, usually, fall into the categories of Arthurian legend, Chaucer based, Sir Walter Scott based, and historically accurate (read: boring).

I've selected three films, two from the 70s and one from 2001 that uses rock songs from the 70s, that veer off from the typical medieval film into their own little kingdoms.

He told them about how he wanted to try a threesome.

1. TORTURE DUNGEON (1970):  All I need to say here is this is a knock-off of the Tower of London, directed by Andy Milligan. Of course, that wouldn't be much fun. Would it? This is the story of Norman, Duke of Norwich, a one-armed, tantrum-throwing, self-proclaimed "tri-sexual" (because he will "try anything"), who tries to take the throne of the kingdom of Terragon by killing everyone of the heirs to the throne ahead of him. Norman (Milligan regular Jeremy Brooks a.k.a Gerald Jacuzzo) looks like a cross between Freddie Mercury and Sonny Bono, while Terragon looks suspiciously like Staten Island.

(L to R) Peter the Ear, Peter the Eye & the nose of Peter the Nose

As with any Milligan film, the dialog is filled with snippy remarks and mentions of gang rape, incest, necrophilia, child abuse, and sadism of all sorts. Add to this a collection of characters such as the kingdom's council made up of Peter the Eye (Milligan regular Neil Flanagan), Peter the Ear and Peter the Nose. The last two characters are played by two uncredited brothers, wearing Beatle wigs, who would fit in more in an episode of The Sopranos than a Medieval drama. The most outrageous character is Magda the marriage councilor. She dresses like a butterfly and sings and dances, while trying to explain how to have sex to the young heroine (Susan Cassidy). The top portion of Cassidy's costume does come together, so her boobs tend to flop out during a chase scene.

She's giving advice on sex and she picked out that outfit.

TORTURE DUNGEON in many ways could be called Milligan's masterpiece, but I prefer to see it as Milligan's twisted fairy tale of Medieval England.

The late Heath Ledger

2. A KNIGHT'S TALE (2001): I realize some will say a movie from 2001 doesn't belong on a retro blog, but the director of this film felt that the 1370s were probably similar to the 1970s, so I think it can be reviewed here. Not only is this loosely based on Geoffrey Chaucer's A Knight's Tale, but Chaucer is a character (often buck naked) in this movie. This comedy-adventure not only spins a engaging yarn of a young man's quest to achieve his dream of becoming a knight, but satirizes the sports culture. The film is filled with turn of the Millennium pop culture references and a great soundtrack made up of 70s classic rock.

He looks like Carson and Letterman would throw him off

The film stars the late Heath Ledger as William, who has dreamed of being a knight since childhood. He comes of age as the squire for a knight. When the knight dies before a tournament, he takes his place using a phony birthright written by Geoffrey Chaucer. He not only befriends Chaucer (Paul Bettany), but Prince Edward and the feisty widow blacksmith, Kate, who makes him armor with a Nike swoosh on it. William falls in love with a noble woman, Jocelyn. He also makes an enemy of a arrogant knight named Count Adhemar, who is sort of a Medieval version of a 80s teen comedy preppy jock, but baring an uncanny resemblance to actor Oliver Reed.

One fun thing to watch for is a flashback, where an old man, who mocks young William's desire to be a knight. It is actor Berwick Kaler, who appeared in several of Andy Milligan's films (not TORTURE DUNGEON though) including, The Rats Are Coming, The Werewolves Are Here, The Body Beneath and as Tobias in The Bloodthirsty Butchers.

A KNIGHT'S TALE is fun and exciting, once you get past the fact that it doesn't take Medieval history very serious.

3. MONTY PYTHON AND THE HOLY GRAIL (1974): Only the Monty Python guys could take King Arthur and stand it on it's head. To tell much about this movie would give away this best gags before some people would see it. Everyone should see this before they die. If you don't watch it or rewatch it, we will be forced to say "NEE" to you.        

BEST OF DESDINOVA: THE DARK KNIGHT WILL SUCK COLLECTION

The whole furrier over Ben Affleck being selected to play Batman in an upcoming movie reminds me of  a tiny blog post I made on the old blog that attracted some hatred on a minor national scale, rather than local Springfield/Ozarks hatred that I usually faced at that time.

I saw on another website some photos "preview" photos of the late Heath Ledger's makeup for the up coming Batman film The Dark Knight. It wasn't like the hardened grin of Jack Nicholson or even the clown face over a mustache like Cesar Romero, it was just gobbed and smeared on his face like a child playing the Joker to his next door neighbors Batman in the backyard.

The post was simple. You can read it here: I THINK THE DARK KNIGHT WILL SUCK. In this post I said two things that upset extreme Batman fanatics.

1. I didn't like Frank Miller's Dark Knight comic books.
2. I like the 1966 TV show Batman and the full length movie that featured the cast.

During that time, I was always surprised when I got a response outside of Springfield, Missouri. A comment was posted by a person who called himself "andrew." Not sure who he was but he claimed to be an assistant on The Dark Knight set (Yeah right!). He was not very happy with me. So, of course, I had to make fun of this guy on the blog. Here is the post: I UPSET A COMIC BOOK GEEK AND I STILL THINK THE DARK KNIGHT WILL SUCK.

I should point out that I had to stop allowing comments on the old blog in 2009, due to spam by get-rich-quick websites and some Libertarian guy who was planing to run for president in 2012. When I stopped the comments, the previous comments were no longer shown on the blog. Not sure why, but I still have access them through the Blogger dashboard. Here is the complete text of "andrew's" rant.

"Um i might be late on this comment but i came across your site and read what you have to say about the dark knight. First of all you may be suffering from being a douche bag. 2nd read a book and read history on wha batman is really suppose to be because nolan has figured it out. Burtons batmans were great then ruined by the next two obviously. The darkness is finally back with batman begins and the dark knight. i work for warner bro's as a PA, and ledgers makeup is supreme to what it is suppose to be. He is scarred in actuality, and the makeup just adds to the image because he obviously puts it on himself, he does not care what it looks like. Get your head out of your ass and go make some more web sites that just makes you sound ignorant and un educated. Yes i do study film, and you may not nonethelss, go watch the trailer again because you really need to if you took the time to make this website, and by the way did you try and justify the 60's batman show somehow?"

The first thing I noticed, that I mentioned in my blog response, is "andrew" apparently didn't know how to use capital letters.

With in a short time, the original blog post made the rounds of the fanatical Batman fans on the web. It was at one point the most read post on my blog. I even had my own thread on IMDB (That was removed for some reason). So, I decided to to be fair and go see The Dark Knight.

You must know something about me, I don't think I have ever hated a movie I saw at a movie theater. Only about two or three, but I just think that going to a movie theater is a special occasion.

Now for the irony of the original post; I saw The Dark Knight TWICE! The first time was at a Springfield movie theater. After that, I wrote this post: I DIDN'T LIKE THE DARK KNIGHT (but it didn't suck as bad as I thought it would). After that, I went to a drive-in at Aurora, Missouri, with some family members. I hadn't been to a drive-in since I was small, so I thought it would be great to go with them. The movies on the double feature was Babylon A.D. and (You guest it) The Dark Knight. Remember what I said earlier about not hating a movie I saw at a theater, well, Babylon A.D, was the only one I hated. It was confusing and Vin Diesel can't act. After sitting through Babylon A.D, I began to realize I HATED THE DARK KNIGHT! It was just a obnoxious and overblown action film with people dressed as characters from the Batman comic book.

At least two people posted comments agreed with me. A person named Eduardo posted this comment:

"You are entitled to like the old Batman. Although this is a new Batman supposed to be taken from the "The Dark Knight Returns" comic book series which relaunched the character in the 80's. What I think is lacking from the Christopher Nolan films is the atmosphere which was achieved by Tim Burton's first two Batman Films from 1989 and 1990. For me, personally, those were the best achievements of Batman on film, period. They struck a balance between looking like comic books, but looking serious nonetheless. The new film looks more like a Michael Mann film (ie. Heat) for the exterior scenes, there is not enough atmosphere. Gotham, usually a character by itself in all of the previous films, takes a back seat on this one. However, what I believe is that each generation gets their own "revamped" version of Comic Book or literary classics. For those who grew up in the 60's, the TV Batman by Adam West is the ultimate "archetype" of the character, for the children of the 80's its either the Dark Knight or Michael Keaton."

My favorite was from a person named Mike:

I agree that this movie looks terrible mostly because of the Joker's makeup. The joker is too vein to leave his house looking like a piece of street trash. Nice concept but you guys ruined the look of the character which is basically the most important part. Batman's outfit looks terrible and the joker looks terrible. It would be easy for anyone to play the Joker, he's an iconic character. Hopefully next time he hits the big screen they don't make him look homeless.

After that I found that there a have been several websites pop-up that not only point out what is wrong with The Dark Knight, but are called "The Dark Knight Sucks" or something to that extent. My favorite is a post on The Rawness blog.

The thing about the old blog is when I made many of the post, I was demonized as a horrible person who should be executed as an "enemy combatant" (Another Ozarks blogger actually called me that). Since that time, I've found that many of the positions I held were the right ones and the people and things I poked fun at deserved to be made fun of. Case in point: Many of the local talk radio people in town that I poked fun of was championing a former SMSU/MSU student who was suing the school because she claimed the students harassed her and the teachers failed her for not compromising her religious beliefs. One of our local talk radio show host (Thank God, he is no longer on the air) suggested that the buildings on campus be set on fire and the students and faculty be shot as they exited the buildings. A friend of mine on Facebook was a student in that department at the time. She and several other classmates had a discussion going on Facebook about this plaintiff and the lawsuit this week. Apparently, this person didn't work will with the other students...when she came to class. Also several mentioned she didn't have to be "the topic group" she said "harassed" her. As one person said, "The media never asked us about what happened or what she was like to work with."

But then again the people who hated the old blog are the ones who put up websites or adorn there Facebook sites with pictures of the President Photoshoped with the bad makeup job Heath Ledger wore in The Dark Knight.

My opinions are why I'm considered the Super Villain of the Ozarks!!! Mwu-HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!