In Class Film

The mini series we watched last Thursday was very interesting to compare to the many versions of the stories we have now read. I agree with Taylor's comment that it was different to see the way that Merlin was portrayed in this version, because he was such a large part of the story. Merlin's telling made it seem as though things at Arthur's court were much more dire than in other renditions of the story. Like in T.H. White, there seemed to be a great deal of fighting and turmoil throughout the court. Merlin also seemed to be the "brains" of Arthur's entire plan for the future--which allowed for him to also be more at fault. I also thought that the evil characters held some significance. The created witch who was basically Merlin's opposite made for an interesting plot line, but she also seemed to control things more than other evil characters. If she was meant to be Morgan Le Fay-esque, she certainly was this and more--and Modred was even worse. The fact that the mini series went to such extremes to show the evil at court suggests a few things. Perhaps the directors wanted to add more drama to the plot or wanted to provide a more tangible problem for the knights and other characters to face; or, perhaps this was simply the interpretation of all of the trickery that goes on at court in general, just more concentrated into one or two characters. Either way, this rendition was very interesting to watch.