Jump to content

‘Outlaw King’: Robert The Bruce Scottish Epic


AncalagonTheBlack

Recommended Posts

6 hours ago, Corvinus said:

Initially disappointed when I realized the movie wasn't going to depict the battle of Bannockburn, but the more I think about it, the more I'm ok with that. It would be another 7 years until that happened from where the movie ended, and it wouldn't fit so well with the movie title. I do hope for a sequel to show that, but I don't know if Pine would be willing to reprise this role.

The film merged the battle of Bannockburn (against Edward II) with Loudoun (against Valence I think). There can't be a sequel with Bannockburn given that Loudoun served its purpose, and that all the events that should happen between Loudoun and Bannockburn such as fighting the Scots (McDougals, etc) already happened before Loudoun in the film.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

13 minutes ago, Pliskin said:

The film merged the battle of Bannockburn (against Edward II) with Loudoun (against Valence I think). There can't be a sequel with Bannockburn given that Loudoun served its purpose, and that all the events that should happen between Loudoun and Bannockburn such as fighting the Scots (McDougals, etc) already happened before Loudoun in the film.

As the movie states, Loudoun was the turning point. But Bannockburn was the decisive victory that won Scotland its independence from England. So I wouldn't say the battles were merged, even though the movie had Eddward II there. The ambush by the McDougals did occur before Loudoun IRL, too. They wanted revenge for Comyn's death, and caught Robert and the remnants of his army after Valance defeated him at Methven.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

10 hours ago, Derfel Cadarn said:

The ones who didn't want to die, at least

Which is actually a more plausible scenario than them just saying "yeah it's absolutely fine forget what the pope said". If a guy has just murdered someone in a church chances are he's not too fussed about killing a few clergy as well.

I think there's also a great TV show (or podcast by Dan Carlin) to be made looking at Robert's life from a more morally grey viewpoint.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

It wasn’t bad.  Still, for all Braveheart’s shittyness, that did have more of an epic feel.  The accents were fine, helped by the fact that Scottish, like other British regional accents, is variable enough that Douglas and Bruce could grow up relatively near each other and still speak with totally different accents. :P  Aaron TJ was great btw, what a dream part he had.

I thought the murder was handled quite well, in those days you murdered somebody, your Bishop forgives you and you don’t need to think about it any more.  I mean, if the Bishop says it’s fine, it’s fine.  I’m surprised they didn’t mention he was excommunicated though, that’s the big thing we all learn in school - excommunicated, declared king, lost some battles, saw a spider spinning a web, won Bannockburn - that’s the Robert the Bruce story.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 11/11/2018 at 12:35 AM, Zorral said:

What was the problem with the depiction of the feckless, hapless Prince Edward / Edward II?

Don’t know if I’d call it a problem but the depiction of him shrieking in the mud and begging for mercy at the end of a battle he never took part in seems more like an extreme example of dramatic licence than anything else.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 11/11/2018 at 6:03 AM, john said:

I thought the murder was handled quite well, in those days you murdered somebody, your Bishop forgives you and you don’t need to think about it any more.  I mean, if the Bishop says it’s fine, it’s fine.  I’m surprised they didn’t mention he was excommunicated though, that’s the big thing we all learn in school - excommunicated, declared king, lost some battles, saw a spider spinning a web, won Bannockburn - that’s the Robert the Bruce story.

There was a line said by Edward I, he gets crowned king faster than the pope can excommunicate him. Which kinda makes sense, if Robert moved fast enough with bishop backing, before news of the murder could even reach Rome.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

It was a decent watch.  It’s like a self-aware sequel to Braveheart with better historical accuracy (obviously not perfect) but less epic characterization.  Braveheart was much more entertaining and a better film (within the expectations of the art form).  The Battle of Loudoun was well done and the cinematography was good throughout.

I could accept the dramatic license to place Edward II at Loudoun, I could just about stretch to have him crawl away as a sniveling coward, but I could not accept that the Scots would allow him to just retreat safely rather than take him captive for ransom and terms.  If you’re going to break with history to suit the narrative of the film, you still need to maintain coherence within the narrative. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

53 minutes ago, Iskaral Pust said:

It was a decent watch.  It’s like a self-aware sequel to Braveheart with better historical accuracy (obviously not perfect) but less epic characterization.  Braveheart was much more entertaining and a better film (within the expectations of the art form).  The Battle of Loudoun was well done and the cinematography was good throughout.

I could accept the dramatic license to place Edward II at Loudoun, I could just about stretch to have him crawl away as a sniveling coward, but I could not accept that the Scots would allow him to just retreat safely rather than take him captive for ransom and terms.  If you’re going to break with history to suit the narrative of the film, you still need to maintain coherence within the narrative. 

I was just about to post this exact thing.  The movie establishes before the battle that the English have Robert's wife and kid held captive so when you have the goddamn King of England beaten, surrounded, and ALONE - you capture his ass and not only get your wife and kid in exchange but also quite possibly favorable peace terms and victory in the war.  There's just absolutely no way you'd stand there and watch that guy walk away back to his army.  That bugged me too.  

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I agree with both of the above. That's the most egregious and nonsensical part. Funny, how it states at the end that his wife was released in a prisoner exchange, and I wondered who. (most likely the real historical person) If Edward II had been captured, that would have ended the war right then and there, at least for a time.

On Edward II, I find it somewhat puzzling that a modern movie didn't put in Piers Gaveston, who had a close relationship with the prince, including the possibility of them having been lovers. Granted, I think right around the time of Loudon, Gaveston had been exiled by the king, but only for a short time. Braveheart explores this part of Edward's character a little, integrating it in his relationship with his father, while this movie explores the father-son relationship from a slightly different angle. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

5 hours ago, john said:

Don’t know if I’d call it a problem but the depiction of him shrieking in the mud and begging for mercy at the end of a battle he never took part in seems more like an extreme example of dramatic licence than anything else.

Agree with that fer shure.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 11/11/2018 at 4:58 AM, Corvinus said:

As the movie states, Loudoun was the turning point. But Bannockburn was the decisive victory that won Scotland its independence from England. So I wouldn't say the battles were merged, even though the movie had Eddward II there. The ambush by the McDougals did occur before Loudoun IRL, too. They wanted revenge for Comyn's death, and caught Robert and the remnants of his army after Valance defeated him at Methven.

Yes, but IRL, he didn't achieve anything against his Scottish enemies before Loudoun, only losses. Whereas in the film, the Comyn supporters are more or less destroyed. You can see several of them killed on screen.

I don't know, I have a hard time imagining any possible sequel to the film.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Saw this. It was okay. Very choppy, doubtless in part the result of the director doing an emergency recutting to excise over 20 minutes of material after its bombed at its TIFF Premiere, but you could tell at least that it was a serious production with quality actors and high production values. Loudon Hill was quite impressive, but I do join others in finding the Edward II situation rather ridiculous, and I'm not too fond of the character's presentation (it's a bit better than Braveheart, I suppose).

Chris Pine carried his role quite well. Florence Pugh was good. Stephen Dillane is good in everything he does, although I remain very fond of the late Patrick McGoohan's Longshanks. 

The best thing in the whole movie was that 8 minute single-take opening, though, I have to say, so if that doesn't impress you and bring you into what it's offering, the rest is going to be a disappointment.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

No, you're right. We're supposed to buy that his seeing the Scots of Berwick in a tizzy over William Wallace's execution being all he needed to just turn himself right around was not very smooth or particularly believable. I feel like there could and should have been more of a build up for that.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

https://www.scotsman.com/lifestyle/culture/film/what-outlaw-king-gets-wrong-according-to-a-historian-1-4829285
 

Quote

 

.... In reality, however, Watson suggests that Bruce was a cold and calculating character, driven by his own personal goals. "I think the most important thing to know about Robert the Bruce is that he was absolutely single-minded in his ambition to become king," she says. "Right from the minute he appears on the scene when he's about 22 he is utterly consistent in working towards that, ruthlessly ambitious to the point where he would commit murder for it."

"He felt that the Bruce family had been cheated of it in the early 1290s when his grandfather vied with John Balliol. and that really contrasted with the way it was portrayed in the film."

Though Bruce's infamous felling of crown rival John Comyn wasn't brushed over in Outlaw King, Watson felt that the representation of Bruce's motives were misleading. "The way I see it, Robert Bruce knew that John Comyn was going to claim the throne of Scotland when Edward I dies and that's why he feels John Comyn has to die first. "He's got all these boxes ticked, he's got blood, he's got the power and the experience. "The truth of the matter is that John Comyn had to die because he was going to become king. Don't get me wrong - I think Robert Bruce is the greatest king we ever had, and a fantastic general who should be much better known - but a nice man? "He is Macbeth with a happy ending. The body count is huge and his vaulting ambition stopped at nothing including murder, but he gets to die in his bed." ....
 

 

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Good piece. I suspected as much about the wife, too Hollywood there. And I appreciate that the historian felt Edward II was over the top in this film. But a balance between the depictions in Braveheart and here would probably have seemed a bit too diffident a character, not someone you could so easily despise.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

17 hours ago, Martini Sigil said:

This didn;t really grab me... and I can't put my finger on why... but maybe it would have been better off as 4-6 one hour episodes...

I agree.  Maybe we are all just spoiled on all the great tv shows and miniseries' that are out there these days.  This maybe would have felt less choppy in a longer format.  

Link to comment
Share on other sites

It absolutely needed a longer, arc format.  There is too much going one politically and culturally and religiously to make it have any meaning in this presentation.  It was about showing men hacking each other up within gorgeous location landscapes.  

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Archived

This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.

×
×
  • Create New...