Everything You Need to Know About ‘The Green Knight’

A24 released an “everything you need to know” video for its upcoming film The Green Knight, an adaptation of the 14th-century epic poem Sir Gawain & the Green Knight, based on King Arthur and his knights of the round table.

After having to delay the film’s initial release in 2020 due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, the film has been brought back to the studio’s marketing focus. The video details the origins of the tale and introduces the principal characters.

The video begins with the poem’s shrouded past. There has only ever been one copy of the poem found in history, and its author is unknown. In an alternate timeline, the poem is ashes. In 1731, this singular copy managed to survive the clutches of a “major fire,” as claimed by the video.

Author J.R.R. Tolkein has championed the work, calling the poem “a window of many-colored glass looking back into the middle ages.”

The Green Knight is an inhuman entity that challenges a member of the roundtable to duel at a location it calls the green chapel. Scholars associate it and its green skin with themes such as respect for nature, the unknown, and death.

Enter Sir Gaiwan (Dev Patel), the reckless nephew of King Arthur. Described as “a bold man, but an unproven hero,” he is a knight of the roundtable. Sir Gawain, although represented several times on screen before, does not have a history of heroic tales about him.

This lack of recognition appears to be an angle the film looks to use to its advantage in its storytelling. In the world of The Green Knight, honor is currency. Look no further than the character posters released for the film with its gold font superimposed over a red background reading, “When honor was everything. When courage made knights.” Sir Gaiwan’s quest to meet the Knight on the field of battle will be his opportunity to claim honor.

Alongside the aforementioned King Arthur and Sir Gaiwan will be Arthur’s wife Guinevere (Kate Dickie), Gaiwan’s mother Morgan Le Fay (Sarita Choudhury), and the wizard Merlin (Joel Edgerton).

The video concludes by describing Gaiwan’s journey from Camelot to meet the Green Knight, where along the way he encounters “obstacles, strangers, and foes, forcing him to prove his honor, his courage, his chivalry, and his loyalty.”

The Green Knight will be released only in theaters July 30.

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