League Of Augsburg - Fighting Talk

Just finished watching this movie. Top film. Really enjoyable. Good plot , well acted and good battle scenes. Highly recommended. Especially as you can get the Blu ray for about £6.00]

I had read the first book but I have never seen the second one so the film gave me the ending.As in most cases it was'nt as good as the book with big chunks missed out.There seems to be a lot of medieval dvds on the go just now, have been eying up Ironfist at tescos so once the price drops I'll probably buy it.

iain

Yep, thanks for that Jim, the Missus liked the look fo it too... so, I guesss we WILL be watching it

I really enjoyed the The Knights Templar. I just got The Kingdom at Road's End so looking forward to watching that.

Ironclad was awful to watch.

It's a pretty decent effort, if no masterpiece : I found the Swedish part more interesting than the Holy Land segment, possibly because Scandinavian shenanigans and Swedish clan feuds are a more exotic and unusual subject matter than the Crusades - at least to me.

Your enjoyment of the film will largely depend on which version you're watching : Arn was originally shown in Sweden as a 267 minute epic spread over two films (Arn, the Knight Templar in 2007 followed in 2008 by The Kingdom at the End of the Road, and clocking in at 139 and 128 minutes respectively). The so-called international version is a drastically edited affair which splices both films together, bringing them down to a total running time of 139 minutes : that's the version you get on the UK Blu-Ray, so expect narrative flow and consistency to suffer as about 40% of the original material was excised.

High Fliers will be releasing a 200 minute DVD version of the film in the UK next week : that's the same so-called 'director's cut' that was released on Blu-Ray over here in France. It's a more satisfactory version of the film, although it still has a few problems of its own : The Kingdom at the End of the Road suffers from continuity problems since a fair bit of the narrative arc and character development obviously ended up on the cutting room floor during the re-editing process, resulting in awkward pacing and a general feeling that everything is rushed. Even without having read the novel, you can tell that significant chunks of the story are missing. In comparison, Arn the Knight Templar feels more assured and better structured, almost certainly because it suffered fewer cuts than the second act.

The 200 minute version is the one I've seen and it's quite good for what it is, although the battles in the Holy Land suffer to some extent from a lack of production values - think TV movie rather than Hollywood epic. Interestingly enough - and this will no doubt amuse or please Barry - quite a few scenes appear to have been shot on location in various parts of Scotland, including Lothian, Dunfermline and Glasgow.

WONDER IF THEY USED THE LOCALS FOR EXTRAS! Surely Scotland didn't double for the Holy Land Sweden I COULD understand!

Why, Glasgow IS the New Jerusalem, isn't it ?

I undestand Fife doubled as bits of the Swedish countryside, although most of the location filming took place in Västergötland in Sweden. The final battle against the Danes and the Sverkers looks like it could have been shot in Scotland, but it may have actually been done in Sweden. You're right Barry, the production did use locals as extras : there is even a Flickr group where they post pics of themselves during the shoot :

http://www.flickr.com/groups/arn_scotland/

And Morocco provided the Holy Land, just to hurt Scottish national pride

We also provided the zombie extras for Brad Pitt's new effort and that would have saved them a fortune in make up.

Jim

Saw this movie through Netflicks about three weeks ago. I really enjoy foreign made movies. This one was really a treat with three different languages spoken with subtitles. Definitly a buy!

barr7430 wrote:WONDER IF THEY USED THE LOCALS FOR EXTRAS! Surely Scotland didn't double for the Holy Land Sweden I COULD understand!

Pollokshaws does have similarities