56
Metascore
10 reviews · Provided by Metacritic.com
- 80TimeRichard SchickelTimeRichard SchickelLove Excalibur or hate it, but give Boorman credit for the loopy grandeur of his imagery and imaginings, for the sweet smell of excess, for his heroic gamble that a movie can dare to trip over its pretensions— and still fly.
- 63Chicago Sun-TimesRoger EbertChicago Sun-TimesRoger EbertWhat a wondrous vision Excalibur is! And what a mess.
- 60Chicago ReaderDave KehrChicago ReaderDave KehrJohn Boorman's 1981 retelling of the Arthurian legends is a continuation of the thematic thrust and visual plan of his Exorcist II, though the failure of that bold, hallucinatory, and flawed film seems to have put Boorman into partial retreat.
- 60TV Guide MagazineTV Guide MagazineExcalibur is a grand, clanky, brooding fantasy.
- 60NewsweekJack KrollNewsweekJack KrollBoorman is both a romantic and a realist, an idealist and a skeptic, and Excalibur is an impressive but uneasy attempt to marry these opposites. [13 April 1981, p.82]
- 50The New York TimesVincent CanbyThe New York TimesVincent CanbyMr. Boorman takes these myths very seriously, but he has used them with a pretentiousness that obscures his vision.
- 50Time Out LondonGeoff AndrewTime Out LondonGeoff AndrewFor all its audacity, a misguided folly.
- 50Christian Science MonitorDavid SterrittChristian Science MonitorDavid SterrittAt a time when most movies try far too little, I don't like berating Excalibur for taking on too much. It's just that Mr. Boorman never quite achieves what he attempts. [23 April 1981, p.19]
- 50The Globe and Mail (Toronto)Jay ScottThe Globe and Mail (Toronto)Jay ScottIt must be said that the closing sequence, in which Arthur meets the misbegotten Mordred on an orange battlefield illuminated by a shield-sized red sun, is an epic, Oedipal masterpiece of authentic mythic power, a sequence so strong it shakes the torpor from one's shoulders and induces regret that the rest of the saga has been so juvenile, so lifeless and so lacking poetry or Shakespearean sweep. [11 April 1981]