Quest for Camelot

Quest for Camelot is a Warner Brothers produced movie made in 1998 loosely based on the fantasy novel, The King’s Damosel, written by Vera Chapman. The movie was worked on by a bunch of ex-Disney animators, and along with Disney’s massive success at the time, Warner Brothers attempted to replicate the Disney style through this movie as a way of competing with the stronger competition, which is something they would try to replicate several more times with some of their other animated properties. What was left was unfortunately not good enough to make back even half of its original budget and resulted in a film that while not truly terrible, isn’t strong enough to be even close to a contender of what Disney, or even what other animation studios, were releasing at the time. Set in the time of Arthurian legend, a young woman named Kayley (voiced by Jessalyn Gilsig) wishes to become a knight like her deceased father (voiced by Gabriel Byrne) who used to serve under King Arthur (voiced by Pierce Brosnan) but is always held back by societal norms and feels restricted by her current lifestyle. Her wish is granted when an insane former knight of King Arthur named Ruber (voiced by Gary Oldman) takes her village hostage and plans to steal Excalibur and take over Camelot. With the sword recently lost in an enchanted forest, Kayley manages to escape from Ruber and finds herself lost in said enchanted forest, which houses several mystical threats and dangers. She comes across a blind man named Garrett (voiced by Cary Elwes) who has extremely reflexes and fighting skills and the ability to traverse the forest to find Excalibur, which leads to the two of them teaming up in order to find the sword. After meeting up with a two-headed talking dragon named Cornwall and Devon (voiced by Don Rickles and Eric Idle), the trio must find the sword and return it to Camelot before Ruber steals it for himself. At a time where every other animation company besides Disney was struggling to be unique, Warner Brothers would eventually find its footing with something like The Iron Giant but slumped into Diet Disney with The Swan Princess and even this film. What could have been an interesting tale which would have its own unique atmosphere and grittier tone, was instead another retreding of the standard Disney Princess-esque formula with stale characters, poorly used animation and a very poor script.

The original story from the book was actually going to be included in the movie from an earlier draft, while removing some of the more disturbing elements to make it functional for kids. With this time period, location and darker atmosphere, this could have been something completely its own and stood out from the Disney crowd, but fears from the higher ups at Warner Bros along with the recent Disney competition, made them scrap the idea and resort to the more Disney-like narrative. What was left was still a decent amount of good concepts that weren’t allowed to properly fleshed out, as on a scripting level, this film actually houses some solid ideas that while maybe a little redundant know, do feel like refreshing takes back then. Elements like a woman wanting to be a knight at the time was different, the blind man was a good diversion from the usual prince trope even if the execution is flawed, the two-headed dragon is a pretty good idea for a comic relief even though that falls on its head due to bad writing, there are ideas here that would’ve made it feel like its own kind of fairy tale, one with a harsher edge but still contain some recognizable troops. While they were ready to be used effectively, it was never executed in an interesting way and leaves the product very bland and lacking personality. The screenplay for this film written by Kirk DeMicco, William Schifrin, Jacqueline Feather, and David Seidler does so little to avoid lame tropes, cliched story beats and traditional character arcs that so little feels fresh in this movie, despite having the ingredients needed to be so. Its goofier tone and Disney-esque atmosphere seem to kill the chances for a more realistic brutal environment that would have fit this story easily and it removes a lot of real elements in exchange for way too much fantasy elements that weren’t needed for this story (its in a Celtic mythology, but there’s still room for some grittiness). From first time director, Frederik Du Chau, this is not a well led movie in many regards as while not noticeably poor, there is a distinct lack of personality and engagement from how this film is led. The film never takes its time to establish its world, so many aspects of the film like what the tone is, the rules surrounding the world, even some of the characters, aren’t established or fleshed out enough to feel fully realized, so it leaves many questions that don’t get good or any answers. The movie is only about 90 mins long but it feels like nothing really happens when it comes to its conclusion and the film has a really issue with structure, as many scenes feel cut down and chopped together with less than perfect edits, very clearly showing when certain scenes were trimmed or altogether removed, whether for better or worse, it’s hard to tell.

As already mentioned, the characters had potential that was sorely wasted once the film stopped taking most of its ideas from the book. The movie has almost nothing to do with the actual book except for a few names and some character setups, which is why the movie and by extension the characters feel incomplete and more like cut outs of pre-created characters from the company, even down to some of the designs (Kaylee has a strong resemblance to a character like Belle that it does become a little noticeable). Even if the cast weren’t as interesting as they could have been, they could have still worked if they had a good narrative and characterization behind them, which unfortunately is not the case. Kayley as a character is a bit obnoxious. While she claims to be a great knight, she never truly does anything of worth throughout the whole movie that backs up that praising, so she comes across like a child claiming to be great when in reality they have done nothing. The voice acting for her by Jessalyn Gilsig can also be a little hit-and-miss, but she’s not terrible, just a little boring. Garrett isn’t much better with a weak even flip-flopping motivation, a design that looks a little odd, and little to no identity outside of his blindness. The two-headed dragon gets annoying really quick, especially with how much they force him to spew several pop cultural jokes left and right that have no connection with the environment and feel extremely out of place (clearly trying to replicate what Robin Williams did with something like Aladdin, even down to getting well-known comedians like Don Rickles and Eric Idle to voice him). The villain is also extremely weak; with a horrible design, incredibly weak motivation, no backstory, and a complete waste of Gary Oldman. The movie is also filled with a lot of great actors and they don’t feel like they’re putting in that much effort. The main leads are pretty bland, Gary Oldman is over-the-top but with no direction or good material to make that fun, Eric Idle and Don Rickles are trying but are stuck with awful lines, and all the others are barely used enough to use their talents.

The film’s animation does again feel like its trying to capture the Disney style, but it doesn’t match what Warner Brother animation is like and what they’re good at. Warner Brother animation is very fast, highly fluid and good at capturing slapstick and fast-paced action, which is why its known for some of the heaviest users of slapstick in the current era. However, the Disney style is a lot slower, more emotional and better suited in a more grounded and somewhat mature environment, so the human characters have these weird looking faces with pronounced lips and confused eyes which makes them look even more doll-like than the actual characters made to be turned into dolls. Some of the designs for the characters look distinct from the formula but other than that, they look pretty awkward. The cartoony animals and fanatical creatures have pretty good expressions and movements because they match with what Warner Brothers excels at, though the film has horrible comedy and bad slapstick so it doesn’t fulfill anything. The film also has some CG moments which are pretty awful, but it was part of the times to include CG for no reason despite how bad it looks. With that said though, the 2D animation does have some very good colors, especially when contrasted to a blue sky, and it clearly shows the effort that a lot of these animators put into it, it just doesn’t match with the style the movie was trying to replicate. The movie also features songs written and composed by Carole Bayer Sager and David Foster that are very clearly forced in at the last minute and proceed to contribute nothing. They have no clear transition into them, they aren’t well written and feel like Disney knockoffs, some of the dubbing is distractingly different (particularly Cary Elwes who is replaced by Bryan White), and most of them clearly seem like they don’t correlate with the visuals, sometimes they don’t even feel like they impacted anything. With that said, the instrumentals are pretty good, while its not used correctly in the film, the song The Prayer is still a beautiful song (and has been sung much stronger elsewhere), and even lyrics for the movie’s main song, I Stand Alone, aren’t that bad outside of this film.

Quest for Camelot failed on its journey the minute it stepped into Disney territory and got swallowed up by their influence. With a more stand-alone feel that worked to Warner Brothers strengths, more elements added from the original source, and if it gave itself a darker tone, it could have been something great, but it was afraid of its competition and fumbled during the process. Objectively it’s not an awful movie, it has some nice elements, some bright colors and even the bad stuff is not hard to sit through, a kid could watch this and be fine, but with a far too simple story, boring even slightly annoying characters, odd animation every once and awhile, and poorly handled songs, it comes across as fake as a medieval times restaurant. Not an awful movie, but definitely not a good one, the chosen one, this movie is not.