Enter The Green Knight.
Directed by David Lowery and staring Dev Patel as Gawain, The Green Knight is the latest film distributed by A24, which in recent years has made a name for itself with the likes of Moonlight, The Witch, Midsommer, and The Light House. Like other films in the A24 catalogue, TGK is artistic and has an indie flair. It's more interested in examining the story presented by the source material and working off it rather than being a direct adaptation. The film's main inspiration is the 14th century Middle English Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, one of the four poems found in British Library Manuscript Cotton Nero A.x, written by an anonymous poet often called the Gawain or Pearl (for one of the other poems) Poet, who wrote in the North Midlands dialect. The author is simply credited as "Anonymous" in the film's opening titles, which my friend and research partner N, who saw the movie with me, commented were "very Monty Python." The movie's plot does not strictly, or even particularly closely, follow that of the poem and instead takes a more "what-if" approach to the story-- what if Gawain failed?
Like all Arthurian characters, Gawain's personality and role are different in every story. In Sir Gawain and the Green Knight (SGGK), Gawain is a virtuous knight, whose failure to turn over the garter is a source of shame to him, despite his apparent victory over the Green Knight. His reputation in most English stories is one of courtesy and good intentions, though he comes off worse in French texts, where he goes from a bumbling loser to a brute to responsible for the fall of the Round Table.[1] Thomas Malory's Le Morte d'Arthur, which was completed around 1469-70 and works off the Post-Vulgate, presents Gawain as capable of both noble and ignoble actions, and again is judged unworthy of the Grail, especially as he refuses to confess and do penance.[2] Patel’s Gawain seems to take after Malory’s rather than the one in SGGK, as he’s a much more morally ambiguous figure.
We first meet Gawain in a brothel, woken up by his favorite girl, Essel, played by Alicia Vikander, then see him stopping off to meet his mother (claiming to have been “at Mass,” one of the few nods to SGGK’s Gawain’s piety) before hurrying in to court for Christmas celebrations with the King. This is where the poem begins—“Þis kyng lay at Camylot vpon Krystmasse / With mony luflych lorde, ledez of þe best, / Rekenly of þe Rounde Table alle þo rich breþer, / With rych reuel oryȝt and rechles merþes.” (SGGK 37-40) (This king was at Camelot for Christmas / With many admirable lords and the best retainers, / The worthy of the Round Table, all the rich brothers-in-arms, / With proper relish revel and are full of carefree mirth). There’s little of that in the film’s court, however. Knights feast and exchange Christmas greetings and characters act as if all is well, but there is an underlying sense of unease.
Sean Harris’s King is never called Arthur, which stood out to me—as did the general sense of malaise in this supposedly joyous occasion. The court is dark, barely even lit by torches, and the King himself appears old and weak, not at all the youthful, childish king whose description in the poem is based upon the contemporary King Richard II of England. The King says he regrets not knowing Gawain, his nephew, better, and asks him to tell a story about himself—Gawain says he has no story to tell. The request for a story the king makes in the poem is a general one, given to anyone who will entertain him before he will eat—much like how I find myself today looking for something on YouTube to watch during lunch. By directing the question at Gawain, the film brings his experiences, or rather lack of them, into focus, especially how he himself will interpret them.
The first major diversion from the poem, however, is the presence and roll of Gawain’s mother, played by Sarita Choudhury. While she’s not present in SGGK, other sources have Morgause of Orkney, half-sister of Arthur, as his mother, and the movie never names her— even though we see her summoning the Green Knight. The ending of SGGK reveals the whole affair with the Green Knight was in fact orchestrated by another of Arthur’s half-sisters, Morgan le Fay, to test the pride of the Round Table and hopefully scare Guinevere to death (2456-2466) in the process. As to be expected from a surrealist film, we’re left to wonder which daughter of the Duke of Tintagel we see and what her reasons for calling on the Green Knight are. However, the whole scene is epic and creepy, with the challenge being delivered via a letter, which when opened takes control of Kate Dickie’s Queen (never called Guinevere), perhaps as a reference to her being Morgan’s target in the source. Gawain’s mother also gives Gawain a green belt before he sets off, changing the origin of the garter that plays a crucial role in the end of the poem, and changing the film’s conclusion.
Instead of focusing on Gawain’s stay at Hautdesert, home of the mysterious Lord Bertilak, The Green Knight is most interested in two bob-and-wheel passages from the second part, or fitt, that describe his journey through England and Wales, as well as the trials he faces on his way to the Green Chapel. This hero’s journey is one of cold, loneliness, hunger, locals who have no idea what he’s asking about; fights with serpents, wolves, bulls, bears, boars, and wodwos—wildmen (691-749). Gawain’s side quests and trek fill most of the film’s runtime. He’s mugged by teenagers in the forest who steal his horse Gringolet and his protective garter and literally leave Gawain to die. To visualize the poem’s theme of the cyclical nature of time, the camera turns 360° as a year passes and Gawain is reduced to bones, then the process reverses, revealing him to be alive. This probably isn’t what the Gawain Poet imagined when he wrote
A ȝere ȝernes ful ȝerne, and ȝeldez neuer lyke,
Þe forme to þe fynisment foldez ful selden.
Forþi þis Ȝol ouerȝede, and þe ȝere after,
And vche sesoun serlepes sued after oþer[1]
(498-501)
(A year runs its full course and never yields its like,
The start to the finish rarely folds up the same.
And so this Yule passed, and the year after,
And each season slips away one after another)
But it’s a great scene.
The next adventure, which gets its own title card, is his discovery of a house and its ghostly inhabitant—a girl named Winifred, played by English-Jamaican actress Erin Kellyman, murdered for refusing a suitor. In a burst of true chivalry, Gawain dives into the nearby lake to retrieve her severed skull. This part, possibly my favorite, is inspired by medieval sources other than SGGK. The dive invokes Beowulf’s hunt for Grendel’s Mother, and Winifred and her backstory are from medieval hagiography—though the original Winifred had her head and her life restored by her uncle, St. Bueno.[2] According to tradition, a spring rose from where St. Winifred’s head hit the ground, and St. Winefride’s Well was a popular pilgrimage site in Holywell, Flintshire, Wales, still in operation today. It’s also one of the few specific places named in SGGK—line 700 mentions Gawain crossing at Holy Head, which no doubt inspired Winifred’s part in the film. It was quite a treat to see St. Winifred’s story combined with that of Gawain’s, I was not expecting that level of engagement with other medieval legends.
There were a few other, more subtle, medieval motifs that I caught—or at least made the connection in my mind with, I have no idea if these are what Lowrey intended, but they stood out to me as a medievalist. I’ll cover them quickly so I can get on to more important things about the character of Gawain himself and how the film handles the text.
The landscapes used in the film have a desolate beauty to them. Very rarely is there any green, continuing the theme of decay established back at court. I was reminded of the Wasteland, a motif in Irish mythology as well as the later French Vulgate and Post-Vulgate Cycles of the Grail romance. This may have just been my own association—Gawain is indicated to be one of the knights who helps restore the land in the Elucidation to Chrétien de Troyes’ Perceval, though he would not be the one to complete the quest (Elucidation ll.225-235).[3] The Wasteland doesn’t have anything to do with Sir Gawain and the Green Knight (unless you count the possible translation of Lord Bertilak’s name meaning “High Wasteland”), but this was a nice addition. My favorite scene, next to the part with Winifred, was Gawain’s encounter with giants, which made me think of giants in English mythology like Gogmagog and Corineus and the Irish Fomorians; mythology aside, this scene was absolutely awe-inspiring and my jaw actually dropped. The sickly king, who as I commented is certainly not the Richard II-inspired Arthur of the poem, instead made me think of Edward III—a once-great warrior who is now old and decrepit, soon to be replaced by a younger man—Edward would be followed by his 10-year-old grandson Richard, the king of The Green Knight is succeeded by his nephew Gawain. Appropriate, since the opening shot of a crowned Gawain seated on a throne holding the royal scepter and sovereign orb imitates the famous Westminster portrait of Richard II.
Now that I’ve spent nearly two thousand words on things that have very little bearing on the film, on to the main event: Gawain and how his story is adapted.Dev Patel’s Gawain is not yet Sir Gawain. He’s still in training to become a knight, and we see him knighted after he returns from his journey. He’s young, unexperienced, and looking for a way to prove himself. In the text, Gawain is “þe wakkest… and of wyt feeblest” (the weakest… and of wit feeblest) of Arthur’s knights (SGGK line 354) but he still is a knight (line 377 calls him Sir Gawain). The poem also says Gawain is already “gode knawen, and as golde pured, / Voyded of vche vylany, wyth vertuez ennourned / in mote” (known to be good, and like pure gold / Voided of villainy, distinguished with virtues / dwelling in him) (633-365). I don’t think that inexperience means he can’t be a good person, so I do like this young, awkward Gawain, just learning the ropes of chivalry.
However, the movie doesn’t try to portray Gawain as exemplary moral, or even very nice. The meeting with St. Winifred seems to be the only time he acts in someone else’s interests, he ignores a group of adoring children who follow him, and he rejects his lover, Essel, a prostitute who is sincerely in love with him—but he raises their son as prince, never mind how he discards the boy’s mother when she’s no longer convenient. Gawain’s canonical piety is also ignored. The film is not interested in the poem’s deeper Christian motifs, though it does keep the arming scene which mentions the five points of Gawain’s virtues, including the five wounds of Christ and the five joys of Mary, as well as showing the portrait of Mary on the inside of his shield—which is later broken and lost. Gawain doesn’t even have his prayer for guidance that leads him to the mysterious castle where most of the poem takes place.
As mentioned above, the film is more invested in Gawain’s journey to the Green Chapel than the destination. This is an interesting angle, and it highlights the theme of Gawain’s internal journey. However, it feels strange to an audience member familiar with the poem, since the most important parts of the source take place in one location—the Castle of Hautdesert, home of the Lord and Lady Bertilak. The film finally gets there about three quarters of the way in, and as a result, those scenes feel rushed. The Lord, never called Bertilak (though, to be fair, the poem doesn’t reveal his name until the end), is played by Joel Edgerton, who (along with Sean Harris) was in 2019’s disastrous Netflix film The King, about Henry V, where he was very much miscast as Falstaff (I might return to The King for a blog post at some point). Here, he’s much better as the rugged, jovial host who welcomes the weary Gawain and gives him a comfy sweater and free reign of the castle while he goes hunting. The exchange game he proposes works just as it does in the poem—whatever the host gets during the hunt he’ll give to Gawain, and whatever Gawain gets while resting at the castle, he’ll turn over to the host.
Trouble ensues, both for Gawain and this film’s purpose, in the form of the Lady of the castle, played by Alicia Vikander, who also portrays Essel. As in the poem, she pursues the attractive knight who’s a captive audience in her home. In the poem, Gawain is in an impossible situation while trying to follow the rules of chivalry—if he refuses the Lady’s attentions, he’ll be discourteous to a lady, and knights are sworn to do whatever their lady wants, and if he gives in to her, he’ll be disrespectful to his host and involved in adultery. Plus, however much he gives in to the Lady’s romantic or sexual advances, he must give the same to the Lord, in a culture that has a complicated view of same-sex relationships. Over the course of three days in the poem, the Lady kisses Gawain twice and gives him a girdle, which she made, that she promises will keep him from harm. Gawain gives the kisses to the Lord, but keeps the girdle, meaning he fails to fulfil all the conditions of the agreement.
The film handles this very differently. The Lady gives Gawain the girdle, which was originally given to him by his mother and then taken by bandits; as well as more sexual attention than the poem describes—the result of which is seen, resulting in gasps of shock from the audience in our showing. The scene has a very uncomfortable air to it and Gawain does not seem to be sure if he wants her to do anything, which made me and the friend with me question if what just happened constitutes assault. Gawain is just as disturbed and runs out, meeting with the Lord, who brings him his catch—a boar, as well as the fox who has accompanied Gawain since the meeting with Winifred. Gawain only kisses the Lord once and doesn’t turn the garter (or anything else) over to him, thereby breaking the agreement even more than he does in the poem.
Gawain’s meeting with the Green Knight occurs in the ruins of an ancient church, filled with overgrowth. It’s a gorgeous setting that emphasizes the Green Knight’s precursors in European tradition—the Green Man, especially popular in England, and the Wildman archetype. This movie is nothing short of visually stunning, and this scene is one of its best dressed, as is its namesake. The Green Knight himself is played by Yorkshire actor and BBC Office alum Ralph Ineson as a towering man with wooden skin and twigs for a beard, all green. This differs from the poem’s description of a green-skinned knight dressed in mostly green clothes, but I think his design here is excellent and probably more unusual and visually interesting to a modern audience.
In the poem, the Knight strikes at Gawain three times—missing him twice, for his honesty, and then, after Gawain flinches, nicking his neck in payback for not revealing the garter he received from the Lady. We’ve already seen Gawain falter in the film, both in giving in to the Lady and not being honest to the Lord, and he shows the same lack of character here. This is where I think, while it’s a major departure from the poem, the film truly begins to engage with its source. Instead of the strikes and revelation of the Knight’s identity and purpose, Gawain runs away (prompting N to liken it to Monty Python and the Holy Grail and the bard’s song immortalizing Sir Robin bravely fleeing). What happens next is hard to explain. Gawain is seen to return to his home court, where he is made a knight, succeeds the old king, and marries a noblewoman, but the kingdom descends into war that he cannot end.
Then the film drags Gawain and the audience back into the present, revealing that the entire sequence was a vision of a possible future if Gawain yet again shirks his duty. While the “it was all a dream/potential outcome” trope can feel like a film taking the easy way out and not committing to the ending, it works here if you consider this to be its main point—what if Gawain failed. The film is most interested in potential situations and outcomes that are posed, but not explored, by the poem—what if Gawain was inexperienced and untested; what if he wasn’t a perfect knight, what if he failed at every challenge he encountered?
This means as a straight adaptation of its source material, The Green Knight fails. It changes too many major details and story beats, resulting in a very different ending than the one in the poem. Any medievalist hoping for just a film version of the story will probably be disappointed. However, as a surrealist film that builds on the basic plot and motifs of the poem to explore the potential outcomes of these changes, it does so well. It joins the ranks of La Mort d’Arthur, The Once and Future King, and Spamalot as parts of the Arthurian mythology. Each new version adds its own interpretation of events and characters. That is simply the nature of Arthurian adaptation, which shapes its stories and characters to fit each new era in which they’re told.
Coverage of the film has suggested that modern audiences would not find the upright, chaste Gawain of the poem believable or even likable. In an article about the movie and its deviations from its source for entertainment website ScreenRant, Alisha Grauso writes “while the Gawain of the poem was considered the chivalric ideal of the time, it's a depiction that would be largely outdated today. But an idle, privileged young man who has much growing up to do is something that can resonate with modern audiences.”[6] As a historian who enjoys historical films, I wonder why it’s assumed that an “outdated” character in a film set in his own time would not be acceptable to modern audiences. Dev Patel has a similar opinion of his character. In an interview, he says “One of my earlier discussions with David [Lowery] was like 'how do we make this guy more likable?' because he was really just quite awful.”[7]
I personally think that the Gawain of the poem already is likable. While he is an exemplary knight, he is human. His fear for his life is what prompts him to keep the girdle, since he was told that it would keep him from harm, and after the ordeal, even when Bertilak says Gawain has passed the test and all has been forgiven, he still feels guilty for his fear and dishonesty. The poem introduces a character known for his virtue, then asks how he will act when put in a situation that requires him to be as good as people say he is. I may just be out of the loop when it comes to modern cinema, but I believe that is already a fine premise.
Patel did not read the poem in preparation for his role, saying “I just loved what [the script] did, I didn’t want to have any other… perspectives on it in a way. This kind of crystallized in my head of what I felt the journey was and David’s take on it.”[8] His method of acting, of course, is entirely up to him. Some actors find it useful to research their characters when they originate from history or literature, some find outside research overwhelming and distracting from the version they are to play, and this is perfectly fine. As someone who has read the poem multiple times in both original Middle English and modern translation, I can’t help but wonder if perhaps Patel would have had a clearer grasp on Gawain if he had read it too.
Director David Lowrey says of things that were cut from final film, “…the rest of the material at the castle was just unnecessary. It's all in the poem, if you want to see what we cut out.”[9] This again may be thanks to my background in medieval studies, but I feel that saying “if you want to know what happened just read the book” largely defeats the purpose of a film adaptation of another material—the reason I want to see a film version of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight is that I love the poem and want to see its events portrayed visually. Lowrey, who also wrote and edited the film, was probably right in cutting down the scenes in the castle, since while they work within a book, they would probably be too slow on screen. Writing, even the kind intended to be read aloud, is a very different medium than something visual like film.
However, by leaving out things he thought were unnecessary, he almost completely ignores other aspects of the story that are important. Why was the exchange game so truncated, making that section feel unbalanced? Why was there so little tension between the Lord and Gawain when so there’s so much discussion in literary circles about the poem’s homoerotic potential—a disappointing choice, especially since many fans of the poem online consider Gawain to be a queer icon. Why was there so little of the poem’s medieval religious influences, which are closely tied to the character of Gawain himself? For the most part, I don’t mind the additions, but I do miss many of the things cut.
The Green Knight is a difficult film to review. I began this fully intending to have a short overview of the film and my thoughts as well as a few citations for things the movie references, and for it to be finished a few days after I saw it. This is now the length of most of my college papers. I suppose it is a testament to how interesting the film is—weeks after seeing it I still find myself trying to comprehend what I saw and to decide if I really liked it or not. It certainly was not what I wanted, since I was hoping for something reflecting the original poem and its themes, and I find myself disappointed that Gawain wasn’t portrayed how I imagine him. However, it’s a spectacularly shot film that also has many great scenes and its own ideas about Gawain and his story that certainly have their merit, and its idea of surrealism isn’t just strange things happening, it is still grounded in medieval imagery. It’s strange, but so is Gawain’s mission to confront the Green Knight.
Notes
[1] Thomas Hahn, ed., “Introduction,” in Sir Gawain: Eleven Romances and Tales, TEAMS Middle English Text Series (Kalamazoo, Michigan: Medieval Institute Publications, 1995), https://d.lib.rochester.edu/teams/text/hahn-sir-gawain-introduction.
[2] Sir Thomas Malory, “The Tale of the Sangrail: Of Sir Gawain,” in Le Mort Darthur: The Winchester Manuscript, ed. Helen Cooper, Oxford World’s Classics (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1998), 327–28.
[3] Anonymous, “Sir Gawain and the Green Knight,” Corpus of Middle English Prose and Verse, accessed August 19, 2021, http://name.umdl.umich.edu/Gawain. All quotations are from this version, translations by me.
[4] Mary-Ann Stouck, “Of Talking Heads and Other Marvels: Hagiography and Lay Piety in Sir Gawain and the Green Knight,” Florilegium 17 (2000): 60–61.
[5] Anonymous, “The Elucidation,” trans. William W. Kibler, The Camelot Project - A Robbins Library Digital Project, 2007, https://d.lib.rochester.edu/camelot/text/elucidation.
[6] Alisha Grauso, “The Green Knight: Biggest Differences Between The Movie & Original Story,” ScreenRant, August 1, 2021, https://screenrant.com/green-knight-movie-original-story-poem-comparison-differences/.
[7] Dev Patel, “Dev Patel Interview: The Green Knight,” interview by ScreenRant, video, July 26, 2021, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4jp70ofxjSo.
[8] Dev Patel, interview with ScreenRant.
[9] David Lowery, “I’m David Lowery. I Wrote and Directed The Green Knight. Ask Me Anything!,” Reddit, August 17, 2021, https://www.reddit.com/r/movies/comments/p68vg9/im_david_lowery_i_wrote_and_directed_the_green/.
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