Memory Loss & Morality: The Buried Giant

This week in class we discussed the myriad themes in the novel The Buried Giant by Kazuo Ishiguro, and the questions that arose from those themes. Among other things, we discussed morality, trauma, and motives. Tying these themes together was a question regarding the ethicality of King Arthur’s decision to have Merlin cast a memory loss spell over the English and Saxon people. 

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This spell, which caused both parties to forget their differences and history of conflict, was effective in securing peace but had other negative consequences. This was very interesting to me, as well as to the class, and our interest in the matter was reflected by the significant amount of time we spent discussing our varying opinions on Arthur’s actions. 

While thinking about this and trying to formulate my own opinion, I was initially unable to reach a conclusion. After continued consideration, however, I found it necessary to engage in the debate using a different approach. Instead of considering Arthur’s actions at face value as purely moral or immoral, I realized that it was necessary to think about his decision in terms of underlying motivations. While he ostensibly directed Merlin to cast the spell in order to affect peace between the two warring parties, I began to wonder if Arthur did so simply in order to mask his own guilt in the situation. He was the one responsible for the war between Saxons and Britons, as his orders directly led to the gratuitously brutal attack on the Saxon village, which in turn precipitated retaliation and the subsequent war that followed. By all appearances, Arthur is the one at fault for the whole situation. 

(Is King Arthur, shown above, as brave and noble as we have been led to believe?)

Did he simply want Merlin to cast a memory loss spell in order to hide his own culpability? In this case, the spell would surely be considered immoral and unethical. Or, on the other hand, were his intentions, as we might expect of King Arthur, nobler? What are your opinions are on this matter? What do you think was the true motivation behind Arthur’s decision to order Merlin to cast his spell? Depending on your opinion, was doing so an ethical thing to do? If so, why? If not, why?

Why We Like The King Arthur Movie

In the modern movie interpretation of the long loved mythical tale King Arthur we see a handful of changes compared to the Geoffrey of Monmouth article. When investigated, these changes are quite historically inaccurate and definitely do not correctly represent the article we read. For example, in class we talked about the fact that in the movie trebuchets were used but the trebuchet was not invented until the 12th century but the story of King Arthur takes place in the 5ht or 6th century. Another example of this is the inclusion of a strong female lead played by Keira Knightley while there are not any female characters of major importance in the Geoffrey of Monmouth text. Now one could say that these changes are made to make the story more modern as this is a 21st century piece of film but I would disagree as there are other aspects of the film that are not as modern thinking such as the strange nudity scene involving Keira Knightley as well as the the scanty outfits that the Woads wear compared to their male warrior counterparts. So if there are all these inaccuracies about the tale of King Arthur in the film, then my question is why did it do so well in theatres both in the United States and worldwide? The movie made a $50 million gross in the United States alone and earned another $150 million in the rest of the world.

My hypothesis for as to why this movie reaped in cash while seeming low effort is quite simple. People don’t really care about historical accuracy or complete gender equality when they are going to see a movie. Especially when it comes to the action/adventure genre movies are judged based on how cool that fight scene was or how capturing the plot line is not how historically accurate the story is. This is the reason why we see a lot of action movies nowadays that are loosely based upon or even just draw one or two aspects of a story from medieval or earlier times and then modernize it to appeal to audiences of today.

King Arthur’s “Realism”

Throughout the film King Arthur, we are led to believe that this may be a more “realistic” retelling of the story. Many of the mystical and magical aspects of the story are not present in the movie. Yet many historical inaccuracies exist as well. This begs the question: was the movie trying to be a more realistic version of the story of King Arthur or simply a different take on a well known story?

The answer I believe is a mix of the two. Magical events are often convenient ways of moving a story forward, but they are not very convincing. Pulling a sword from a “magical stone” was the focal point of many of the other versions of King Arthur. King Arthur the movie remedies those parts of the tale by ignoring them or not putting much emphasis on them. At the same time, realism is suspended in the movie for the sake of entertainment. Armor piercing crossbows and large longbow battle formations were not the way Romans or Saxons fought their battles. Roman “knights” were not present in their empire, at least not in the way the Knights of the round table were portrayed in the movie.

A more realistic representation of how a Roman soldier would look

What does this all mean for King Arthur as a movie? Its attempt at a different version of the classic tale shows an interesting version of Arthur as a man who is just like everyone else. He overcomes his trials through determination and faith instead of divine intervention (as he said in the movie, God was supposed to take his life, not the lives of his men) or magic. The viewer only needs to accept in this version that some of the historical information is not entirely accurate for the setting. Whatever take the creators of the movie were going for, they had considerable freedom because of the lack of real information on King Arthur as a person.

Reimagined Legends, New Beginnings

During the film King Arthur we were presented with a modern day version and what the producers say is a historically accurate look at the legend of King Arthur. But how true does the movie actually hold itself to the legend of Arthur? For our class on Monday we were told to read Geoffrey of Monmouth’s version of the King Arthur, and for myself personally I felt it was as historically accurate as it could be because at the end of the day it is still a legend, and a legend is usually a story told to entertain people. So is it wrong for the movie to claim that it represents a legend in a modern context, while not necessarily referencing the legend or holding true to the version of the legend that we read? Is it bad that this movie creates an almost new chapter to add to the legend of King Arthur? That it simply relies on the legend in name and some of the big overall details about the legend?

I don’t think so. Instead I believe that by creating this movie, the story of Arthur spreads to a wider and more diverse public. By making a movie about King Arthur, interest is created in the legend that the movie comes from. You also have a chance of spreading the legend to a wider audience. By creating a movie you create a more accessible way to learn about King Arthur because its easier to watch a movie than to read about a legend and since it is a movie, it is advertised to get people to go and watch it and this usually works out very well. So why create this movie that is loosely based on the legend of King Arthur that we read from Geoffrey of Monmouth view? The same can be asked of basically all other movies based on King Arthur throughout history, and any other movies based on legends. I believe the answer to this is to simply keep the legend alive and to keep spreading it. I believe by creating a newish movie we put the legend in a new modern day light and allow a new audience to learn about it in a way that feels so dated.