This movie is without a doubt the best adaptation of King Arthur. The acting is spectacular, the visual style is stunning, the action is excellent, the themes from the source material are all there, and the costumes/sets are the best I have ever seen. I don't think anyone will ever make an adaptation that stays so true to Arthurian legend, manages to cover the entirety of the story, and still ends up so amazing.

_Excalibur_ is why I love movies so much. I first saw this epic fantasy as a child, decades ago, when I was too young to know how to dislike a film. The extravagance, the splendor, the passion profoundly affected me and magically transported me to another world. To this day, cinema still has that power, and even now when I watch this masterpiece and recognize its flaws, I am magically transported out of this life... >Anál nathrach, orth’ bháis’s bethad, do chél dénmha.

on the upside, the movie showed a few noteworthy and beautiful landscapes and castles. however, there was serious overacting from every actor. maybe that was just the way acting worked in the early 80s. I really hoped for a gem here, but overall it was a total waste of time. just a sequence of random scenes, time jumps partly with different actors for the same character, no clear distinguishable story, terrible voice over (lips moving while nobody talks, terrible background voices), the producers must have taken some pretty sick drugs, otherwise I don't know how one can come up with so much weird crap. there was way too much screen time for merlin and we started laughing everytime he talked, because most of his lines were pretentious bullshit. maybe one needs to know the general story beforehand, I knew nothing about it

Brilliant movie, the first movie I saw multiple times at the movie theater. Nicol Williamson steals the show as Merlin.