A Knights Tale

It might remind you of a Hindi film towards the end but that's part of its daring. Posing as a medieval story about jousting, A Knight's Tale's about reinventing the period drama, a job Moulin Rouge failed so royally to do. To begin with, peasants watching a tournament chant Queen's We Will Rock You. Then Robbie Williams, Dan Powell, Eric Clapton, Sly & the Family Stone, and groups like Heart and Third Eye Blind, pitch in at 'appropriate' junctures. These include the romance between a peasant (Heath Ledger) in the knight's role and a fair maiden of noble origin (Shannyn Sossamon) and contests, which seems more like charged espn stuff than tension-ridden clashes familiar to fans of the period genre. The highpoint is David Bowie creating a rock soundtrack for a Gothic ballroom dance. By then we've seen Geoffrey Chaucer (Paul Bettany) as Ledger's cohort, while creating a humorous, less then earnest ground for the birth of English fiction. Director Brian Helgeland sticks to the usual formulae of the chivalrous tale, giving it a renaissance feel of sumptuous fun and frolic.