Thread by @SamiraNadkarni

Pondering the ramifications of livetweeting my watch of #TheGreenKnight. How horny is too horny for main? Cause we're going to approach that event horizon VERY rapidly, friends. Lockdown has been a LONG dry spell.

Oh, I really like this mix of lute with the percussion of the water dropping! Nice. #TheGreenKnight

This film gets straight into a wet Dev Patel wandering about putting a loose shirt on. I THOUGHT I WOULD HAVE MORE TIME TO BRACE. NO ONE LOOK DIRECTLY AT ME, DAMMIT. #TheGreenKnight

There's something really interesting about all buildings in films about the medieval period specifically looking worn and old because that's how we conceive of them now. We never really see new construction or unworn building sides because of unspoken aesthetics. #TheGreenKnight

There's a presumed gap the set design & costumes need to close for viewers which is always a really interesting thing to think about, in terms of aesthetics & temporality, because we cannot visually accept the sight of "new" though this is when they were built. #TheGreenKnight

There's something really cool about sensing the way time is going to be used in this film as a nexus, from Gawain's "I have time" at the start, to this use of imagery, to the whole conceit of a year and a day, etc. There's a nice layering to it. #TheGreenKnight

Am I more into Gawain or his extremely lovely ochre coat? This would not be an easy choice... #TheGreenKnight

Distracted from my lust by how much work the cinematography is doing! There's this constant sense of restless movement that's doing so much to make Dev Patel seem younger than he actually is. #TheGreenKnight

I'm very amused to realise the blue and yellow toned palate is setting up for green (and thus foreshadowing the Green Knight's eventual appearance). God, this is a clever visual. #TheGreenKnight

Beginning to realise that the Sean Connery Christmas crotch film maybe wasn't an accurate interpretation of the poem so now I'm here like "... is Gawain's mom a witch? Why is this scene so ominous?" #TheGreenKnight

Not really relevant to the plot but all the fog and mist with the blue make it seem like the weather would be cool (if not cold) and I'm here like, why aren't there more/ any tapestries on the walls to help hold the heat in? #TheGreenKnight

This is one of the few things I'm sad about because it feels like a big part of this early section of the film is about establishing the power of the king at this moment and a part of that should have been tapestries with legends + the functionality of warmth. #TheGreenKnight

(Though maybe tapestries for warmth was an early modern thing? Unsure. I only know about it because a friend took me to Hampton Court and spent a solid hour telling me about how tapestries would have worked and it was the best time ever, I miss her so much.) #TheGreenKnight

Rewound and rewatched the section where Gawain walks through the doors and into the hall and this is such an interesting choice of architecture for the insides. It reads almost Persian to me (the use of arches, the domes in particular) though ymmv? #TheGreenKnight

(It's times like this I really miss Kritika because I'd just have to pause and turn to her and she'd yell at me about architecture and how I know nothing, how do I know so very little, she will send me a documentary IMMEDIATELY to rectify this, etc.) #TheGreenKnight

Am I reading too much into this? Look at that use of high arched domes as he walks through this corridor. It does feel like the film is melding an architectural style to double down on its deployment of cultural narrative? #TheGreenKnight

I feel like this is a thing because the tops of those doors are pointed and not rounded (though again, ymmv and I can't swear to it because god knows my knowledge of architecture is limited), but I'm going to need to go look this up at some point because HMMMM. #TheGreenKnight

I keep pausing to stare because the temporality of this film's visual aesthetics are so odd to me: on the one hand the worn outsides, on the other this minimalist inside (was minimalism a thing in the medieval period? Churches make me think no?) #TheGreenKnight

It's almost as if the gap these visuals are trying to bridge is also one that's trying to fit the medieval into our current focus on minimalism (justified by the medieval being "back then" and therefore having less, I guess?). I'm more than a bit unsure. #TheGreenKnight

That said, England was considered more than a bit back of the beyond before the early modern period (LOL at British nationalist myths forever) so is this an attempt to echo that? No idea. #TheGreenKnight

(I have managed to watch a grand total of ten minutes of this film in this last hour, and a solid 15 mins of that has been me trying to google books on the history of architecture. Recs welcome!) #TheGreenKnight

The king's son is away but this deeply awkward scene with the king almost makes it seem like the king and Gawain's mom did the sexy boom-boom at least once in the past, which could mean that Gawain is illegitimate? Unclear exactly what is happening right now. #TheGreenKnight

That's right, I called it the sexy boom-boom. You're welcome. #TheGreenKnight

I like the film using calligraphy this way. It doesn't just cordon off sections of the story but serves as a nice nod to the intermediality of the text (the tying back to the poem itself & its translations to this film &contexts). Performance/ written word/ film. #TheGreenKnight

OH MY GOD, THIS KING IS NOT SUBTLE. HE'S ONE STAGE FROM "I'M YOUR DAD"-ING GAWAIN. I'M SCREAMING. #TheGreenKnight

?????????????????? Gawain is the king's nephew?

Also "queefed from her womb" is a verbal visual I will not soon forget. #TheGreenKnight

Paused to stare at the king's clothes and I do love that they've gone with copper instead of gold so that green from oxidising is so visible. His surcoat has metal engraved pieces sown on, this one with a house maybe? It links back to the pieces Gawain's mom had. #TheGreenKnight

I can't remember where I read it (because why would my brain ever be useful) but I maybe remember black dye would have been very expensive and I think getting a stain this dark would have been tough so his surcoat is actually pretty indicative of wealth. #TheGreenKnight

It seems like the engraved metal squares are adhered to his surcoat almost in the style of a chain of office (though I think that came to fashion later).

Strong petition to kidnap the set designer and force them to answer all my questions because I HAVE MANY. #TheGreenKnight

It's a cloak! With symbols on the metal plates. I see a tower (maybe strength?), a bird (could be a reference to lineage or to freedom?), a crown (kingship?), something that looks like a four legged animal (idk)? I'm going to hunt for costume stills later. #TheGreenKnight

I AM SCREAMING AT THESE FUCKING STUNNING VISUALS. ARE YOU KIDDING ME?! LOOK AT THOSE TEXTURES. WHO CARES ABOUT DEV PATEL ANYMORE, I AM 100% INTO JUST THIS SHOT. #TheGreenKnight

100 OSCARS TO THIS SET DESIGNER. 100 OSCARS TO THE COSTUME DEPARTMENT. FIGHT ME. #TheGreenKnight

I CANNOT. Look at the framing of this straight line to the door, foreshadowing. Look at the darker (but grey) clothes on those serving (though cackling at the cone hats). Look how the domed architecture matches the circle table matches the crown. UGH, I LOVE IT. #TheGreenKnight

(ALT text: a gathering in a hall lit by wall torches and light from a window that illuminates a circular table witn an opening on one end around which people are gathered. The king stands at the head of the table such that he stares straight down the corridor at the entrance.)

Just the set design is making so clear that there is going to be thematic use of circles in the narrative (also evident by the fact that we began with Gawain telling this story as his head caught on fire) so it's just *kisses fingertips*. #TheGreenKnight

I began horny for Dev Patel but now I am horny for set design. No regretz. #TheGreenKnight

DESTROY MEEEEEEEE. Circles, but also look how the head coverings are straddling cultural markers. Also, excellent headgear/ hat from this one lady. The echo of that window's circle as well. UGH. #TheGreenKnight

Really glad I'm not watching this in the theatre because the high pitched noises of lust I'm making right now would not be appropriate in public, good lord. #TheGreenKnight

That triangular window is really interesting because it's so abruptly interrupts the circular imagery, much as the Green Knight is about to interrupt the circular and inertia-laden goings-on of this great hall. #TheGreenKnight

A very long time ago I subbed in to teach film theory and interpretation for a year, and somehow this movie makes me miss those days like a quiet ache. I would have loved to take this film into class and had conversations with everyone about what it's doing. #TheGreenKnight

(I should note that I never trained in film theory so no one should assume I know anything at any time. The only thing I'm formally trained in (i.e. hold a degree) is modernism and British poetry. Everything else is just me futzing.)

I'm staring at that screengrab non-stop and that round table (AHA) is weirdly between Byzantine and Art Deco? There's almost an odd Scandinavian boardroom element to it (because of how it's light wood and usually English oak would have been more tan). #TheGreenKnight

Vaguely annoyed by the fact that I know English oak tends to be more tan because youtube shorts keeps showing me videos of people "upcycling" furniture by painting it. I HATE THIS. THAT CABINET'S DRAWERS DOESN'T HAVE ROLLERS. YOUR PAINT WILL JUST CHIP & BE EVEN UGLIER. AAARGH.

LOOK AT THIS. Look how the torches and the natural light from the windows and the open doorway all line up at the top 2/3rd of the screen, drawing attention straight to the shadowed figure of #TheGreenKnight. It's all so pretty and doing so much subtle work!

*the cabinet's drawers don't

Paused here because it seems like a good spot to stop for the day and because I've got errands that I need to go sort out this morning.

Just saw @excaliburedpan claim Gawain's mom is Morgan le Fay and I am so confused because the round table made me suspect this king is either Arthur or echoing Arthur and I'm ??? about the whole thing but now incest is back on the table because remember Mordred? #TheGreenKnight

Are they collapsing Gawain and Mordred? I vaguely had the impression the king in the original poem was not Arthur (I need to get around to reading this poem already!) and I'm now 100% more baffled than when I started. #TheGreenKnight

Back to watching #TheGreenKnight & assured by @excaliburedpan and @erik_kaars that the king in question is Arthur, and apparently Gawain was canonically Arthur's nephew and has super murky parentage where his mom is definitely Morgause but who knows who his dad is (MAYBE ARTHUR?)

Having spent some time mulling what I've seen of #TheGreenKnight so far (spring cleaning is good for reflection, if nothing else), I think I was right in thinking of the sheer amount of labour the cinematography is doing. In particular, the use of movement to convey tone.

#TheGreenKnight's early scenes with Gawain are so full of movement; it feels like the camera never stops tracking him. There's this sense of energy & it does so much to add to that sense of young restless energy, whereas all the scenes once in Arthur's court are fixed & static.

Even the rhythm of the dialogue, which otherwise was so pacey, is slowed here. There is a sense that this is an old court, that there's a certain amount of inertia conveyed with those shots. Gawain in this space is more subdued, the change so evident. #TheGreenKnight

So far, the film makes me read Gawain less as himbo and more "restless with something to prove"? It carries some flavour of 'gritty up #TheGreenKnight' because there's a tonal shift here of Guinevere saying he shouldn't take his place among legends lightly.

Gawain with Arthur says he has no stories to tell, but of course we begin the film with him telling his tale (and we're back to circles), and there's this manner in which the cinematography & set design is driving home divisions and boundaries already. #TheGreenKnight

The use of movement is one way of setting this up (Gawain vs others in Arthur's court), but also this visual. The line across 2/3rds of the screen is a clear symbol of the division between worlds, something that will be transgressed soon. #TheGreenKnight

https://twitter.com/SamiraNadkarni/status/1429608330108887040

At this point, having spent some time with this 15 min opening, I'm a little wary about what it is foreshadowing: I sense that Gawain's turn from himbo to younger man with something to prove is setting up a tale of masculinity, poor choices & toxicity? #TheGreenKnight

I may be wrong about this, and I'll admit it's a gut feeling for now, though I'd argue the opening scenes support me on this: Guinevere's chiding to not take his place among legends lightly, and that opening scene where his head is aflame. These are warnings. #TheGreenKnight

And so most of yesterday was spent trying to think through what it means that the first production of #TheGreenKnight with a brown Gawain is shifting from (contextually white and very bisexual) himbo to a man driven to prove himself becoming a firey cautionary tale. Troubling.

I plan to keep watching but it's something I'm trying to work out for myself pre-emptively as I go - what it might mean to tell that particular story with these particular visuals at this particular time & how that fits narratives of who has access to "chivalry." #TheGreenKnight

Chivalry itself is a loaded thing (I still can't remember the name of the person or where my notes are, but there was a great paper on medieval chivalry as rape culture) and it's going to be interesting to see how they navigate that in #TheGreenKnight.

I remain vaguely confused by the fact that the opening shows Gawain holding all the symbols of kingship because I don't remember him becoming king in anything I've been told, but I'm also not super familiar with #TheGreenKnight's original poem so I'm pretty much learning as I go.

Oh my god, the mistletoe was an actual thing! My brain is now trying to flash me (extremely unwillingly) back to Sean Connery's Christmas crotch and I am desperately resisting! #TheGreenKnight

https://twitter.com/SamiraNadkarni/status/1324389562873884673

... That codpiece is so bulbous. Will I ever be free of this visual!?!??! #TheGreenKnight

Oh, interesting! Guinevere taking the letter from Arthur (potentially to preserve Arthur, potentially because any attack on her would breach chivalric codes?) and this seeming possession as she reads and speaks with the voice of #TheGreenKnight.

(Vaguely off topic, but Mitch & I have been chatting about the gothic & possession as symbolic of penetration & the way stories that later use the trope of a woman having no memory of what is framed as violation (but the men remain knowing) play to rape culture.) #TheGreenKnight

Rewound to check but how interesting that as Guinevere begins to breathe deeply and before she begins reading, as she is backlit by green, the next two shots focus on the women in the room watching her. Not Arthur or Gawain or Merlin but these unknown women. #TheGreenKnight

There's something so marked about this film's use of sight/ knowing here: Morgause covered her eyes as she wrote in the ritual, Guinevere's eyes are filmed over as she performs this ritual. Guinevere has stopped reading & is simply reciting now. #TheGreenKnight

Presumably the green knight is mute here as well, and there's choices being made here to equate disability with the uncanny that I don't think are a great choice personally. (I suspect these are added elements rather than stemming from the original poem?) #TheGreenKnight

Genuinely in rhapsodies about the lighting, costuming, and clever cinematographic choices being made in #TheGreenKnight. Look at this choice to have Gawain and those two aides mirrored on either side in shadow, presumed to be of no consequence to this. That close up of Arthur >

as he realises no one he glances at is willing to take up the challenge (he himself is old). Gawain speaks then from behind Arthur, at a point where he cannot be seen, and then the shift in focus from foreground to background so Gawain is now lit by the windows. #TheGreenKnight

The camera angle in the first shot keeps him in sight but minimises the light coming in from the window behind him, but the third makes excellent use of it. The grey of his garments parallels the two cone-wearing aides, rather than the bluer grey the others wear. #TheGreenKnight

(Just here screaming non-stop about mise en scene, don't mind me.) #TheGreenKnight

There's something about how cracked open Gawain's face looks as Arthur whispers "remember, it is only a game" that's oddly pointed. This following close to his visible vulnerability when admitting he has no stories is setting something ominous up re: masculinity. #TheGreenKnight

Why does Arthur seem to call him Garwin? Is that the correct pronunciation? (And if so, oh no, I've been pronouncing this wrong for as long as I've known about this tale!) #TheGreenKnight

??? Did Arthur just give Gawain Excalibur??? #TheGreenKnight

Ah, I see what everyone means about the odd Christian imagery. Hmmn. #TheGreenKnight

Oh god, paused because I suspect I know exactly what is about to happen and I'm STRESSED out because the foreshadowing, it's HERE. #TheGreenKnight

This film is doing such clear parallels: as Gawain jumps over the table, he spills wine on the flagstones and it resembles blood. As the green knight lays his axe down, soft golden moss rises. So much foreshadowing of intentions. #TheGreenKnight

I went back to listen to the green knight's challenge again and it makes mention of only the need to nick him, only to strike a blow but not to kill. Arthur's whisper of "remember, its only a game" is a warning but Gawain hears it as something else. #TheGreenKnight

We're ramping up to that particular idea of humiliated masculinity and an insecure desperation to prove oneself tied to Gawain's youth, and the fact that the green knight does not speak means Gawain might strike an unarmed man in his desperation to prove himself. #TheGreenKnight

I'm trying to listen to my gut on this because the film is trying to talk about masculinity (via power & vulnerability) and codes of conduct, but there's something about visibilising these transgressions & questioning these beliefs via a brown man... idk. #TheGreenKnight

The film is layering all these nuances to what is being said: Gawain asking "what do you expect me to do?" completely at sea but desperate to do what he feels is expected. Guinevere saying "have courage" asks us to think what courage means in this scenario. #TheGreenKnight

And again, that contrast between the frantic, jittery energy of Gawain versus the slow, measured movements of the Green Knight echoes the earlier scenes as well. In a lot of ways, Gawain feels out of time in this film & I mean that both ways. #TheGreenKnight

His immaturity makes it evident that he feels pushed to prove himself once in the court (thus wanting to already have his stories and feel part and not apart), and this sense that his own rhythms don't match with anyone else here (who are older & measured). #TheGreenKnight

There's something so telling about the way these close-ups are framed. Even as he's about to act, as he's coming to his decisions, he's not centred in the frame. He's off to the right, which builds anticipation but also reads like he doesn't feel in control. #TheGreenKnight

Given how skillfully this film uses framing, the absence of light, his isolation even as he is conscious of people in the room (watching, judging, waiting), the person he is speaking with leaving him alone to decide... there's so much going on here. #TheGreenKnight

Went back again to rewatch the early scenes after Gawain is given the sword and it's fascinating that the framing shifts from having both the Green Knight and Gawain centred in the frame to Gawain then off centre (emotionally & quite literally in the shot). #TheGreenKnight

(Has it taken me 3 days to get around to watching more than 20 mins of this film? Yes. Is this why I never get anything useful done? HOW DARE YOU but also yes.)

Arthur closing his eyes and looking away as Gawain beheads the Green Knight. There's a really interesting shift here from the way the 1980s movie set up this scene & what's happening here in terms of presumed knightly battle, masculinity and codes of conduct. #TheGreenKnight

The Green Knight speaks only after Morgause removes the cloth covering her eyes, his laughter echoing as he leaves. There's something interesting in the choice to only have him speak after the trial, once Morgause seems to end the spell. #TheGreenKnight

I do like that the film is playing with how we're meant to navigate this scene: the horror of what Gawain first did, the uncanny of the Green Knight's return, his mocking laughter as he leaves (carrying his head); parsing the horrific against the uncanny. #TheGreenKnight

In the original poem, does he put his head back on or does he carry it away? There's interesting choices in the film leaving the Green Knight headless as he rides away (because it makes me think of the myth of the dullahan, though it's unlikely that's the intent). #TheGreenKnight

I'm unsure what to make of the star in the centre of the framed circle of the round table lit by the circular skylight and suspect I'm missing something here? I do love the choice to juxtapose frames, this visual return almost seeming like the circle has rotated. #TheGreenKnight

Google has helpfully provided an answer: The pentagram, representing the 5 wounds of Christ, plays an important symbolic role in the 14th-century English poem Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, in which the symbol decorates the shield of the hero, Gawain. #TheGreenKnight

How interesting that the entire visual is then set up to have blood spilled dishonourably staining this circular floor (echoing the shield), that call of "never forget what happened this Christmas day" doing so much work to ask us who Gawain has acted like. #TheGreenKnight

There are engravings on the Green Knight's axe and I can make out what seems like either a rearing deer and potentially something above it. The scene feels specifically like it's meant to evoke nature (or the hunt?).

I like #TheGreenKnight showing different tellings & reactions: the knights clapping, Arthur's quiet & distant horror as he takes Excalibur back, the children watching the play as a story that makes them gasp and laugh, the antipathy Gawain shows, his lover's fascination with it.

I have to admit that Dev Patel's antipathy in this scene is so familiarly Dilli fuckboi that I am here just staring into camera. I am too old to find this sexy; that ship sailed a long time ago! #TheGreenKnight

I like the way juxtaposition of scenes & voiceover are used; there's such interesting use of silence & speech in this play-within-a-play (as there was in the scene with #TheGreenKnight). The film is building out from writing to narrative to mythmaking to recounting to performing.

I particularly love that the scenes are framed to have such a distinction between the act itself and the audience viewing this. It's doing such clear work in setting up how this myth making works, who its audience is, what is said and left unsaid & why. #TheGreenKnight

Oh, I do like the inclusion of a portrait scene! A thing I used to love discussing in class (and that many students were always baffled by) was the fact that portraits weren't always meant to be accurate: they were painted in the style of the period & to purposes. #TheGreenKnight

Clothes, for example, were used to designate the person's wealth or their status (and so use of particular colours could say a lot about a person's standing). Jewellery would be added in to designate class and social position/ opulence. You see that in this scene. #TheGreenKnight

I dunno about the choice to have the painting so closely hew to realism because I would have assumed a lot of medieval paintings would have used iconography and symbolism & been about presumed inner virtues more than extremely accurate features? Unsure. #TheGreenKnight @katiegtj

@katiegtj I'm also a bit surprised at the choice to have a full length single person in this piece vs something more like the top half or 3/4th of the body. But I'm also basing this on being dragged repeatedly through the National Portrait Gallery (which I loathe). #TheGreenKnight

@katiegtj (It's okay to like portrait galleries! It's not my personal preference so I mostly find it incredibly boring unless accompanied by someone who can explain nuances that make it interesting. Otherwise this is one step from looking at a rando's vacation photos. Sure I can, but why?)

@katiegtj From what I vaguely recall (and I'll admit again to being potentially wrong on this), three dimensional portraits were introduced towards the end of the 14 Century, so this would actually be accurate in that sense because #TheGreenKnight is late 14th C (afaik).

The more I think about it, the more I think @excaliburedpan is on to the fact that one of the film's references in Byzantine in nature. The use of the yellow and blue really adds to this feeling as well. Hmmn... #TheGreenKnight

@excaliburedpan Just noticed that the painter in question is a woman. Well done, film! #TheGreenKnight

Whether or not I know anything about medieval art (I know nothing), I think the film is using the portrait in the way I've suggested: to show the distinction between the portrait used to convey noble virtue & symbolise strength with the reality as distinct. #TheGreenKnight

"Was it not just a game?" feels like such a childish thing to say, but it gives us so much room to think about how normalised the gamification of death is: everything from the colonial origins & contexts of board games, to shooter games & drone warfare, etc. #TheGreenKnight

I do think the film is using its roots in the original poem (the Christmas game) to talk about the ways in which games seem to have no consequences, except they do because they are often geared towards teaching us contexts of power & keeping us to "the rules". #TheGreenKnight

I know so very little Arthuriana but general media depictions of Arthur I remember tend to be much younger (particularly since Guinevere and Lancelot seem to leave before he gets old?) so this particular representation feels unusual. #TheGreenKnight

I think this plays into the inertia of the old and established court, and does set up the seeming difference of Gawain's quite callow youth to Arthur's measured exhaustion. It's doing something with masculinities here that I'm still thinking through. #TheGreenKnight

There's something telling in the fact that the plot is saying that a year has passed and nothing has changed despite the myth making the rounds: Gawain still lacks a purpose & seems as immature as ever but the camera doesn't dart about after him anymore. #TheGreenKnight

I think the shift from tracking shots to a more fixed medium or medium long shots are supposed to convey Gawain's being stuck; that original sense of restlessness shifting into what reads like apathy. #TheGreenKnight

This whole "you have mud on your face" scene is so unexpected. There's something wholly unexpected in the way this film is presenting Arthur, utterly unlike any of the media depictions I've seen before. I'm not quite sure what to do with it. #TheGreenKnight

The heavy-handed metaphor about Gawain's public persona aside, there is a really unusual amount of face touching and quiet caregiving here. This film is either going VERY hard on Arthur is his secret dad and/ or is softening Arthur's role (to what purpose though?) #TheGreenKnight

I do love that Morgause has a coven in this film, and that they're mixing domestic labour with magic (the sewing of his clothes). The juxtaposition with the Latin (?) mass (?) is fairly expected, though I'm surprised Guinevere is who names the blessing. #TheGreenKnight

I'm more than a bit ambivalent at how heavyhanded the scenes between Gawain and his lover are; it feels like #TheGreenKnight is trying almost too hard to make a point here, and isn't willing to trust that we already understand the deconstruction of masculinity + honour + chivalry

This is the first real moment in this film where there are no layers. It's just thumped down in front of us, and it's all the more unwieldy for it. I quite dislike this because I have no sense of Gawain's lover outside of her being used as his foil this way. Meh. #TheGreenKnight

The three primary women in this film—Guinevere, Morgause, and Gawain's lover (unsure what her name is)—seem to be playing to specific tropes of womanhood as well, and while I have a sense of what the first two portray, the third eludes me entirely. #TheGreenKnight

This film is doing such interesting things with material: the creation of Gawain's garments and his belt, the painting on the inside of his shield with Guinevere naming what the blessings are meant to invoke, etc. #TheGreenKnight

By putting these together, there's a paralleling of different forms of faith, different practices of craft, the materials of those crafts made visible as well (the shield, the painting, the clothes, the belt + the holy water, the scratched runes, the herbs, etc). #TheGreenKnight

I may be wrong here, but it does feel like #TheGreenKnight is leaning further into magic as a part of court culture (rather than hidden and only practiced in the shadows) than I've previously seen in Arthurian media. It also shows magic specifically as political use, which is new

The Green Knight's presence is no doubt a chance for Gawain to make his mark, but there's multiple political implications in Guinevere reading the spell vs Arthur, the seeming necessity of clergy to sanctify the quest only made possible by magic, etc. #TheGreenKnight

There's nicely collapsing parallels here that are doing some really interesting stuff. Courtly romances are very reliant on witchcraft as a trope, so the idea that it is solely reviled isn't actually the case (afaik), & was more of a push & pull of power dynamics. #TheGreenKnight

Though, of course, caveat again that I haven't studied witchcraft in the medieval period (and I'm drawing heavily from patchwork memories of a paper on witchcraft in medieval Europe I once heard ages ago at a random panel, so it's worth looking up more). #TheGreenKnight

(This livetweet is a shady testament to the fact that, if left to myself for more than 5 mins, I will inevitably attend the nearest panel available to me, no questions asked.)

(Whoops, accidentally split this thread so adding this tweet back in): @katiegtj has confirmed that I was roughly right about medieval portraiture so I'm feeling extremely pleased with myself. (There's quick additional info here: getty.edu/art/exhibition…) #TheGreenKnight

This extended scene where Gawain refuses to respond to these children is so telling in & of itself. I almost feel like shaking whoever decided that heavy-handed scene with the "why are men not satisfied with goodness?" thing and yelling SEE, YOU CAN DO IT BETTER. #TheGreenKnight

For all that Gawain is the focus of #TheGreenKnight, he is so very isolated. His conversations seem largely people talking at him rather than with him, and while the implication is that he's swept up in something he has no control over, this is the real result of his actions.

I do like the way #TheGreenKnight is playing with previous interpretations of the tale; we'd half expect Gawain to have made much of this year (he has not), or to ride out ready to prove himself (he is at a steady slow walk), or show more than apathy (he does not).

UGH, THE FUCKING CINEMATOGRAPHY. I know I'm screaming about it a lot but COME ON, LOOK AT THIS LONG SHOT. LOOK AT THE COMPOSITION. And it's held just a fraction too long to drive home that sense of waiting for something to happen (that won't). #TheGreenKnight

The lingering in these shots, or their rapid shifts, are doing so much interesting stuff with time in this film. In particular the way in which folklore and myth-making works during this period (eg someone was asleep for a hundred years that felt like a day, etc) #TheGreenKnight

There's the idea of visiting with the fae and returning hundreds of years later, or of having your life stolen when you are still a youth (as Gawain fears). Time is more malleable, and I do feel like the camera work in #TheGreenKnight is playing with that sense of suspension.

"What do you do with just a year?" makes you think time would speed up, the camera would speed up, we'd be cutting from scene to scene, trying to fill everything in. Except no, there's this long lingering vista that Gawain barely seems to even pay attention to. #TheGreenKnight

ARE WE REALLY DOING A FLASHBACK RIGHT NOW? IS THIS FILM TROLLING ME?!?!?!?! #TheGreenKnight

(Googled the name of Alicia Vikander's character because I can't keep calling her Gawain's lover, and it's apparently Essel. My brain is now an endless refrain of the Essel World jingle because I was a child in the 90s and that jingle is burned into my very soul.) #TheGreenKnight

So, is Essel a sex worker? The film shows them as partners, and from what I remember, marriage among non-nobles was more agreed upon cohabitation than the kind of formal ceremonial system than we have today so absolute chastity might not have been a thing? Unsure. #TheGreenKnight

Went to look up how sex work would have been contextualised in medieval Europe and Britain at the time (to see if that helped make this any clearer) and there were some regulations, though it remained stigmatised: daily.jstor.org/regulating-sex… #TheGreenKnight

#TheGreenKnight continues to fail Essel. I understand what they're trying to do here, but it's impossible to carry through because the film isn't giving us enough of Essel outside of her interactions with Gawain to know her & Gawain is the dating equivalent of a mushy turd.

It feels like she's supposed to have genuine emotions for him and I'm here like, why. Give me one instance in which we're given some reason for her to love him. Heck, forget love; one reason to even like him or think he's capable of care. #TheGreenKnight

Justice for Essel, basically. I honestly think she'd be much smarter than this film gives her credit for—sex work often means building skills to quickly read people, and it's baffling to me how much these scenes don't account for that at all. #TheGreenKnight

Via @skazka_9000: "Essel seems to work in a bathhouse (some of her outfits remind me of the illustrations in the Wenceslaus Bible) > 1/2 #TheGreenKnight

Via @skazka_9000: so I understood her position as kind of marginalized in a way that’s incompatible with courtly protocol — client-facing sex work/being Gawain’s paid mistress/both." 2/2 #TheGreenKnight

Paused to go get some dinner.

Caffeinating to deal with being up this early but now I'm Back to watching #TheGreenKnight this morning. There's something quite cool in the fact that the film is actually staying fairly close to the idea of unadorned mail and leather garments with textiles added in for fashion.

That textured belt, his cloak, the chainmail, the horse - there are reasons these battlefield scavengers think he is a knight right off the bat. This guy's interest in the belt in particular seems to affirm this? (I'm going to have to go away & check later). #TheGreenKnight

This film is so horny for ruching and I am now also horny for ruching, a thing I never thought I would be into but ugh, it is 2021, just let me have this. #TheGreenKnight

(Side note: if anyone has a good book rec that talks about sewing/ materials/ patterns/ clothing in the medieval period, I would very much appreciate it.) #TheGreenKnight

Such an interesting use of the camera pan (in a circle, ofc) to show the passage of time one way and then reverse it to the present. Again, I think this film is using its camerawork in ways that are SO INTERESTING when it comes to the themes of the medieval text. #TheGreenKnight

There is the obvious implication of time passing & reversal, of one particular outcome vs the other, but also the mise en scene isn't going for realism here: the bones are too clean, the clothes are unmarred, no animal scavenging. It emphasises the unreality. #TheGreenKnight

Which is such a complex thing because I feel like #TheGreenKnight is using so much of what would traditionally be associated with realism, while also keeping to the ways in which realism is subverted in the tale itself. It's such a smooth transition, honestly.

There's something I can't quite put my finger on in terms of the way this film keeps playing with the idea of seeing/ knowing: the skeleton in the coffin cage near the crossroads had cloth covering its eyes as Gawain looked at it. Gawain sees the dead soldier. #TheGreenKnight

And then of course we see one of the possible outcomes of this course: Gawain himself dead and unknown in the woods, his skeleton simply one among the many so far (the one in the coffin cage, the ones on the battlefield, etc). It points to loss of individuality. #TheGreenKnight

Which is so interesting because individualism the way we understand it after modernity wouldn't have been a convention during this period, so this film is doing some careful bridging of our expectations of what #TheGreenKnight should convey vs what the original poem offered.

This use of seeing/ knowing is undercut in so many ways: Morgause covering her eyes as she performs the ritual, Guinevere's eyes going blank as she speaks for #TheGreenKnight, the way Gawain is seen vs the different versions of truth under this, our own watching of events, etc.

The fact that #TheGreenKnight is leaning so heavily into showing that knowledge/ reality/ the narrative is unfixed (quite literally showing possibilities: the puppet play showing Gawain's death, this scene playing out Gawain's death, etc) feels more modernist to me than medieval?

The use of layering and instability, the fractures and multiple narratives, the use of the template of knightly honour in ways that destabilise what is understood by knightly honour... this feels modernist. #TheGreenKnight

Full disclosure: I'm a modernist so there's bias here.

(I may have now started the clock on getting my ass handed to me by several medievalists, OH NO). #TheGreenKnight

Since I'm mulling, #TheGreenKnight is doing some extremely cool things with gender, knowledge production & material production, particularly in the scene with the woman painter (crafting Gawain's image) & Morgause and her coven crafting his armour (clothing & protection).

I personally can't remember a lot of media focused on the medieval that somehow doesn't try to strip sewing from clothing production to make it simply a way of coding class and gender. I do really like that this isn't the case in #TheGreenKnight.

This choral soundtrack's use of rhythmic sticks for its percussion sounds like a clock ticking, which is so interesting because it comes back to the percussion of those water drops at the start too. For the millionth time, I'm gonna say it: #TheGreenKnight is playing with time.

Such a pointed call back to the scene in the hall: the frame of a circle, the body collapsed on its side, the broken shield where there was a splatter of blood. This film does such cool things with inside/ outside, repetition, & him subverting death (just like #TheGreenKnight)

We already know #TheGreenKnight is doing this disruption of inside/ outside in some sense: the lead scavenger says "this is the chapel" and then the camera holds a long pause as we see the portrait of Mary & the baby Jesus on the inside of Gawain's shield before it is destroyed.

Which really leads so neatly and subtly to the inevitable thing the film is laying out: what constitutes the world as it is understood and its rules? This kingdom? Its people? Is it the hall? Is it the quest? Is it these repeated moments of isolation? #TheGreenKnight

Again, this feels so darn modernist as a conceit because there's something quite distinct from what I've presumed (and might be wrong about) is the medieval idea of the quest being a way of finding the self & place in the world via an agreed upon narrative > #TheGreenKnight

and the sense that the rules are shifting, the boundaries are unstable, the outcomes are unclear, the roles are set but fit badly, isolation is constant, this exploration seems to teach us nothing, etc. #TheGreenKnight

This may seem oddly basic but I do think there's something to be said for distinguishing the fact that this is a modern take on the tale versus simply a contemporary take. The two get conflated quite often but there's particular theoretical frameworks here. #TheGreenKnight

There is a difference in a narrative that would have a young man/ boy go on a quest and earn his spurs, thereby shifting his identity from young to established, from noble to knight, etc. That sense of role in the social order affirming identity is pre-modern. #TheGreenKnight

I'd argue that the film so far shows Gawain not knowing his identity whether noble or knight, and it feels like the quest is part of this exploration (in a sort of traditional bildungsroman), except how much is Gawain truly coming into himself. #TheGreenKnight

I will admit that Dev Patel grimy with one tit out, writhing on a forest floor, is not leaving me unmoved, friends. JFC, he's filthy but I'm so much filthier. DO NOT LOOK AT ME. #TheGreenKnight

(2021 is the year of being horny on main with many regrets. Oh so many regrets.) #TheGreenKnight

I have mixed feelings about the soundtrack. I do really like its use of percussion, but outside of that I feel it goes so much for the expected thing that I don't think it adds very much. It doesn't layer as well with everything else for me, though ymmv. #TheGreenKnight

Paused to go eat breakfast because I am starving.

This scene with Winifred is a return again to the undermining of seeing/ knowing: her head is in the spring, "it may look like [her head is on her neck] but it is not," this uncanny of her being the sort of liminal alive/ dead (like #TheGreenKnight).

I do really like the choice to visibilise how transactional courtly rituals and quests are underneath the veneer of honour and chivalry. The film is making so evident how much of "honour" is dependent on whether someone recognises your being & rights or not. #TheGreenKnight

I'm using "being" here fairly deliberately because Gawain in this scene draws parallels to himself and Winifred, but he was the one who chose to behead #TheGreenKnight to escalate what was "a game". His questioning whether she is human or spirit feels like a call back to that.

The film plays with liminality: earlier as Gawain followed the sight of the fox and discovered the dead soldier, the first impression was merely of someone seated against a tree. We have #TheGreenKnight too, then Gawain's possibilities in the circle, now Winnifred as well.

This is the second time the fox has appeared, which clearly means I'm missing something. What were foxes supposed to symbolise in medieval culture? The only one I know of is Reynard who was a trickster and is part of satirising the court. Unsure. #TheGreenKnight

It's a bit fascinating how #TheGreenKnight negotiates boundaries of being: Gawain is constantly held to knightly codes, yet he is not a knight (even says he is not a knight). Winifred refers to him as a knight but points out that "a knight should know better" than to touch her.

But there is no way to ensure that these courtly codes and rituals are adhered to; as Winifred's story shows, being seen as noble/ carrying a title is no guarantee of honourable behaviour. Plus, as mentioned before, there's a lot of rape culture in chivalric tales #TheGreenKnight

There's something very pointed in Winifred noting that it makes no difference whether she is real or not, that she simply wants her head and needs help; that she has to verbally slap Gawain down when he makes getting her head a transaction. #TheGreenKnight

I keep circling this is because it's coming back to that idea of gendered knowledge: Winifred knows more about the conditions constituting the gap between how a knight should behave and the reality, about what things appear to be and their truth, than Gawain does. #TheGreenKnight

This lighting doesn't work for me. The abrupt switch to red is clearly meant to symbolise something (likely blood) but it doesn't read as easily? A simplistic psychoanalytic reading would be the birth of him as an honourable knight (the water a sort of womb)? #TheGreenKnight

I'm not sure. Either I'm missing something or this is oddly crude in terms of its symbolism. Either way, I don't think this scene works and I'm getting so tired of this high pitched chorus. It all feels like it is trying too hard. #TheGreenKnight

The calligraphy changes so much over the course of the film, and I wish someone who knows more about medieval manuscripts could talk about the choice to move between these different fonts and discuss what they're likely to be drawing on/ alluding to. #TheGreenKnight

I don't know much about this but there are, as far as I know, at least two distinct styles: you'd have a sort of semi-informal court cursive which was for administrative work in the court and a formal lettered script which tended to be used in books? #TheGreenKnight @elrambo

@elrambo Which makes me wonder if the intention here is to indicate the different writers who would have used the template of Arthurian legend to write about Gawain, and thus #TheGreenKnight is making reference to this collage of narratives (even as it undermines them). @erik_kaars

@elrambo @erik_kaars There is, at least to me, a sense of the communal construction of narratives being visibilised in #TheGreenKnight itself: the puppet show, the scene with him and Essel discussing what the whole event felt like, the creation of the portrait, etc. So this feels like it adds to that

There's definitely going to be a gap between the calligraphy the way a medieval text would have it and the way it appears here, particularly since it's using modern English, but I would say the shifts are pointing to something and this is my best guess. #TheGreenKnight

Was Reynard ever part of the Arthurian tales? I know nothing about this and am getting increasingly frustrated with the limits of my knowledge. (A solid reminder to get on with doing the reading rather than futzing all the time, ugh.) #TheGreenKnight

I WAS NOT PREPARED FOR THE CUTENESS OF FOX CUDDLES. HOW DARE THIS MOVIE ATTACK ME WITH THIS ADORABLE ENERGY. #TheGreenKnight

Such an unusual use of a low angled long shot. There's something oddly surreal about how the vista looks, and the angle somehow gives Gawain's figure unusual proportions. It makes him seem ungainly, which really adds to that sense that he's exhausted & struggling. #TheGreenKnight

Gawain is eating what look like wet cave mushrooms and I'm 99.99% certain we are about to watch a medieval knight trip his ass off. #TheGreenKnight

Oh god, I beg you, no more soprano chorus. TRY ANYTHING ELSE, FOR HEAVEN'S SAKE.

This film doing so much to make less obvious choices in a hundred ways but this soundtrack is repeatedly bringing the most basic energy to the table and the contrast is SO STARK. #TheGreenKnight

It shouldn't have to be said but here goes: you can totally make a film set in the past without relying solely on the exhausting quality of a lone soprano reminding everyone of being forced through long hours of some religious ceremony or the other. #TheGreenKnight

So much texture and use of chiaroscuro! I like the choice to use this while Gawain trips from the mushrooms; it does feel like it's intended to emphasise his own body as real and the reality of the cave he's sheltering within in contrast to his visions. #TheGreenKnight

(There's something hilarious about Dev Patel wandering about outside in the cold wrapped in an embroidered grey pashmina; the thing that nearly every mom in the north owns and which I've had thrown at my head any time I've taken a train up to visit relatives.) #TheGreenKnight

Wait, are the giant nude women from the original poem or is this something the script writer decided to throw in? Because I'm very confused. #TheGreenKnight

I'm so confused about this extended scene. I've no idea what I'm meant to be getting from the giant nude women vocalising together???? Is this still... the mushrooms???? I would have said no but I also do not understand what's happening here. #TheGreenKnight

Oh, I love the textures of this extreme long shot: the way the moss echoes the colour of Gawain's cloak, the cracks in the rock with the moss pushing through echoing the early scene where #TheGreenKnight lays his axe on the floor of Arthur's hall and moss grows in the cracks.

Unable to shake the feeling that I am somehow 3 seconds away from a Bollywood remix dance scene. That aside, what an interesting mix of textures: velvet and what looks like either embroidered satin or silk? Turquise seems an unusual choice of shade. #TheGreenKnight

The costuming in this scene is lovely & odd all at once because it feels more aggressively modern than anything so far. This blue gown with its flow structured by all this tight ruching. Gawain wearing what looks like an Ambercrombie cotton shirt from 2010? #TheGreenKnight

I suspect the use of contemporary cuts and fabric styling is intentional & used to add to the experience of this moment as unreal; the sort of illusion that's seemingly grounded in what feels familiar but has enough of a gap that you can tell it's not quite right. #TheGreenKnight

These ceilings! I'm currently paused to just stare at them because WHAT. I would have assumed these were far later than the medieval period but I also know nothing about this sort of architectural flourish so someone/ google needs to explain! #TheGreenKnight

This visual is also interesting just from what it's coding in terms of what would have been the wealth of an average lord or lady, which I don't think would really have been the case? It feels like the film is coding "opulence" to make it comprehensible for us. #TheGreenKnight

Most of my recollections of homes and castles in the older parts of Colchester tended to be low ceilings with wooden beams. Higher vaulted stone ceilings were for churches mostly? I couldn't swear to it but this does not read medieval to me at all. #TheGreenKnight

There's aspects of it that remind me of Powderham Castle (though again, Powderham is darker wood and was extensively renovated in the late 18th and 19th Century) so I don't know how much this holds? #TheGreenKnight

So @ehorakova points out that the ceiling really looks like the neo gothic Fantasia hall ceiling in Walpole’s Strawberry Hill. @NussbaumAbigail says the scene was shot in a 17th Century castle. Pallavi is informing me that the film was shot mostly in Ireland? #TheGreenKnight

(Now being unmercifully mocked by Pallavi for taking ages to watch a movie. Remind me again: why am I still taking her calls?)

Per @ehorakova: "It’s significant because Walpole is a pioneer of both neo gothic architecture and the gothic novel [...] So some resonance maybe re: the imagined/ recreated/ fantasised national past & relations to sexuality and power and lit possibly?" > 1/2 #TheGreenKnight

Per @ehorakova: "Otranto is all about weird bodies, knights out of nowhere and revenge coming due." 2/2 #TheGreenKnight

Between @ehorakova and @NussbaumAbigail, we've established that it's Charleville Castle (erected 17th century), but that the ceiling in the dining room was designed by William Morris who was a 19th C London based medievalist designer conversant with Walpole. #TheGreenKnight

This actually makes me feel a lot better for thinking parts of it reminded me slightly of the other castle renovated around that period because this bump up in opulence would likely have been the result of colonial funds. So this echoes my feelings on the opulence #TheGreenKnight

With Arthurian legends basically baked into British nationalism, the use of this later opulence to code imagery around a medieval period piece acts plays very much to traditional ideas of ideas of empire and heritage. #TheGreenKnight

But it's fascinating that this is taking place in the lord's castle where real & illusion mix where we are between worlds, between times, between realities, between identities: Gawain is on a quest but not a knight; the lady is and isn't Essel; etc. It's liminal. #TheGreenKnight

And this reflects in how we're allowed to read the film: against the original tale but apart from it, as British nationalist myth but subverting it, a tale about the past & the present but dependent on what reading we privilege. #TheGreenKnight subverts our own seeing/ knowing.

What is happening to that egg and why does it look like there's is the top of a scallion wedged into it??? #TheGreenKnight

I know Christine de Pizan was French but something about having this character dressed in blue as she discusses being a writer and a scribe makes me think the film is maybe trying to evoke this. I'm not sure about this but it is the first thing that came to mind. #TheGreenKnight

Paused to go make lunch.

"Sometimes, when I see room for improvements, I make them." This feels so aggressively on the nose. Again, I'm so baffled by a film that's otherwise so trusting of its audience choosing to have these scenes that are about as subtle as a wet cod. #TheGreenKnight

WE'VE COME TO THE SMOOCHES. I AM BI AND I AM READY. SMOOCH THAT BOY NOW. #TheGreenKnight

I really like what #TheGreenKnight does with doorways. There have been a couple of scenes so far: Gawain entering Arthur's castle, one of the coven entering the room in the tower, Gawain entering this house, this one with the lady closing the door to this hallway.

I love how #TheGreenKnight seems to use these to denote thresholds or points of change in Gawain's journey. Thresholds are also, very famously (say it with me), liminal spaces: neither within nor without. I love that these scenes offer brief moments of opening unto/ closing out.

(Imagine me here, the equivalent of the gentleman Pooh meme, holding a monocle and mouthing the word "liminal" exaggeratedly with my entire tongue. Oh yeah, this bitch read some Derrida in her day.) #TheGreenKnight

I can't read this (though I wish I could), but I'm enjoying the cleverly shaped book. I do really like that there is marginalia, including a faint sketch on the right hand side of a woman and a child. #TheGreenKnight

I'M SCREAMING. IS THIS A FUCKING REFERENCE TO NIEPCE'S CAMERA OBSCURA? IS THIS A FUCKING HELIOGRAPH? OH MY GOD. #TheGreenKnight

This is really doubling down on the 19th Century references! There's some parallels (she seems to paint the pewter in oil which was probably lavender and bitumen) but there's definitely creative liberties (this process would have had to take days, not seconds). #TheGreenKnight

I'm so utterly delighted! #TheGreenKnight is just so self-consciously open about its references to media: the writing, the books, the telling, the paintings, the heliograph, the puppet theatre; it's so conscious of this incredibly vast expanse of representation & performance.

God, I could write a fucking book on this film without half trying, are you fucking kidding me with this self-referential postmodern turn! ARE YOU TRYING TO MAKE ME SCREAM THIS HOUSE DOWN?! #TheGreenKnight

Paused to go help Ma with laundry.

Back now and I'm still just screaming (sorry, Ma!) about how playful this use of realism TO UNDERMINE REALISM is. Also, the choice to link the medieval period to the 19th Century says really interesting things about British imperial narratives. #TheGreenKnight

From what I remember, the British were hugely obsessed with medievalism in the 19th Century and romanticised the hell out of it, particularly Arthurian legends, and this was a period that emphasised this idea of rich heritage (with opulence) & courtly manners. #TheGreenKnight

So this mise en scene isn't just any random mix of time periods thrown together but is actually a really conscious positioning of this notion of a return to a great and magisterial past. What's fucking gold is that #TheGreenKnight is straight up labelling this fantasy.

Am I here aggressively chef's kissing my fingers because I deeply enjoy the subtle "fuck you" this offers to British nationalism, particularly post-Brexit? Yes. Yes, I am. This is fucking gold. #TheGreenKnight

We're back to the soprano and I want to shake the composer for this film because I loathe this ridiculously banal choice of soundtrack. WHY. WHY THIS. #TheGreenKnight

Wait, aren't we going to get to the lord asking Gawain for smooches too? He gave you a gift too, so there should be smooches, Gawain! Where are the smooches? #TheGreenKnight

HO HO hoooooooooo ALL RIGHT, WE'RE GETTING TO IT NOW.

My delighted cackling aside, we're back to a sort of transactional structure for courtly rituals and honour (previously undermined by Winifred, but otherwise kept up by #TheGreenKnight, and this lord and this lady.)

Paused to think because I'm not sure what we're meant to do with that: Winifred's being and history are seemingly a challenge to the idea of the courtly ritual and the transaction, so are we meant to see this as Gawain not learning this despite encountering her? #TheGreenKnight

"It's terrible. Every man should see it at least once." This is simultaneously telling and horrifying; in sum, it is an accurate representation of a solid 72% of dude conversations. #TheGreenKnight

Oh interesting! I've said that I think #TheGreenKnight is trying to undermine the idea of inside/ outside and seeing/ knowing and this whole speech by the lord regarding no mysteries in his home is bang on the money for it. It's textbook; home is nation is family is honour.

This whole speech is so fascinating, and the nexus does seem the be her use of verdigris. There's so much this is drawing us back to: the copper of Arthur's crown, already showing green at its edges (echoing the older court and Arthur's own waning as he ages)> #TheGreenKnight

The moss that pops up among the stones of the castle as #TheGreenKnight lays his axe down (again, a reference to time and taking back of spaces once seemingly colonised; this sense of a resistance to order and designation of inside/ outside); the green of his axe as well.

The resilience of #TheGreenKnight who both is and is not of this world, who is seemingly killed but able to return. Verdigris in the pigments used by medieval painters and scribes to tell these stories (which are themselves shifting narratives told to the context of the time).

There's something a bit odd about the fact that verdigris (to my very limited knowledge) falls out of favour in the 19th Century, so we don't actually see it used as much because other pigments become more easily available and aren't as likely to shift tone > #TheGreenKnight

so why use that very specific context for this moment in the film when so much of the visual framework is that of the 19th Century? Unsure and a bit baffled. #TheGreenKnight

Anyway, it's a lovely choice of symbol because verdigris is so unstable and unfixed (part of the reason it was abandoned as a pigment), darkening or lightening based on the world it is in, & that's a perfect metaphor for the unfixed narrative & the quest for self. #TheGreenKnight

What I'm particularly taken by—to an honestly startling degree—is the fact that by using verdigris in this way, #TheGreenKnight links this idea of the chivalric quest to the unfixed, evolving, & somewhat unmappable self. Again, it's using medieval symbols to talk about modernity

(I have been horny about mise en scene for most of a week now and it's honestly a relief to just be horny about dialogue for a change.) #TheGreenKnight

I do love that the film now has so many images of Gawain throughout—his portrait, the daguerreotype from the heliograph, the puppet, tales about him, etc—but they are all skewed versions that serve purposes, but not his. It's quite visibly meta. #TheGreenKnight

The way the camera lingers on the portrait, on the puppet, on the daguerreotype means we have to pause and ask what this is for, what it conveys, why it needs to be created, what knowledge and purpose it serves. Even with realism added in, what is the aim? #TheGreenKnight

Which feels like a question #TheGreenKnight self-consciously asks us to reflect on via its use of different means of representation (writing, painting, heliography, storytelling, conversation, etc); we're supposed to be asking what making this story feel real accomplishes.

Of course we're circling so neatly to nationalism, origin myth, and historical moment. Even with all the interruptions of fantasy in this film, the quest to find oneself is usually pretty universal. What's interesting is how little Gawain seems to accomplish this. #TheGreenKnight

I'm still muddling through very mixed feelings on this: on the one hand, his inability to discover himself through the rituals of the quest does feel like an undermining of British nationalist myth (a plus in my book). > #TheGreenKnight

But at the same time, I really wonder if the choice to centre a brown man allows for a certain dismissal from the very colonial nationalism this works to undermine. I wonder if it might subversively propound false & racist stereotypes of weakening nation, etc. #TheGreenKnight

I'm still really undecided on this and I think there's always going to be a certain amount of risk in challenging nationalist narratives used often purposed to racist ends with racebent narratives that do not speak directly to race. A lot may depend on the ending. #TheGreenKnight

What does it mean to have a brown man in this film that's drawing links between a contemporary moment in Britain to the 19th Century to the medieval period, trying to use an origin myth to subtly reference colonialism? What does this say or accomplish for us? #TheGreenKnight

I'd like to think it opens us up to complex and unstable histories, but I wonder which complex histories are made evident through the choice to make this a film with race so front and centre that never talks about race. That gap is repetition, and not unusual. #TheGreenKnight

Anyway, YMMV but the longer I sit with this film, beautiful and startling as it is in a hundred different ways (except for the soundtrack; I continue to side-eye whoever was in charge of this), the more I'm asking myself to sit with its politics. > #TheGreenKnight

Because inherently, any film that positions itself as taking on a nationalist myth (that's been repeatedly turned to racist purpose) does need to be interrogated from that particular axis. In this, I personally feel like #TheGreenKnight is rather hollow. (Again, ymmv).

I like this section with the lord poking holes in Gawain's ideas about honour (as #TheGreenKnight is drawing links back to Essel's discussion of good vs great men) and the idea that it would only take this one thing to "prove" Gawain has "honour"/ is "worthy" as a knight.

"I wish I could see the new you." I'm back on my horse thumping on about modernism & liminality because IT'S RIGHT THERE. The idea of rebirth, of dying, of living is constantly being destabilised (as is identity), so what is the line one draws for old self vs new. #TheGreenKnight

The central conceit of the film seems to be the questioning of how one achieves honour/ how a person knows themselves and it's oddly hilarious that this is a film reinterpreting #TheGreenKnight which is a text that's very clear on exactly how courtly ideas of this nature worked.

Paused to go chop veggies for dinner.

Back at it early this morning. I like the way the film slides from the lord saying he will miss this fun and these games, to the wood panel painting showing the lord hunting Gawain (and are we meant to see Gawain linked back to the fox here? Unclear). #TheGreenKnight

This is so interesting because it is so clearly the game: she is dressed to parallel her husband in the previous scene (and therefore we're to remember that Gawain has promised to hand over anything he receives), and so this is part of the presumed game of honour. #TheGreenKnight

This is such a WEIRD scene with him possibly jacking off with the belt but also ripping it off her, the whole "you want it, take it" thing. It's deeply, deeply weird and feels messily manipulative. #TheGreenKnight

The axe is brown in this scene, so I presume that's symbolic of Gawain's potential to grow honour being shown to be a fallow field? #TheGreenKnight

#TheGreenKnight keeps returning us to this: Gawain among knights yet apart from them in Arthur's halls, his refuting that he is a knight when taken by the scavengers, his breach of courtly protocol pointed out by Winifred, the scene with the lord before the fire & this scene now.

It's really driving home the distinction between what Gawain sees is the quest (only the final battle) vs what the quest might truly be (everything leading up to it and who you are in the process), which is of course the whole point. #TheGreenKnight

... Are we about to see Gawain give the lord a handy? OMG OMG OMG. #TheGreenKnight

SMOOCHES ARE ACHIEVED. #TheGreenKnight

I'm a bit sad they did not fuck or rub one out because Gawain and the lord oddly had far better chemistry than Gawain and the lady, and there's that repetition of "Take it" from the scene with the lady becomes "I will take it" with the lord. #TheGreenKnight

Normalise telling Gawain he looks submissive and breedable. #TheGreenKnight

Trying heroically to dampen my fervent joy at A TALKING FOX to listen to the actual dialogue in this scene, but between fox cuddles and ADORABLE TALKING FOX, I am scream! #TheGreenKnight

I love that you can so clearly hear Morgause as an undertone when the fox says "come home with me." Attacking his companion in this petulant outrage really does drive home how Gawain has learned absolutely nothing in this quest, not even to heed a warning. #TheGreenKnight

This film really repeatedly offers marker after marker for Gawain to heed warnings, to understand the rules of the game, to heed the rules and follow them, to understand the presumed knightly code underlying these rules, and yet he never does. #TheGreenKnight

Interesting. This scene with the fox is one of the few scenes where we have a visible fade out to mark a closing of this chapter. Presumably that's because this was his last warning before he faces the battle? #TheGreenKnight

Went back to see if I could find any similar pleated material in green on the Green Knight in the first battle but didn't see any. I did only just notice the runes on his armour, which is an interesting touch. #TheGreenKnight

This choice of yellow-toned backdrop as Gawain is confronted by the fox is so telling because, for all that he seems to be resolved to a knightly quest and insists he will go forward, Gawain has acted the coward over and over and repeatedly transgressed. #TheGreenKnight

There's such a lovely use of tonal shifts between the copper of Arthur's aging crown, the ochre of Gawain's dirtied cloak, this tinted yellow of the final scene with the fox showing the gap and/or the potential for Gawain to be knightly/ kingly/ honourable vs not. #TheGreenKnight

Plus, in a film evoking so much of the history of media and narrative (and I think it would be so easy to write a good, solid paper on this), this use of yellow tinting is so reminiscent of the early 20th century in film-making to convey tone. #TheGreenKnight

I'm back to cursing this chorus. I know the idea is to use something equivalent to conveying a building sense of drama and suspense but it's been a style used so heavily in this film that it's just repetitive! I don't know who did the music but I HATE IT. #TheGreenKnight

Just stunning, ugh. So much symbolism of doorways & thresholds, the bright vs dark lighting conveying the shift of scene once he enters, this sense of his entering a space distinct from previous ones (that line of real/ unreal), the journey of this visual tunnel. #TheGreenKnight

Just yellows and greens in these scenes, no blue (not even the sky) which feels like a nod to the fact that this will now be between Gawain and the Green Knight. I like that they've kept it silent for this part with no overwrought chorus. #TheGreenKnight

This is just so stunningly pretty. #TheGreenKnight is back to taking long, quiet pauses to play with time, but also, it's a way to draw notice to the fact that so many of Gawain's trials (where there was quick action) have preceded this. The point was hardly this final battle.

There's something particularly lovely in the way Gawain and #TheGreenKnight look at each other here; these long glances and pauses. As a presumably climactic scene, it stretches beyond the point of just drawing the scene out into a kind of quiet breathing with that I like a lot.

There's something genuinely wrenching in Gawain's broken "is this really all there is?" because it does really drive home this idea of what the courtly quest was meant to accomplish, what it supposedly did, what it supposedly proved about you. #TheGreenKnight

Dev Patel has done a frankly phenomenal job in this late section because, as frustrated as I am with Gawain and as much as he's extremely (medieval) fuckboi, the desolation of that question was just such a wrench. #TheGreenKnight

The framing of this! It's really startlingly beautiful and the shot uses vignetting to sort of narrow the scene just to its specifics as Gawain gets on his knees, paralleling the sense of his world narrowing to just this moment, this small space he can feel. #TheGreenKnight

(Back to being extremely horny about cinematography. It is 9 am on a Tuesday. Good grief.) #TheGreenKnight

Oh this return and the doorway is really nicely done. His inability to remove the belt, his silence throughout. You can almost see his movement from being broken by having to confront himself to shock and shame to now an internal justification for it all. #TheGreenKnight

This whole section with Arthur and Guinevere is very confusing because I don't know that I've ever come across any Arthurian tales where he is old or dies in bed. WITH HIS WIFE? (Are we 100% sure this is supposed to be Arthur? I have some questions.) #TheGreenKnight

I love this. The crown is so much more tarnished; you can see so much more verdigris and it's so telling how distinct his style is from Arthur. There's a sense of tight control offered here via costuming. (Also, the structured lines of this clothing! THAT RUCHING) #TheGreenKnight

Yet again, this whole scene with Essel and the baby feels like a choice to make this about Gawain and to create Essel solely as unknowing and innocent gendered victimhood. I'm genuinely frustrated by this constant hurting of Essel to speak to Gawain's character. #TheGreenKnight

This film does not do Essel any sort of justice and I'm genuinely quite pissy about it. This is just shoddy writing. #TheGreenKnight

Staring at the weird tidal tie-dye of Gawain's tunic like ???? but at least it is not the ruffled monstrosity of a dress this lady has shown up in, HOLY CAKE ALERT. (Is her makeup meant to remind me of Padme in Star Wars???) #ThGreenKnight

Such a startling shift in colours from the start of the film, this use of blues and whites. There's still grey in the mix but it's a shift to a much lighter palate than Arthur's court. #TheGreenKnight

This dress feels like a bad idea that got away from a designer on Project Runway. I've been declaiming my newfound lust for ruching but if this is the endgame of that particular personal quest from me, I too (like Gawain) and taking a hard left and booking it. #TheGreenKnight

Having stared in horror for a while now, I'm going to venture a guess that it's evoking Queen Elizabeth. Between the red hair, the ruffle that taking over her body (oh no), the presumable idea of power & virginity, plus this film's mixed timeline, it seems viable. #TheGreenKnight

I AM SCREAMING. IMAGINE THIS WEIRD DISGUSTED MEDIEVAL FOX FACE STARING AT YOU EVERY NIGHT AS YOU FUCK OR TRY TO FALL ASLEEP. I'M DYING. #TheGreenKnight

I'm curled over, genuinely wheezing, because @skazka_9000 has pointed out that Gawain's bride is basically dressed like a Raffaello. #TheGreenKnight

I watched the last few scenes to the end and after a bit it became quite predictable. I was half-expecting that it would be one of the potential futures playing out, and it seems I was right. The ending is, honestly, a bit of a let down. #TheGreenKnight

Personally, I feel the weakness of the ending is premised on the fact that it is Gawain's imagined future and thus everything is solely about him and it plays out such a tediously predictable conclusion. We've seen this narrative before; there's nothing new here. #TheGreenKnight

The choice to play out those last, very predictable scenes as a reinterpretation or an alternate telling actually undermines so much of what the film seemed to be trying to do. It's genuinely frustrating but, in my opinion, this film did not stick the landing. #TheGreenKnight

I don't know about you, but any film that goes from the search for individuality and takes a sharp turn in the last 15 mins into nihilism (regardless he dies alone with his head chopped off) is just going to annoy me. It's peak indie dude cinema and it bores me. #TheGreenKnight

I'm sorry but if the whole point of making a 2 hr film is to say "the point is to ask what is the point of all this", that's just your average undergrad philosophy student aggressively wanking while musing about existentialism. I'm too old for that emo teen life. #TheGreenKnight

For all its promise, I think #TheGreenKnight's conclusion is trite and predictable & ruins the film a bit for me. The standout work is the costuming and the cinematography. I would quite happily pitch the music director into the nearest lake. The writing needed more work. 6/10.

I've been informed that Essel wasn't even a character in the original film, which means she was literally written into this film to be a half-baked foil for Gawain's ability to be cruel. JFC, I'M EVEN MORE FURIOUS ABOUT THIS NOW. #TheGreenKnight

Note: As a general rule, I'm not particularly interested in what David Lowery intended or what his underlying purpose was (I'm vehemently of the school of 'the author is dead') so I prefer to see what the film accomplishes and what contexts it might sit in. #TheGreenKnight

At the end of everything, I think my hesitance to read #TheGreenKnight as doing anything valuable with racebending was the right call. I think this film attempts a specific idea of a universalised search for identity/ masculinity that's defaulted to whiteness. It misses depth.

And, in general, I don't know that you can talk about an Arthurian legend without talking about its links to British nationalism and thus white supremacy. So ymmv, but that was always going to be something I was thinking about with the film. #TheGreenKnight

Anyway, I'm glad to FINALLY be done with #TheGreenKnight and now will wander off to percolate further on it for a few days. People were really kind and sent me a bunch of threads which I'll probably read over this week but which I'll add below for anyone interested.

I'm excited to read this thread about costuming in #TheGreenKnight! (Thank you to the person who sent it via DM)

https://twitter.com/NataniaBarron/status/1422348143233011712

I'm also going to go through this thread that @excaliburedpan sent me on costuming and interviews with the costume designer in #TheGreenKnight:

https://twitter.com/vandroidhelsing/status/1428210444230021130

Anyway, after a solid week of watching nothing but this film, I'm finally FREEEEEEEEEEEEEEE.

This, by @ShinyNickel91, is maybe the best interpretation I've seen so far of the (frankly rather odd) giants scene. #TheGreenKnight

https://twitter.com/ShinyNickel91/status/1432333311037300747

I could put cash money on a white dude writing an academic essay on how #TheGreenKnight's use of existentialism is incredibly meaningful because HOW DO WE KNOW OURSELVES EXCEPT THROUGH DEATH, MAN'S ISOLATION, etc, etc. I'm exhausted just thinking about it.

https://twitter.com/SamiraNadkarni/status/1432674653000986633

There's a reason I don't read much European philosophy anymore; there's only so much time you can emo-wank to how ethical responsibility is framed through the isolation of death before you realise that this is an abstraction predicated on vulnerability conceived through whiteness

... Not that I'm hugely generalising about an entire subsection of a discipline (except I totally am and I'm not particularly sorry).