VeteranLight I don't have all the words right now but this film is a work of art.

Chirphymium It's entirely possible that sending the audience out feeling lousy was intentional

Voxitype Good films always raise compelling questions, whether the format is fiction or documentary fact.

Dana An old-fashioned movie made with new-fashioned finesse.

malcolmgsw I watched this on TCM and couldn't quite believe what I was seeing and hearing.Although I marked it 1/10 it is so bad it is hilarious.We have George Sanders who really doesn't look one inch a king nor Rex Harrison ,Saladdin.However the biggest laugh is Laurence Harvey.He is supposed to be a Scot ,so where is his kilt?He does nt pretend to have a Scottish accent.Furthermore he is called Sir Kenneth of Huntingdon.Should be Sir Kenneth of Williams !Huntingdon is near Cambridge and was the former parliamentary seat of ex PM John Major.All I can say is that I hope all 3 got a big fat cheque for their participation as they have left us with a truly awful film full of anachronisms."Don't get mushy over her" says Sanders to Harvey at the end.By my troth indeed!

bkoganbing Somehow King Richard And The Crusaders made the Medved list of the 50 Worst films of all time. I'm not saying it's Citizen Kane, but I've seen far worse. And until The Lion In Winter and Robin and Marian, we have never been given a true picture of King Richard I of England.George Sanders who also in his career played King Charles II, a monarch of a far different temperament than Richard is in the title role. The film is based on the Sir Walter Scott novel, The Talisman and takes place in the Middle East during the Crusades. As in the DeMille epic The Crusades which this bear a faint resemblance, The Lion Hearted King is beset with lots of problems, not all of them caused by the Syrian warrior King Saladin whom he faces in the field. Duke Leopold of Austria and Philip Augustus of France question his leadership of all the Christian nations, his brother Prince John is looking to seize his throne back home and right in camp, he's got a couple of fifth columnists in Robert Douglas and Michael Pate.Pate and Douglas put in action an assassination attempt in which Richard is only wounded by a captured Saracen arrow. Richard's loyal retainer a Scot knight played by Laurence Harvey starts hunting up the assassins. But in the mean time, a truce of sorts is called as Saladin, hearing of Richard's attempt sends his personal physician played by Rex Harrison. There is a romantic subplot going here with Harvey and a cousin of Richard's played by Virginia Mayo. Richard likes Harvey enough, but not to marry into the royal family, especially when as a royal princess, Mayo can be married off for alliance purposes.Sir Walter Scott was one of those authors in the 19th century who cleaned up the Middle Ages quite a bit and invested those bloody times with a romantic aura. He was never more effective in doing this than in his more well known work Ivanhoe. In fact Ivanhoe is almost a sequel of this film as it deals with the capture of Richard by Duke Leopold on the way back to England after the action in this film is concluded and the ransom for Richard demanded and paid.George Sanders and Robert Douglas were both in the screen version of Ivanhoe that MGM did two years before Warner Brothers did this film. Ivanhoe is a much better film, yet King Richard And The Crusaders does hold its own.When the Medveds wrote that 50 worst film book they cited a line that Virginia Mayo says which is "war, war that's all you ever think about Dick Plantagenet". In point of fact that was the thing uppermost in that very bloodthirsty man's mind. More truth than humor there.And you won't get much truth from King Richard And The Crusaders. Still it's not as bad a film as the Medveds would have you believe.

Deusvolt Saw it on its second release in 1962. I liked it then and recalling several scenes, I still like it. First, I fancied Sir Kenneth's very unusual armour which was a deep copper color. I had seen silver and gold finish armor in movies, even shiny black but this was the first time I saw copper colored armour. But wait, in Samson and Delilah (with Victor Mature) the shields and breastplates of the Philistines were made of copper.Memorable is the scene when Sir Kenneth introduces himself to King Richard (portrayed by George Sanders) in Gaellic. Although used to foreign knights as the Crusades were after all a multinational mission of Christian kingdoms, the King nevertheless was surprised that he couldn't discern the language spoken by Sir Kenneth. When the latter informs him that it was Gaellic, George Sanders' blue eyes flashed and he said: "One of the Scotsmen! I swear as soon as this crusade is over and the Saracens are defeated, I will bathe their miserable country in their blood." Or something to that effect. Remember in the 11th century,England and Scotland were rivals in power and were constantly at war over borders with England always trying to subjugate the Scots.I always enjoy listening to George Sanders' rich voice and very cultured but manly intonation which can sometimes be reassuring but at times menacing. His voice over of Bagheera the tiger in Disney's The Jungle Book with its range of moods is superb. The battle and dueling scenes were very good.

ragosaal Have to admit I didn't read Sir Walter Scott's "The Talisman" in which this film is supposed to be based on. If "King Richard and the Crusaders is a good version of the book I'm glad I didn't.This movie is sort of colorful with some acceptable gowns (I didn't say accurate), Virginia Mayo has some good profile shots (I didn't say scenes), George Sanders renders an acceptable performance as the title character and Robert Douglas plays fine one of his usual costume villains. And that's about all.The medieval extravaganza looks definitely as a low budget one with not much credible situations, lots of full speed horseback riding towards nowhere, standard swordplay and that originally ridiculous undercover doctor (Saladin himself) curing his enemy Richard wounded by an arrow thrown by his own men. Nobody understands either why really Douglas wants to kill his king; I mean they say why, but its not enough reason (too standard). And there's one of the most insipid and dull heroes ever in a medieval film: Laurence Harvey as Kenneth The Leopard with a blonde wig, a wooden acting and ridiculous lines in his romantic scenes with Mayo (it's hard to understand how Harvey went into a reasonable film career if his first roles where like this one).The only explanation for this picture being made could be that the producers tried to take advantage of the ticket box's success of "Ivanhoe" (based on Walter Scott's best novel) and "Knights of the Round Table" both released a short time before. If my guess is right, they failed completely.