THE GREEN KNIGHT, the Whimsy of David Lowery, and the Dishonorable Immortality of Legend
“Look, see a world that holds more wonders than any since the earth was born. And of all who reined o’er, none had renown like the boy who pulled sword from stone. But this is not that king. Nor is this his song. Let me tell you instead a new tale; I’ll lay it down as I’ve heard it told. Its letter sent, its history pressed, of an adventure brave and bold. Forever set, in heart, in stone, like all great myths of old.”
The Green Knight opens with the promise of an adventure brave and bold, like all great myths of old, and for the opening minutes, it seems as though that might be the kind of adventure we will get. Gawain, a young nephew of the legendary King Arthur, has been invited to the Christmas party at the Round Table, where he hopes to gain attention from the knightly giants around him after years of youthful passivity. Halfway through the Christmas Feast, a mysterious Green Knight appears on horseback and beckons the other men to join him in a game of friendly combat. Gawain, motivated to prove his honor, takes up his uncle’s sword Excalibur and strikes down the knight in a symbol of strength.
Only that’s not the whole story. Dev Patel’s Gawain (notably absent of the ‘sir’ title from the original story) is kind-of the medieval equivalent of an unmotivated twenty-something loser who skipped college and still lives in his mom’s basement. He has a relationship with a prostitute named Essell, but he’s unwilling to man-up and make her his lady (or leh-deh) in any committed adult sense, despite her humble pleas for his heart. When asked to tell a tale of his knightly heroism, he says “I have none to tell.” He’s mostly skating through life on the heels of his family and his vaguely upper-class status.
And then The Green Knight comes along to set him straight! Or that’s what the story would have you expect.
Back in 2019, when I first saw Greta Gerwig’s Little Women in the theater, I immediately felt that it was one of the best onscreen adaptations of a book I’d ever experienced. That feeling only deepened on the rewatch; the brilliance of Gerwig’s screenplay was that she was able to “have the cake and eat it too” - staying faithful to the original source material while also subverting expectations (a hot-button phrase) and commenting on the origins of the story in a fresh and metatextual way. The Green Knight, in all its splendor, joins this club of adaptions, also.
It’s also, like, really funny? And really entertaining? And full of rich new thoughts upon every rewatch?
I’ve been a big fan of David Lowery’s movies for a few years, sometimes despite my natural instincts telling me they wouldn’t normally be my thing. On paper, A Ghost Story sounds like it would be utterly pretentious and self-important and burdened, perhaps enough to be unwatchable. Onscreen, though, it just works. Lowery’s direction has a rare sense of playfulness that can allow even the most deadly serious premise the opportunity for whimsy - not through actual jokes, mind you, but through a tonal clarity that gives room for the viewer to imagine Lowery himself grinning cheekily behind the camera even in the midst of the heaviness. It’s a rare blend of self-awareness and sincerity.
Some have mocked A Ghost Story for the fact that it expects the audience to take seriously the image of a man in a bedsheet for two hours, but the key to Lowery is that he doesn’t expect you to take it entirely seriously. The image of Casey Affleck standing in a bedsheet is inherently comical and tragic and silly and dark. Lowery leans into the oddity of it all.
Lowery has mentioned here and there that The Green Knight might actually be his first real comedy movie, and once you catch the vibe, some of it is hilarious. When The Green Knight dramatically rides out of the castle holding his own head and cackling maniacally, it’s hard not to chuckle when the camera cuts back to Gawain standing frozen with a wide-eyed look of “oh shit.” Other times, Lowery’s humor shows up in quirky and subtle subdued ways, like how nearly every character in The Green Knight says Gawain’s name differently - including King Arthur, who bafflingly sounds like he’s saying “Garrrrwin.” In an interview, the director said, “some of it is regional accents, some of it is whimsy.” Lowery is so cheeky that he even admitted to including references to the Star Wars prequels in The Green Knight. I’m still searching for all of them, but the closest I’ve been able to find is that Barry Keoghan’s character pointedly says “hello there.”
Many have compared the ending of The Green Knight to The Last Temptation of Christ, but Lowery likens it more accurately to the ending of Raising Arizona - which speaks again to the eclectic nature of his influences. And if Coen Brothers and prequel references weren’t enough, The Green Knight opens with a whispered voiceover of a passage from the original poem that Lowery translated himself. The voices we hear are actually those of Lowery and his wife, but they sound an awful lot like a reference to Galadriel in the opening of The Fellowship of The Ring.
One of the elements of the original story that is emphasized and fleshed out in this film adaption is that our Gawain is a bit of an antihero; his lack of chivalry is so pathetic that it often comes close to comedy. If he were played by any other actor, we might not even be rooting for him - but here, Dev Patel’s effortless underdog charm often comes in clutch. Some have gone so far as to say that Patel’s Gawain isn’t even a hero worth rooting for at all, but I must say that on my 3rd viewing of the film, I started to view him in a far more sympathetic light than before - both as a boy who is manipulated by everyone around him from the start, and as a young man who has seemingly lived without a father figure for the majority of his life. It’s not hard to imagine Gawain as a very troubled child, bullied for being the fatherless son of a witch and even (in a serendipitous example of casting elevating subtext) shunned by the other kids for his darker skin color. Of course, these are all just things we might imagine about the young Gawain…but one of the wonderful things about Lowery’s enigmatic storytelling is that he’s really, really, good at leaving room for speculation - or, to use a modern word, allowing the possibility of headcanon. Many have theorized about the deeper meaning and intentions of the post-credits scene of this film, which depicts a little girl playfully trying on the king’s oversized crown, but Lowery responded to the curiosity by saying simply, “I wanted people to leave the theater feeling optimistic. That was a little moment we grabbed on set and it just makes me happy.” This response feels almost microcosmic toward his fast-and-loose approach to the “canonical” and “non-canonical” details of the stories he tells. In a recent Reddit AMA about The Green Knight, Lowery even acknowledged several fan theories about the film by saying “wow, you taught me something about my own movie! I’m going to own that interpretation!”
There’s a legendary, mythic aura resting on the first 20 minutes of The Green Knight. The film opens with a cryptic, static shot of animals on a farm while a building slowly burns down in the distance. Eventually, a brave man and his lady get on a horse, he draws his sword, and they flee. It’s a powerful and microcosmic opening shot, but Lowery’s musings on the A24 Podcast reveal it’s more than that: he says the whole image is meant to abstractly represent the Fall of Troy, the event that begins the original poem. After the man and woman - vague representatives of Paris and Helen of Troy - flee the scene, the camera pulls back to reveal this was all occurring outside Gawain’s window as he slept through the morning. It feels like a direct callout to the adventures and legends that are occurring and influencing all around Gawain’s world, outside his window, and maybe even in his dreams, while he sleeps through it all.
Gawain is living in the shadows of these giants - and perhaps, even searching for a father figure among them - from the very start of The Green Knight, and when The King suddenly and fortuitously invites his nephew to join his table, many questions spring to mind. Is Gawain actually, perhaps, Arthur’s bastard son - much like the son he will have in his vision of the future toward the end of the film? Was Arthur’s sudden fondness for Gawain completely manufactured by Morgan Le Fay, who seems present in every interaction they have? Is the king remorseful for an empire he has created by spilling blood, or is he truly, naively unaware of his own impact in the world? Either way, Arthur’s Christmas party starts as apparent wish-fulfillment for any aspiring knight; Gawain is beckoned to the side of the king and told that his uncle wants to know him more deeply, and Arthur even lends him the sword pulled from the stone to prove his worth in front of the entire round table.
From time to time over the years, there have been A24 movies (especially toward the horror genre) which feel so preoccupied with their own darkness and aesthetic gloom that the characters don’t even feel like real people, showing little affection or kindness or levity onscreen. Within the first few minutes, Lowery’s film makes it clear that it doesn’t fall into this trap; Sean Harris’ interpretation of the king is warm and vulnerable and human, and it really feels like he’s regretful that he didn’t step up to be the father figure Gawain never had. Whether this is the king’s true emotion, or whether it might be the enchantment of Morgana, is one of the delightful mysteries left open to speculation.
The sense that Gawain is passively being ushered into a legendary status, like a young monarch dispassionately inheriting his father’s throne, is palpable in the early stages of the story. After Gawain strikes down The Green Knight, while he himself is left standing in frightened shock, the room itself applauds and cheers - and in the “Too Quick Year” section, the world around Gawain hails him as a hero, staging puppet shows and knightly portraits and songs to tell his great tale. Gawain, however, seems understandably discontent and anxious - mostly drinking through the months until Christmas comes around again.
When he finally leaves the castle to venture out into the wild, Gawain’s passing conception of his own greatness is quickly dispelled. Upon the first confrontation with anyone, he’s instantly beaten and robbed of his shield, axe, belt, and horse. He frequently loses his way and finds himself hungry and wet and tired - and also, sometimes, high on mushrooms. The Green Knight haunts Gawain’s every vision and eventually leaves him trembling in a cave waiting for the sun to rise again, unsure whether he’s returning home or pressing onward.
If Gawain’s quest to find The Green Chapel feels like it disproves any sense of his knightliness or nobility, his final vision of the future in “The Voyage Home” completely destroys it, leaving the viewer with a feeling of “wow…this guy suuuuuucks.” The legend is broken. But we’re still hearing it told.
David Lowery’s stories have always had the rare gift of knowing exactly where their hearts are. Pete’s Dragon, A Ghost Story, The Old Man and The Gun, The Green Knight - all of them have a deceptively simple, old-fashioned sense of spectacle from time to time…but the real soul always lies in the intimate moments between characters and the small relational winks that bring more fulfillment than any quest or existential apocalypse ever could. Casey Affleck’s ghost lives through a lifetime and sees the end of the world, but the thing that frees him from his bedsheet is the little note Rooney Mara left in the house he haunts. In a major way, Lowery’s stories also explore the concept of legacy, the unstoppable march of time, and the stories we leave behind as the world moves on. Perhaps to my own detriment, I’ve always been obsessed with legacy and significance - which might be why these films speak to me so much. Lowery’s movies often bring me back to the quote from Hamilton that I read at my grandfather’s funeral two years ago: “legacy - what is a legacy? it’s planting seeds in a garden you’ll never get to see.” A Ghost Story explores the notion of significance in a world that just keeps on moving once you’re gone. The Old Man and The Gun dives into the meaning of fulfillment in old age when you’ve only defined yourself by one thing throughout your entire life. How will we be remembered? Will we be remembered? These questions plague and enrich Lowery’s stories.
If Old Man and Ghost Story both have these thoughts in their periphery, The Green Knight feels like Lowery’s most overt confrontation with his own notions of personal legacy. The Green Knight posits that the desire to become legendary or great will ultimately and unstoppably lead us to dishonor and shame, and that real fulfillment comes through ditching our pride and humbly making honorable choices…even if we don’t get to see the fruit or glory of them. There are simple ways of describing this, of course: “make good choices! be a good person even when no one is watching! think about something greater than yourself!” But Gawain’s quest runs deeper than any of those shallow bumper sticker sentiments.
If you want a bumper sticker thesis, though, here it is: “Why greatness? Is goodness not enough?” Honor, pride, and shame are linked, and honor is more important than any legacy or legend. But you only truly gain your honor when you admit that you have very little of it.
As the final montage peering into the potential future, “The Voyage Home”, makes abundantly clear, Gawain is not particularly honorable. Even at the start of the film, he’s hardly a chivalric or biblical hero - more David the adulterer than King David the shepherd. Before he sets out on his quest, Gawain is already unable to own up to the fact that he is in love with a prostitute, unwilling to commit to marrying her because it’s implied that it would be socially dishonorable to do so. Instead, in the future sequence, he will impregnate her, steal the child, and marry a more high-class woman to maintain his “honor.” The irony is, while he maintains his chivalric standing by rejecting Essell, he proves his true dishonor by using and abusing her affections. And every step along the journey to the Green Chapel only cements this noncommittal, flinching, self-serving, performative virtuosity.
As Gawain kneels and accepts his death at the hand of The Green Knight in the closing moments of the film, he finally relinquishes any hope of honorably becoming a legend - but it still offers more peace than living in shame waiting for an even worse demise. And miraculously, the most pathetic and un-legendary choice Gawain makes at the end of the film - to humble himself and accept his mortality - is ultimately what the audience is most satisfied to see. The final choice Gawain makes is the first active decision he pursues in his life - and yet the action itself is one of noble passivity. He believes this is the tragic and quiet end of a story that will be quickly forgotten.
And yet…we as the audience are eagerly beholding the tale of Gawain’s adventures, even his end. This story has not been forgotten. It has not ceased to be told. Forever set, in heart, in stone, like all great myths of old.
Perhaps the best myths are humbler than we expected.