ARTHUR THE KING (2024)
Starring Mark Wahlberg, Simu Liu, Juliet Rylance, Nathalie Emmanuel, Ali Suliman, Rob Collins, Michael Landes, Bear Grylls, Paul Guilfoyle, Cece Valentina, Zamantha Díaz, Oscar Best, Elizabeth Chahin, Sharon Gallardo, Alani Ilongwe, Luis del Valle, Clearco Giuria, Mauricio Adrian, Carlton Mallard, Jason Chan, Roger Wasserman and Arturo Duvergé.
Screenplay by Michael Brandt.
Directed by Simon Cellan Jones.
Distributed by Lionsgate. 90 minutes. Rated PG-13.
“Don’t worry, this dog lives,” Mark Wahlberg assured us in the previews for Arthur the King which started showing up on social media a few weeks before the film’s premiere. While technically this could be considered a spoiler, I actually respect the filmmakers of the film for coming straight out and letting us know this plot point up front. There is nothing more horrible than a film trying to wring some pathos from their audience by killing off a beautiful dog (or cat, or bird, or any other animal, for that matter).
This film, based on a true story of adventurers competing in a dangerous endurance race in the Dominican Republic when they run across a stray dog, and the mutt bonds with them, particularly the leader – would seem to be just the type of film which would put the dog in many hazardous situations, and you never know how he will survive those. Therefore, the reassurance was appreciated. I could go into Arthur the King with an easy mind, knowing that I would not have to deal with that sort of fate.
Well, maybe I would have to deal with it a bit, because once I watched the film, I found that much of the last 15-20 minutes of the movie do as much as they could to tease the idea of the dog actually being very close to dying, leading me to wonder if Wahlberg had been lying to everyone in the ads. Luckily, he wasn’t lying. (Again, sorry if that feels like a spoiler, but they have been literally advertising the film on the idea the dog will survive, so if anyone let on the spoiler, it is the film studio themselves.)
But discussing the last 20 minutes of the film is getting a little ahead of ourselves. Was the whole of Arthur the King in its own way regal, or was it simply a pretender to the throne?
The story revolves around a daunting 435-mile endurance race through the wilds of the Dominican Republic. Teams have several days to traverse the length of the course. They are allowed – in fact, it is necessary – to use multiple modes of transportation. Most of the time they are simply running, or hiking, or climbing, but they must also use things like kayaks, boats, swimming, bicycles, ziplines, etc., to reach the finish line. The first team to reach the finish line wins… something… I’m not 100% sure what. Undoubtedly, it’s a bit of money and bragging rights.
The team we are following is led by Wahlberg’s Michael Light (a fictionalized version of real-life Swedish adventurer Mikael Lindnord, whose book is the basis for the film), a well-respected guy on the circuit who always comes just short of winning. He is now a father and being pressured to slow down and live a normal life and take a job in his stepfather’s business. However, Michael is determined to take one more shot at winning – even to the point where he spends his own money, which he really can’t afford, to get his group into competition.
The team is made up of kind of underwritten types – there is the social media obsessed one (Simu Lui), the one who is racing to please her dying father, who was a legend in the circuit (Nathalie Emmanuel) and the aging former star with a bad knee (Ali Suliman).
For the record, the Arthur in the title is the name the racers gave to a stray dog who crossed their paths, apparently because the leader Michael respected the canine’s fearlessness and regal bearing, which reminded him of the medieval king. Michael gave the dog a couple of meatballs early on in the race, and hundreds of miles later the mutt showed up again, apparently having followed the group the whole way.
Oddly, despite the fact that the movie is named after the pooch, he really doesn’t connect with the racing team until about halfway through the film. In earlier sections of the film, they periodically show short scenes of the dog enduring the hard life of a stray in a small village in the tropics, undoubtedly because otherwise the audience will be wondering when the dog will be entering the story in a substantial way.
While many of the sections of the race are interesting and rather exciting, the film really doesn’t hit its stride until Arthur joins up, becoming the group’s mascot, and eventually the main focus of Michael’s trip. In fact, honestly, the way the obsessive racer suddenly falls in love with this dirty but sweet dog is rushed a bit in the second half of the film. I’d kind of have liked to have the dog along from the very beginning, although of course that is not how it happened in real life.
Arthur the King is a bit cheesy and sort of predictable, and yet it is a sweet feel-good drama which almost makes it to the finish line. As noted before, the late section where the dog is in eminent danger is overly manipulative and melodramatic, but it doesn’t completely knock the film off of its footing. No one could call this a terrific movie, but it is an enjoyable one if you’re willing to turn your brain off for a bit and just go with it.
The dog is cute as hell though, and Arthur the King is worth seeing for that reason alone.
Jay S. Jacobs
Copyright ©2024 PopEntertainment.com. All rights reserved. Posted: March 14, 2024.
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