Tristan + Isolde **

Tristan + Isolde
Directed by Kevin Reynolds. Starring James Franco, Sophia Myles, Rufus Sewell, David O'Hara, and Henry Cavill. Rated PG-13.

Normally, I probably wouldn't have gone to see a film like this because I'm not the biggest fan of war movies or love stories. Yes, I was dragged to it. And just as I thought, it was underwhelming. Tristan, a noble English knight, is injured and left for dead after a great battle. After his body is put onto a boat and pushed out to sea, the boat washes upon a shore of Ireland, where he is nursed back to health by Isolde, the future queen of England. At the same time, Isolde's father, King Donnchadh, has chosen to give away his daughter to the winner of a tournament between the greatest warriors of England, a tournament that Tristan is to participate in. However, her hopes are crushed when she learns that he is fighting for her in behalf of the English Lord Marke. I went in with low expactations and rightly so. There were some good qualities to the film like a decent romantic story and some fairly good battle sequences, but it still turns out to be just a below average movie.