Delayed Reaction: The Kid Who Would Be King

Premise: A boy in modern day England discovers that he's the reincarnation of King Arthur.

Joe Cornish is an interesting director. He's been around for a while in England, mostly working in TV. I don't know much about those years, but he seems to be buddies with all the cool British genre and funny guys like Simon Pegg, Nick Frost, Edgar Wright, and Stephan Moffat. His debut film is Attack the Block, which does OK in theaters but quickly earns a reputation. It's the 2011 movie that people loved to use as their "ear to the ground" example of a good movie. It was the 10th movie on a lot of "hip" people's top 10 list that year. They loved to talk about how they "discovered" the movie. It's a fine movie. Mostly, it's notable as John Boyega's breakthrough role. I liked it. It's funny and works as a genre excercise. Mostly, it's one of those movies that made you think, "If this is only his first movie, what else does he have in store?"

Then, nothing happened. He worked on a couple high-profile screenplays, but that's about it. I have no idea why it took 8 years for him to make his followup, The Kid Who Would Be King. It's probably some Hollywood bullshit. I assume he started developing several projects that lost financing or got shelved by a studio. Sadly, it meant that all his Attack the Block momentum was gone by this year.

It didn't help that Cornish's idea for a follow-up sounded more like the premise to a mid-tier 90's kids movie. He basically just reversed A Kid in King Arthur's Court. I'll admit, I wasn't excited for The Kid Who Would Be King. I was hoping Cornish would make something a little - for a lack of a better work - cooler.

This movie is a charmer though. It's a kids movie that doesn't talk down to kids, which ends up making it accessible to adults too. It knows exactly when to take itself seriously and when to deflate itself. There's an awareness of just how famous the cast needs to be. Patrick Stewart only shows up for a couple scenes. Cornish gets Rebecca Ferguson as a ringer to play the villain. Otherwise, it trusts a lot of fresh-faced kids to keep the whole thing earnest.

Verdict: Weakly Recommend