Mary vs the Movies

Hollywood Avalon, Episode 38 – The Mists of Avalon (2001)

The Hollywood Avalon logo, a drawing a green hill with stone steps leading up to a castle tower, with Hollywood Avalon written on the hill and Mary vs the Movies written against a colorful sky.

The classic Arthurian story is given a Pagan spin, where the adherents of the Goddess of the Old Religion–lead by Vivian, the Lady of the Lake, and her chosen successor Morgaine–are at odds with the growing Christian religion of Glastonbury and Camelot. Everyone hopes that Arthur will be the one true king to unite the two faiths into one nation, but, well, we all know how that turns out.

This tv miniseries adaptation of Marion Zimmer-Bradley’s extremely popular novel is lusciously designed for its time, but the story falls apart in the second half, not only skipping large portions of the book, but rewriting it in ways that I found frustrating.

Starring Julianna Margulies, Anjelica Huston, Joan Allen, Samantha Mathis, Edward Atterton and Michael Vartan. Written by Gavin Scott from the book by Marion Zimmer Bradley. Directed by Uli Edel.

CW: contains a brief discussion of the child sexual abuse allegations against Bradley and her ex-husband.

The original Game of Thrones but make it Enya. Six people stand in front of ACTUAL TAPESTRIES–take that, Twilight Zone–and again look like their hair is crimped. Was the style at the time an onion on the belt and braiding your hair wet and then styling it by taking the braids out? At least that's what this looks like instead of, again, the Twilight Zone, which looks like an actual crimper.

Listen to the preview here: https://sites.libsyn.com/398906/hollywood-avalon-ep-38-the-mists-of-avalon-2001

This is a preview of the latest episode of our series Hollywood Avalon. To hear the entire episode, join the Mary Versus the Movies patreon for $3/month to hear this and the entire series Hollywood Avalon: https://www.patreon.com/maryvsmovies. 

Leave a comment