Did anyone really need a medieval jousting movie scored to Queen and David Bowie? No. Did millennial audiences in 2001 immediately understand that Brian Helgeland’s A Knight’s Tale – out again in cinemas this week – was exactly what they wanted anyway? Absolutely.
Five years after Baz Luhrmann had proved that modern soundtracks could electrify period texts in Romeo + Juliet, Helgeland applied the same logic to tournaments in the Middle Ages, and discovered it worked brilliantly. For this is a film so joyous and free of pretentiousness that questions about historical accuracy splinter on impact.
