Occasionally, movies come out that are so bad, studios refuse to screen them for critics. To help give you a heads-up, here's our take on the trailers.
Let me preface this by saying I'm a sucker for sword-and-sandal movies. That said, it's hard to tell from the trailer why this movie hasn't been screened for critics. A predecessor to Romeo and Juliet and even the story of Lancelot and Guinevere, Tristan & Isolde is set in the Middle Ages and tells the story of a prince and princess whose love is complicated by questions of honor, allegiance and friendship.
Tristan (Franco) is orphaned and reared to adulthood by Lord Marke (Sewell). Wounded and thought dead in a battle, he is found and nursed back to health by Isolde (Myles), daughter to the king responsible for his parents' death and who now seeks to kill Tristan to remove any threats to his rule. Tristan returns home and is sent as Marke's champion to unwittingly win him Isolde's hand to bring peace to England.
Ya can't get any more romantic than that.
The film looks like it has it all: a compelling love story, great battle sequences and strong themes. So why no screening? Chalk it up to a period setting (traditionally a hard sell at the box office), a tough-to-figure-out-how-to-pronounce title ("he's old" with a dropped "h") and no big stars. Here's hoping audiences can rise above all that.