Lionheart (1987)

A young knight sets out to join King Richards crusaders. Along the way, he encounters The Black Prince who captures children and sells them as slaves to the Muslims. It is Robert Narra's ... See full summary »

Director:

Franklin J. Schaffner

Writers:

Menno Meyjes (screenplay), Richard Outten (screenplay),

Stars:

Eric Stoltz, Gabriel Byrne, Nicola Cowper

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Eric Stoltz	...	(Robert Nerra)
Gabriel Byrne	...	Black Prince
Nicola Cowper	...	Blanche
Dexter Fletcher	...	Michael
Deborah Moore	...	Mathilda (as Deborah Barrymore)
Nicholas Clay	...	Charles De Montfort
Bruce Purchase	...	Simon Nerra
Neil Dickson	...	King Richard
Penny Downie	...	Madelaine
Nadim Sawalha	...	Selim
John Franklyn-Robbins	...	The Abbot
Chris Pitt	...	Odo
Matthew Sim	...	Hugo
Paul Rhys	...	Mayor of the Underground City
Sammi Davis	...	Baptista

Storyline

A young knight sets out to join King Richards crusaders. Along the way, he encounters The Black Prince who captures children and sells them as slaves to the Muslims. It is Robert Narra's sworn duty to protect the children and lead them to safety.

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Plot Keywords:

knight | slave dealer | france | crusader | richard lionheart | 

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Taglines:

A timeless evil. A warrior lost. A mystical quest.

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Genres:

Adventure | Drama

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Certificate:

PG

Details

Country:

Hungary USA

Language:

English

Release Date:

August 1987 (USA)

Also Known As:

Lionheart: The Children's Crusade

Filming Locations:

Hungary

Company Credits

Production Co:

Hungaro, Mafilm, TaliaFilm II Productions

Technical Specs

Runtime:

104 min

Sound Mix:

Dolby

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

This is the final film that composer Jerry Goldsmith would compose for Director and personal friend, Franklin J. Schaffner, who would direct one more film before his passing in 1989.

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Connections

Referenced in Kingdom of Heaven (2005)

User Reviews

Interesting failure undone by bad casting and editing

Lionheart - The Children's Crusade was an interesting find in a bargain bin at a video shop - a medieval epic that I'd never even heard of from the director of Patton, produced by Coppola and with music by Jerry Goldsmith. Looking it up on the IMDb, not many others have either: it only seems to have played a week in Detroit! Why? Well, the obvious reason is it's not very good.

Its got a solid script about a disgraced young French knight who finds himself leading a bunch of abandoned children to the Holy Land to join King Richard's crusade and coming up against Gabriel Byrne's disillusioned crusader turned child-slave-trader. But it often looks like chunks are missing, and the kids are pretty awful: Eric Stoltz very effeminate and uncharismatic as the lead, Dexter Fletcher irritating as the lovable Artful Dodger type and Nicola Cowper a one-woman petrified forest as the love interest - I've never, ever seen an actress stay as rigidly immobile or as impervious to emotion as this gal. It's like watching a beautifully made up corpse in early rigor mortis for 105 minutes. Only Deborah Moore seems to give it a bit of wellie as a tomboyish female whose far more manly than the hero.

Bits of it do work, and Byrne's dark knight character is genuinely interesting and gets all the best dialogue, but the main interest is Jerry Goldsmith's astonishingly good score, one of the best I've ever heard for an epic even if it disappears towards the end. Worth a look but set expectations on low.