Review of The Kid Who Would Be King (2019) by Arth J — 28 Jan 2019

And The Kid Who Would Rule.

The Kid Who Would Be King.

Cornish has made a delightful treat for the kids and the adults. This '70s textbook plot breeds the sincerity it had decades ago with a taste of the 21st century humor and ideologies. And this is something that we get fresh right out of the oven, since these teenage kids are dipped into this more practical world where everything has to be mocked and questioned. Filtering out those exact characteristics, Cornish polishes his story more and more as the characters themselves starts putting it into trial. The first act is rudimentary with spiraling out the usual introduction which personally I feel is his biggest bluff. Contradicting you in every step on rest of the film, this adventure that these brave kids have chosen to go through keeps giving you back enough reasons to be giddy up for more.

Aforementioned, the characters are well aware of the assumptions that film might lead you to, hence quoting Lord Of The Rings and Game Of Thrones and plenty other references it keeps the tone light and breezy. Cornish is still aware of the practicality of the storyline or how does it appear as a whole picture. And this is how he makes sure that his film is mythological, through all the exceptions are prophecies or their special characteristic.

For instance, the action is written maturely, it never jumps on a conclusion of the battle, it makes sure that the stakes are always the same and putting up such kids in the battle field requires lots of character insight to be developed. Lopping off all that work, Cornish is speaking behind the screen with notions that actually comes off as mumbo-jumbo in such genre but not in here; the rules set by Stewart plays a vital and probably the best part of the film. This prophecy-like plot kick in its middle act which is the smartest of all for it puts the king on a test that everyone was already in, circling back the humane part of the character.

As far as the performance is concerned the younger cast has done a decent work if not anything extraordinary. Stewart and Ferguson gets a scene to share where probably is the only point where they are completely themselves but the performance is surprisingly disappointing. The script is absorbing and gripping with its main asset being the characters that are three dimensional and are analyzed through and through; even after out team teams up, they still have to go through plenty of issues to fight as one.

Taylor who plays Lance, hence, gets one of the best role to play since it is the one with a complete cinematic arc. The background score and visual effects could have been a lot better but with good sound mixing and action packed sequences, it sails off smoothly on technical aspects. The Kid Who Would Be King has a king that we haven't seen before- at least not for a while- it is a triumph on civilizing that king and then make him rule along with his army or perhaps friends.