BEFORE: And just like that, my mini-vacation is over. But we had some fun, ate at the Palm steakhouse and then yesterday we hit two buffets, the breakfast buffet at the Borgata and the dinner buffet at Caesar's. We'd been to both places before, in fact I think we've now hit every buffet in Atlantic City at least once. If we keep going back we're going to have to find some new places to eat, or else just keep repeating ourselves, which I'm fine with.
By the end of Sunday I was down $35 from playing the slots, and Monday morning was even worse, by noon I was down $95. But I hit on both machines I played at Caesar's, and then all four that I played at Bally's, and ended up losing only $26 overall. That's not bad for 2 days at the slot machines, I've done much worse. I've also won overall and done much better on past trips.
Rufus Sewell carries over from "Gods of Egypt".
THE PLOT: An affair between the second in line to Britain's throne and the princess of the feuding Irish spells doom for the young lovers.
AFTER: I never knew much about the story of these two lovers before - I know there's an opera or two about them, but that's about it. Turns out they're like the Celtic version of Romeo and Juliet, if the Montagues were the fractured tribes of Britain and the Capulets were the Irish. And I guess there's more than a little bit of the King Arthur story here too, especially the love triangle between Arthur, Guinevere and Lancelot.
Before they ever meet, Isolde is promised to a Irish warlord, one who Tristan then conveniently kills in battle, though she doesn't know that for a while. Then Tristan falls in battle and his body is set adrift on a burning boat, only the Brits aren't great at setting boats on fire with arrows, or determining if a man is really dead or not, for that matter. And Isolde is conveniently a whiz with potions and such, so she's able to restore him to health when his boat washes up on her shores. (He was probably just fine, until some idiot hit his boat with a burning arrow...)
To be on the safe side, since they're on different sides of the conflict, she doesn't tell him her real name, which sets up the mistaken identity thing. Tristan comes to Ireland on behalf of his king to win the right to marry the king's daughter, only he has no idea that the woman who nursed him back to health, whom he fell in love with, is also the king's daughter, Isolde. Then for about a minute she's happy when she thinks she gets to marry the man she loves, only he's there to win her hand for his lord, the king. Whoops.
So they both think they can put their personal feelings aside, and do what their sense of honor and duty would suggest - Isolde says she'll be sleeping with King Marke, only she'll be thinking of Tristan, and Tristan says he'll be fine, only he's NOT fine, and this sort of thing never works. Why Tristan can't just go out and find another girl seems to be the point of contention. Why he also can't speak up and tell the king about his relationship with Isolde is another question. The solution seems to be rather simple - just tell the king that the princess is not pure and virginal, since he knows this fact first-hand. Boom, problem solved, then he can run off with her to someplace else.
But no, this was a different time when people pledged themselves to the service of the king, and Tristan is the king's "second", which is strange because the king has a blood relation, Melot, who doesn't like being skipped over. So yeah, that's probably going to cause a problem down the line. Can these crazy kids manage to work things out, and find happiness together? Not if Wictred and Donnchadh have anything to say about it...
Also starring James Franco (last heard in "Sausage Party"), Sophia Myles (last seen in "Underworld: Evolution"), David O'Hara, Mark Strong (last seen in "Kingsman: The Secret Service"), Henry Cavill (last seen in "The Man From U.N.C.L.E."), Bronagh Gallagher, Ronan Vibert (last seen in "Dracula Untold"), Lucy Russell, Leo Gregory, Dexter Fletcher (last seen in "The Elephant Man"), Richard Dilate (last seen in "Argo"), Graham Mullins, Jamie Thomas King (last seen in "Mr. Turner").
RATING: 5 out of 10 slave caravans
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