So today Eva and I sat down and watched everybody's favorite sports movie

[conuly]

A Knight's Tale. She was a little skeptical at first, threatening not to let me pick the movie again, but she started to see the charm when the crowd began singing....

Yes, they made some bold choices in that film, and it fucking works. Special shout-out to Jocelyn's costume and hair designers, who didn't even pretend to do anything other than 90s chic. I'm pretty sure ombre hadn't been invented yet in the middle ages, but if it had been, they would've been all over it.

Wat and Geoffrey seriously need to get a room, and serious question: does our thrilling victory mean that Jocelyn isn't going to end up hitched to the mustache-twirling villain we all love to hate? Or are we just pretending that she is, in fact, going to run away and live her life in love on the road? Because speaking realistically, the romance probably falls out of that life as soon as she has to do her own laundry.

Comments

[oloriel]

I think we're expected to hope that now that Will is properly knighted AND tournament champion, Jocelyn's father will agree to the match and Will will be able to afford the servants that will take care of the laundry.

[conuly]

Trufax: Historically speaking, laundry is the only job outsourced more than childcare. Literally anybody with two pennies to rub together sent their laundry out until the widespread adoption of fully automatic washing machines, even if that meant they had to economize on essentials elsewhere.

Even those (mostly male) writers who liked to write in paeans to the ceaseless industry of their mothers and wives do not say "She does her own laundry". She sits and spins until the wee hours of the night, perhaps, she clothes her servants all in scarlet - but nobody washes her own clothes who can afford not to. Literally nobody.

[oloriel]

Well, that makes sense. Pre-washing machine, it wasn't even just the labour, you also needed a lot of room both for the washing process and to dry (and possibly bleach, oh no!) your laundry. So you couldn't possibly do it all on your own, and unless you were rich enough for your own wash house, you didn't have the space either.

Which takes us back to "I hope Will can afford the necessary services"! XD

[conuly]

I don't know about "you can't do it all on your own". On the flipside, everybody who didn't have two pennies to rub together was taking in laundry to make ends meet, so obviously laundry could be done by hand as a cottage industry.

But man oh man, pre-washer laundry day does NOT sound fun.

[oloriel]

OK, correction: You could do it on your own if you didn't have a lot of laundry. But if you had a lot of it (and to avoid having to run out of laundry, if you could afford it, you had a lot), it took a whole group of people. Naturally they did it by hand! But definitely not single-handedly. Too many steps involved, and you can't just let the soaking laundry sit in a basket somewhere until you have the time to wring it out, then hang it up or spread it for bleaching. Heck, you need two people just to move large and soaking wet linen tablecloths or bedsheets around, never mind wringing it. Even with a mangle, you need one person to operate the mangle and another to "feed" it.

I read that it was generally turned into a sort of laundry party feat. songs and drink, but that seems to have been more of a way of making back-breaking work endurable, not an actual fun-fun party.

[conuly]

and to avoid having to run out of laundry, if you could afford it, you had a lot

It's also a form of conspicuous consumption, which for many generations the key ethos of which was "more is more". Look at me, I can have a whole wardrobe of very expensive clothing instead of just three practical garments!

[oloriel]

Absolutely. Oooooh, look at me, I can change gowns three times a day without wearing the same thing twice! Ooooh, don't worry about spilling gravy on the tablecloth, there's more where it came from!

[conuly]

My gown is so wastefully long, I have to hire people to hold it up. Ooof, it's hard to be rich. Fan me.

[thewayne]

It was such a ridiculously non-historic movie that it was tremendous fun!

[conuly]

And yet, it's also much more firmly planted in history than many films which use more "period" music. (Which often isn't really anyway.)

[thewayne]

As a rule, if the singing paced the music, it's not authentic, at least for early renaissance.  That was a later innovation, can't remember when.  Heck, instruments always keeping time with each other was frequently unique!  Even time measures and scales were later innovations, choral music showed notes being higher or lower than the previous, but not how much!  I can't imagine how much of a caterwaul that could produce!

[anankastick]

I love that movie! It was a go-to for my first college friends and I've been a fan ever since first watching it in my dorm room. But yeah, Jocelyn has a hard road ahead and I don't know that she's really up for it....

[conuly]

Then again, her father doesn't seem to put many restrictions on her behavior at all. Maybe she can talk him around to a large dowry to Will.

[skygiants]

When I saw this movie for the first time as a tiny teenage pedant, I had nothing but scorn for it, and then two years later I ended up watching it three more times while sick in a hotel room with nothing else to do and ended up loving it with all my heart.

[conuly]

Your tiny teenage pedant clearly did not understand what you were watching.

[adrian_turtle]

It does what it does *magnificently.* I really wish I had the visual skills to compare it properly with "Friday Night Lights." (I mean, the visual skill to watch them both all the way through in detail without triggering migraines.)

[conuly]

Magnificently and absolutely 100% unapologetically.

I'm sorry about your migraine problems :(