KING ARTHUR

[] (One star)

How to waste a knight. Running time: 130 minutes. Rated PG- 13 (intense battle se quences, a scene of sensuality and some language). At the Chelsea, the Harlem USA, the Battery Park City, others.

DISNEY’S annus horribulus – “The Alamo,” the dumping of “Fahrenheit 9/11” and the Passion of Michael Eisner – continues apace with “King Arthur,” a leaden, dreary-looking and verbose “reinvention” of the legend.

Listlessly directed by Antoine Fuqua (“Tears of the Sun”) from a barely coherent script attributed to “Gladiator” co-writer David Franzoni and “newly discovered archeological evidence,” this historically specious, $150 million dud manages to be as empty-headed as previous opuses by the Mouse House’s top producer, Jerry Bruckheimer – without being a fraction as entertaining as, say, Bruckheimer’s “Pirates of the Caribbean,” which opened exactly a year ago.

Camelot it’s not.

This King Arthur (Clive Owen) is a brooding Roman soldier whose custom leather gear would not be out of place on certain stretches of Eighth Avenue.

He and his ragged band of knights are just finishing a 15-year stretch in Britain of the Dark Ages – which cinematographer Slawomir Idziak (“Black Hawk Down”) presents far too literally, with fog machines working overtime – when a bishop forces them into (groan) one last mission.

They are to rescue a Roman nobleman and his family from the marauding hordes of the Saxon Cerdic (Stellan Skarsgard).

This brings Arthur into contact with Guinevere (Keira Knightley of “Pirates”), who is no longer a fair maiden but a woman warrior in blue face paint and a skimpy leather S&M getup who joins none too credibly in the battle.

Bruckheimer keeps the round table (which wouldn’t be out of place in medieval times) – but tosses the triangle of Arthur, Guinevere and Arthur’s pal Lancelot (Ioan Gruffudd), who barely gets to exchange a longing glance with Guin.

Owen is a fine actor who looks the part, but, like the film, he’s bogged down by long-winded speeches about freedom – and a highly unoriginal patchwork plot that pillages “Braveheart,” “Gladiator” and “The Seven Samurai,” among many other sources.

“King Arthur” offers action sequences so bloodless – in pursuit of Hollywood’s Holy Grail, a k a the PG-13 rating – that it’s a lot closer to Disney’s “The Sword in the Stone” than to John Boorman’s “Excalibur,” still filmdom’s last word on the Arthurian legend.