James Absolon explains how this Pope-themed film, despite its risky premise, works
Alex Pollard reviews Hollywood's biopic of the controversial Margaret Thatcher
For those of you who may be hesitant about reliving the tiresome, complicated, and somewhat distressing ‘experience’ of this 8th century epic poem, fear not; for you needn’t sit in the cinema long before you realise that this is definitely not the Beowulf you remember from school – assuming, that is, that your hitherto associations with Beowulf don’t include Ray Winston as a cockney, Sean Bean lookalike hero, or a naked Angelina Jolie as the ostensible ‘hag’, Grendel’s mother.
Director Robert Zemeckis has reinterpreted the oldest narrative in the English language using the newest innovations in digital technology, creating a strangely captivating cast of warriors, wenches, kings and queens, who are, disconcertingly, neither quite human, nor quite animation; who age without the awkwardness of prosthetics, and blend in comfortably with outlandish backgrounds and grandiose action scenes. In fact, this vivid effect, resembling a highly advanced computer game, lends itself to Beowulf’s mythic grandeur, itself a step outside reality into a milieu of demons, dragons, super-humans, and sorcery. The cast itself is first class, boasting not only Ray Winston as Beowulf (having undergone quite a makeover, from corpulent, sunburnt, ex-crook in Sexy Beast, to six-foot muscle-bound Adonis), but also Anthony Hopkins, John Malkovich, and Angelina Jolie.
Aside from the all-star cast and inarguably impressive special effects, however, the real success of this adaptation is in its reinvention of the narrative; from the typically polarised good-bad struggle of the epic poem, to a more human, nuanced portrayal of vice, vulnerability, and guilt; offering a semi-psychological interpretation of the characters’ comparatively 2D 8th century counterparts, not without a couple of Oedipal hints.
For all its successes, this film will no doubt make Beowulf purists cringe.
For all its successes, this film will no doubt make Beowulf purists cringe; in its sexual innuendo (particularly, the attempt to preserve a naked Beowulf’s modesty using coy tactics inspired by Austin Powers), and in its shameless play with the narrative, including a half-hearted attempt to engage with the tensions between Christian and Pagan beliefs which characterise the poem. However, despite the fact that audiences might not rate it up there with Lord of the Rings (the holy grail of action-epics) or 300, Beowulf treads on new ground: it is animation with a twist, it is reality with an edge, it is Ray Winston with a six-pack -and it is definitely worth a trip to the cinema.
You must log in to submit a comment.
