5 reviews

---

Andrea Hopkins December 3, 2007

I was pleasantly surprised by how good this movie is; it's immensely rich and dramatic as well as having stunning fight scenes. It follows in the footsteps of Kingdom of Heaven in being very respectful of its medieval source material - whoever wrote this script knows the Anglo-Saxon epic poem well and loves it.

The Hollywoodization of the story has made the three central conflicts of the story interconnected, neat and circular, replacing the rather tantalizing mysteries of the poem with a very dramatic and beautifully exposed back-story, which I won't spoil by revealing, except to say that it provides one triumphantly wonderful scene where the interior struggles of the main character actually match the magnificent action sequences - when he realises that he has inherited Hrothgar's curse and effectively ruined his life, the animated Beowulf actually looks sickened and diminished, as he sees the consequences of his lie stretching away into his future, right at the moment of what should have been his triumph. Brilliant.

I actually thought Ray Winstone was rather good, and his deliciously funny "I've come to kill your monstah!" effectively exemplified and made understandable a culture in which boasting, reputation, and story-telling were, let's say, as important as wealth - something very foreign to our self-deprecating modern ways. I also really liked the way the movie brought the women in the story right into the heart of the dramatic action - and I didn't find Robin Wright Penn as Queen Wealtheow in the least wooden, on the contrary giving a moving performance, and connecting the younger and older Beowulf's exploits and feelings.

I should also repeat the caveats of the other reviewers - this is definitely NOT a movie for children as it is violent and disturbing - it gave my 11 year old nightmares. But grown-ups should definitely give it a shot. 8/10

---

Glenn Watson November 14, 2007

“I’ve come to kill your monstah!” cries cocky warrior Beowulf (Ray Winstone) to the beleaguered Danes. And so begins a testosterone-fuelled tale of pride, temptation and computer-generated violence.

Beowulf sees the Old English poem given a twenty-first century makeover by Back to the Future director Robert Zemeckis. Pushing the cinematic envelope further than he did in The Polar Express, Zemeckis persuades Anthony Hopkins, Angelina Jolie and Ray Winstone to undergo performance capture technology.

Donning leotards covered in electric sensors, the thesps’ performances are digitized by computers. The result? An animated movie based on real acting but whizzy enough to give Winstone an eight-pack chest and turn Angelina Jolie into a sea-serpent siren.

Beowulf responds to King Hrothgar’s (Hopkins) call for a hero to rid his kingdom of the man-slaying monster Grendel. But Grendel’s mummy (Jolie) loves her troubled son and holds the key to Hrothgar’s secret – and Beowulf’s. And hell hath no fury like a serpent scorned.

Zemeckis plays fast and loose with the legend, changing the ending to suit his theme of the never-ending folly of men. Even so, Neil Gaiman’s script is dotted with Old English and Hopkins allows his beautiful Welsh accent full rein. That, and Winstone’s East London twang, give Beowulf a salty, refreshing sound.

But it’s the visuals that make or break it. Get over the computer-game impassivity of the faces and you’ll be treated to some awe-inspiring, almost photo-real landscapes and dragon-chases. And if the film has a heart, it belongs to Robin Wright Penn as Hrothgar’s young wife and Beowulf’s amour.

After a barnstorming first half, filled with arm-lopping, eye-bursting fights and all-round roistering, Beowulf sags as the father-son, monster-mother Freudiana takes centre stage. But Beowulf’s last-act battle with a dragon (who may also be his son – go figure) is suitably flesh-ripping, literally heart-stopping, and livens things considerably.

Occasional quirks will either distract or delight – such as Beowulf stripping to the buff for a fight scene that manages to hide his manhood by all manner of helmets, cups and strategically placed persons.

Sturla Gunnarsson’s handsome, 2005 live-action version of the tale (Beowulf and Grendel) is a more faithful rendering of the story, and arguably more visually stunning. But Zemeckis’ film cannily avoids being a cartoon or a carbon-copy of CGI splatter-fests like Sin City or 300.

As such it retains a 12A certificate in spite of – just so you know – squelchy monsters, pseudo nudity, some sex references and the kind of violence you won’t find in Harry Potter or any animated kid-flick. Beowulf is camp-fire poetry for the popcorn generation – literate, lusty and lurid. In a good way.

---

Glenn Watson November 12, 2007

In Beowulf, an Old English poem gets a twenty-first century makeover. Back to the Future director Robert Zemeckis pushes the cinematic envelope with performance capture technology, requiring his actors to wear leotards with electronic sensors, picked up by computers.

Beowulf’s stars – Sir Anthony Hopkins and Ray Winstone – talk to Daily Info about acting like idiots in the name of art.

Sir Anthony Hopkins

Is it difficult to act when you’re dressed in a leotard covered with electronic sensors?
Once you get over feeling like an idiot – it only takes a couple of minutes – you’re fine. You get into the role. Like my first scene as King Hrothgar, I’m on the throne and I’m drunk. I asked the director how drunk I should be. As drunk as you want, he said. Well, I’m feeling like an idiot anyway, so I just went with it. It’s like being in a rehearsal, without scenery or props.

A couple of years ago, you were in the papers as saying you weren’t enjoying making movies any more…Is that true? And what was it about this film that attracted you?
I didn’t say that. Papers will say what they want. I took a rest, that’s all. I’ve worked a couple of times since then. The reason I did this was that Robert Zemeckis asked. The word genius is bandied about - but he is. And I knew Ray Winstone and Angelina Jolie would be in it. Also, I don’t understand computers at all, so I thought this would be something new for me.

So it didn’t feel too different from other movies you’ve made?
This is the director’s movie; it’s his vision. As actors, we’re guests invited into his party. The first time I saw it was a few days ago in Los Angeles, two years after we made it. I was astonished by it. I can’t even begin to think how they put it together.

You’ve got other interests apart from making movies – painting, composing music. How do you find time for it all?
I wanted to be a musician originally. This profession was a sidetrack. In the last four or five years, I’ve taken it up again, writing music, painting. It keeps me out of trouble! I enjoy working as an actor but I’m more laid back now. I’m at an age when I can be selective. So when something new comes along - like this - it’s pleasant.

You use your Welsh accent in the film. How did that come about?
When I first met Zemeckis, he asked how I wanted to speak the part. I said I could use Welsh. And he says, what’s that? I said, we’re the Irish who couldn’t swim. And it’s an old language. So he heard it and said okay. And as you might imagine, playing a drunk with a Welsh accent was no problem for me!

Ray Winstone

How does it feel seeing yourself as a computer generated hero?
When I read the script, it said Beowulf’s six-foot-six with an eight-pack stomach. And I thought, they must mean a different Ray Winstone! Seeing it two years later, my jaw hit the floor. You’re looking at yourself as you were in your twenties – although I didn’t have an eight-pack then.

What kind of experience was it for you as an actor, using this performance capture technology?
It doesn’t miss a thing. Whatever you do, good or bad, it’s picked up. To that extent it’s pure cinema. Hearing it was made with computers, some people can forget there’s a real performance behind it.

Do you think it opens things up for actors or will it be the end of acting as we know it?
There are parts you’re too old to play, physically – like this one. Or maybe parts you weren’t capable of playing at certain ages. It’s certainly the most physical part I’ve ever played at any age. Performance capture opens things up. I can play Marilyn Monroe now!

So do you think this kind of technology will redefine cinema?
It’s like going from silent movies to talkies; black and white to Gone With the Wind. Film keeps reinventing itself. People like Zemeckis and Spielberg, they’re always inventing. I wouldn’t even try to think where cinema’s going.

But the CGI here lets you have some sexy scenes with Angelina Jolie, with only a 12A certificate.
Yeah, the only thing is, Angelina didn’t need enhancing and I did! No, with this, it’s about the way you move. And it’s not hard to feel sexy when you’re stood in front of Angelina Jolie and Robin Wright Penn, two of the most beautiful women in the world and two of the finest actors.

How do you connect with your character’s world when you’re filming with this technology?
Imagination. As an actor you’re always using your imagination. You put on the leotard, study the artwork and away you go.

So what attracted you to the film?
What I like about the film – apart from it being a great story – is that it’s got a strong European feel to it. It’s an English story. It doesn’t feel like I’m watching an American blockbuster. I hadn’t read the poem. But I get the impression that Beowulf was a one-dimensional hero. I wanted to bring something else. A fallibility.

You even play the dragon in the film. How did that come about?
It was sprung on me at the last minute! It was the only time when I wasn’t working with another actor. Your arms become the wings, your legs the tail and you perform the act of being a dragon. It’s like being a five year old kid again! It was great fun.

It could have been so good. It was silly. The dragon at the end wanted to be in a different movie, a cool movie, where exciting dialogue and real narrative tension meant we gave a hoot about the characters whom we had grown to love over the course of a couple of hours. Here, Anthony Hopkins’s Hrothgar spoke for the cast when he threw himself to his death from the castle battlements for no real reason. I bet Sir Anthony just did that in the rehearsal room one day in frustration – mimed committing suicide by throwing himself on the floor, so awful was the material he was working with – and the director thought, ‘That’s cool! Let’s keep that in!’

There are incidental delights. I hope there will be youtube clips available of the bit where John Malkovich says ‘bollocks’ with an accent unknown to man (try making it rhyme with ‘Daleks’ and you’re about half-way there). Presumably there’ll also soon be a computer game in which it will be the job of teenage players not to fight Grendel but to see how artfully you can ensure that your naked hero’s genitals don’t come into view while he fights the monster, but are instead always obscured by yet more hilarious phallic objects: swords, spears, fire-irons, other warriors’ torn-off limbs or heads, whole tables. Grendel’s mum: it’s not possible to make her a hag in 2007 as that’s demeaning, so let’s make her an impossibly pneumatic female with in-built high-heels in her flesh. And let’s pretend she can walk on water in her stiletto ankles. And how about if she had a really plastic version of Angelina Jolie’s features? Yeah, that’ll pull in the crowds. There were five people in the cinema.

Can the really good dragon audition for a part in the upcoming ‘The Hobbit’ and the rest of it be shredded before it makes it on to DVD?

JCM 19 Dec 2007

Hmm... If there was ever an example of miscasting then having Ray Winston as the lead voice would definitely be one... His cockney accent makes it difficult to take the character seriously. Also, it appears that his character is heavily based on Sean Bean. Hopkins does a fine job as he always does (a bumbling old man), whereas the Queen is very wooden and disconnected.

As a fan of computer graphics, I would say I have a fairly critical eye for CG quality. The first 10 minutes of the movie takes getting used to because it's clearly *not real*, even though it tries to be. The computing power available today makes me wonder if there were budget and/or time constraints because the quality was comparable to Half Life 2 and possibly The Matrix. The Star Wars and Lord of the Rings movies had better graphics... This is made evident during random parts of the movie that appeared to be rendered to a much greater detail, i.e., Jolie's character.

The landscapes are indeed nice, but then again they're a piece of piss to create on computer; it's the rendering of soft edges, facial features and delicate limb/finger movement that's the hard part. The movie is perhaps on par on this front. The ending itself is very far fetched and rather unemotional and silly. It is the first half of the movie that is most exciting, although the fighting is kinda Matrix-esque and very much what a games programmer would conceive.

This is a film that is not suitable for 12A. I guess this rating was passed simply because it is technically an animation. Even so, slain bodies left hanging from the roof is something more for a 15 rating in my book...

6/10

Uplah 19 Nov 2007