Beowulf (2007)

Director:

Robert Zemeckis

Writers (WGA):

Neil Gaiman (screenplay) &
Roger Avary (screenplay) ...

Release Date:

16 November 2007 (USA)

Genre:

Animation | Action | Adventure | Fantasy

Tagline:

Pride is the curse.

Plot:

The warrior Beowulf must fight and defeat the monster Grendel who is terrorizing towns, and later, Grendel's mother, who begins killing out of revenge.

Plot Keywords:

Beowulf | King | Demon | Warrior | Reward

Awards:

12 nominations

Cast

Robin Wright Penn	...	Wealthow (as Robin Wright-Penn)
Anthony Hopkins	...	Hrothgar
Paul Baker	...	Musician #1
John Bilezikjian	...	Musician #2
Rod D. Harbour	...	Musician #3
Brice Martin	...	Musician #4 (as Brice H. Martin)
Sonje Fortag	...	Gitte (as Sonja Fortag)
Sharisse Baker-Bernard	...	Hild
Charlotte Salt	...	Estrith
Julene Renee	...	Cille
Greg Ellis	...	Garmund
Rik Young	...	Eofor
Sebastian Roché	...	Wulfgar (as Sebastian Roche)
Leslie Zemeckis	...	Yrsa
John Malkovich	...	Unferth

Also Known As:

Beowulf: An IMAX 3D Experience (USA) (IMAX version)
Beowulf: The IMAX Experience (USA) (IMAX version)

MPAA:

Rated PG-13 for intense sequences of violence including disturbing images, some sexual material and nudity.

Runtime:

115 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English | Old English

Color:

Color (DeLuxe)

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Sound Mix:

SDDS | DTS | Dolby Digital | Sonics-DDP (IMAX version)

Certification:

UK:12A | South Korea:15 | Ireland:12A | Singapore:NC-16 | Malaysia:U | Australia:M | Germany:12 | Finland:K-13 | Philippines:PG-13 (MTRCB) | Switzerland:12 (canton of Geneva) | Switzerland:12 (canton of Vaud) | Netherlands:12 | Argentina:13 | New Zealand:M (re-rating) | New Zealand:R16 (original rating) | Taiwan:R-12 | Brazil:14 | Sweden:15 | France:U (with warning) | USA:PG-13 (certificate #43938) | Finland:K-15 (director's cut) | Portugal:M/12 (Qualidade) | Norway:15 (TV rating) | Iceland:12 | Canada:18A (director's cut)

Filming Locations:

Culver Studios - 9336 W. Washington Blvd., Culver City, California, USA

Company:

ImageMovers

Trivia:

Most of the time when Grendel is talking in the movie, he is not speaking in Modern English but in Old English, the language in which the original poem was written, which in sound resembles modern Swedish. Interestingly, he never speaks in the original poem. He only sings a song of sorrow (which most people take to be a wail) when Beowulf rips off his arm.

Goofs:

Factual errors: In the end when Wiglaf is going into the water, the waves break in a pattern that is only present in very shallow water (1-10 cm), but he is in to his waist.

Quotes:

[first lines]
King Hrothgar: I want mead! Give me some mead, my queen!

Movie Connections:

Referenced in The Making of 'MirrorMask' (2006) (V)

Soundtrack:

A Hero Comes Home

Fun, handsome, but spoilt by 3D

Pretty much everyone knows the story of Beowulf - man fights monster, monster's mum and then a dragon - but this ancient story has inspired generations of writers and academics, now it gets a shiny makeover courtesy of Neil Gaiman and Roger Avary.

Beowulf (the man) could have been written as a cookie-cutter hero, but fortunately he's something else - fallible and not yet the hero he must become later in the movie. But (and this is really hard without spoiling the movie), the battle that turns him into a hero also leads inexorably to his undoing. That's something the two writers have brought to the millennia old text and it works perfectly to help fill in some of the gaps in the original poem and provide a back story to events.

A special mention also to Crispin Glover's Grendel. I wasn't particularly struck with the physical realisation of the monster, but the performance is knock out. Instead of just being a rampaging beast, Grendel is almost something to be pitied - a misshapen outcast with noisy neighbours, and his final scene is remarkably touching. Oh and if you don't understand Grendel, you clearly haven't been keeping up with your Old English classes!

But let's be honest, everyone watches a movie about Vikings for the action. And Beowulf delivers this in spades. Here comes my first proviso - Beowulf in the UK is getting a 12A rating, but there is no way I would take a 12 year old to see this film in all its eye-ball spearing, spine-snapping, ligament-tearing glory. This movie would get a higher rating had it been shot in real-life and it's worth considering this before packing the kids into the car. Mostly the violence is justified, but it is there and it's NOT cartoony.

The animation is the talking point of this movie, and its a real step on from the zombified performance of 'Polar Express'. The impression of living, breathing flesh is almost complete with the exception of strangely dead eyes - this movie is a landmark in computer imagery. The majority of the characters are stunningly rendered (Beowulf in particular) in close up, but they somehow look less convincing at a distance. Generally the men are better done than the women, with Queen Wealthow the spitting image of Julie Andrew's queen in Shrek 2.

So, its a violent special effects triumph - could anything be wrong?

Actually yes.

Two things. One - the accents. Oh dear god in heaven above what were they thinking - this is a treasure house of appalling voices, Irish(ish), Scottish(ish), Welsh(ish) are all thrown into the mix, but the standout horrors are Jon Malkovich's take on Danish which might have been inspired by the Muppets and Angelina Jolie dusting off her accent from 'Alexander'.

The second is the 3D projection. For reasons best known to studio executives we're all meant to get very excited by 3D all over again. Beowulf is one of the first movies to be released in the UK using REALD - a system familiar to anyone who has been to a Disney park in the last 20 years. The animators of Beowulf clearly had great fun working out new ways of making things jump out of the screen at the audience, but the effect becomes slightly wearisome after a minute or two. Fortunately things settle down later in the movie and the makers stop trying to show off their new technology.

More disappointing, the poor quality of the Polaroid glasses you have to wear make the image slightly blurry and spoilt by reflections. After years waiting for the crystal clarity of digital projection, the whole thing has been undone by a gimmick. If you have a choice, you might be better off seeing a regular 2D version.

A final comment, Beowulf spends part of the movie naked, bet you can't watch it and not think of Austin Powers.