TITLE: Beowulf
DIRECTOR: Robert Zemeckis
SCREENPLAY: Neil Gaiman & Roger Avary
TAGLINE: "Pride is the curse."
CAST: Ray Winstone, Anthony Hopkins, John Malkovich, Robert Wright Penn, Angelina Jolie


I have to admit that I never read the poem so I can't really make any genuine comparisons between this adaptation and the original.

Anyway, here's a very short recap of what the movie is all about:

The movie Beowulf is about a warrior-hero, named, well, Beowulf (Ray Winstone), who comes to save the kingdom under the rule of King Hrothgar (Anthony Hopkins) from the FUGLY party-pooper demon, Grendel (voiced by Crispin Glover).

Beowulf, and his merry band of vikings (think 300 but with only 14 men), killed Grendel but when it came to Grendel's vengeful mother (played by naked, wet and computer-generated half-lizard Angelina Jolie), he found his sword melting away in the face of her beauty and her promises of wealth and power.

Years later, Beowulf, now an aging king whose reputation went far and wide, found his kingdom ravaged by his own personal demon -- a fire-breathing dragon, his son by Grendel's mother. Once again, a hero is called for. Who will answer?

It's quite simple, isn't it? And obvious. But I guess that's what makes it a good movie to watch. With a straightforward plot like that, you don't have a lot of expectations. And this movie being marketed as Oscar-contender animated feature, I guess at least one of your reasons for watching it is the supposedly fantabulous CGI.

Then again, we're talking about an adaptation of an epic here and by such writers as Neil Gaiman (man, I didn't even realize until I saw the credits) and Roger Avary and director Robert Zemeckis, who gave us such runaway hits as Forrest Gump, Back to the Future, and most recently Polar Express, another entirely live-action performance-capture technology-friendly film.

That said, I'm not overly impressed by the CGI in this movie. Since all the characters are played by real actors in real settings, the animation artists really had very little to work with, apart from adding a few details to the background and some airbrushing here and there.

One of the main problems I see in animation technology is the apparent absence of gravity. When a character falls down, it's just not convincing. You can't really feel the impact even as animation artists try their darnest to simulate disturbed dust and what-not. Also, the eyes tell it all. In a few scenes, the characters still look a bit spaced out. I see that animation technology still has a long way to go.

But despite that (I might even say BECAUSE of that), I think the movie gave a whole new dimension to the story of Beowulf. I realize that a lot of people compare this movie to the dumbness of 300 -- all mindless visuals and gore, no soul -- but look a little closer. Gaiman and Avary added flaws to the hero, made Beowulf a bit of a pain in Unferth's (John Malkovich) butt...turned him into an unreliable narrator with a propensity for exaggeration.

For instance, during his retelling of a swimming race he had, Beowulf made his adventure sound more dangerous and exciting than it actually was and flossed over the parts where he wasn't being very heroic. That scene with the mermaid/sea monster was a foreshadowing of Beowulf's eventual downfall at the hands of Grendel's mother. It showed his weakness of the flesh.

As how the film turned out, Beowulf wasn't a hero because he killed demons and became a good king (I'm assuming he was a good king). The character was, in fact, weak and very human. What made him different from King Hrothgar -- who, like him, fell for Grendel's mother, to his complete and utter shame -- was that Beowulf took responsibility for his own mistake. He killed the dragon himself and did not wait for a young hero to come and slay the beast for him, like what Hrothgar did.

I think that was the best part about the film -- the portrayal of a flawed hero. Other than that, this action-adventure movie offers a lot of, well, action and adventure and little else. There was some attempt at a love-triangle between Queen Weathleow (Robin Wright Penn), Ursula (Alison Lohman) and Beowulf, but it got sidetracked when it was time for Beowulf to don his armor and go dragon-slaying once more.

The ending was also pretty interesting although I am not certain if this was really in the poem or mere speculation by the screenwriters. Either way, it does pose a few questions for the viewers, one of them being what kind of character is Wiglaf? Being merely foil to Beowulf's swash-buckling hero, we don't really see much of Wiglaf's true character in the movie, and I like that the writers are aware of this and made it seem like if the movie was ever continued, it's going to be about Wiglaf.

In sum, this movie is for those people who like action-adventure films. The CGI technology used makes it a little different from all other action-adventure offerings this year. You might also want to watch this movie for a slightly different take on the epic poem. Or if you're just looking for an entertaining movie without a lot of heavy drama, then this is it. These days, you can't really go wrong with Neil Gaiman.

THE SCORE

Story - 8
Sound - 7
Cinematography - 7
Picture - 9
Special Effects - 10
Acting (Voice) - 7

Overall - 8/10

Labels: action, adaptation, adventure, animation, cgi, fantasy