| BEOWULF |
 2007 - USADirector: Robert Zemeckis
- Reviewed by Linda
That said, once you get used to the dead eyes, and the disarmingly not quite right movements of characters' lips while they talk, Beowulf is a pretty cool-looking movie. Computer animation lets the filmmakers literally do whatever they want. Beowulf, played by real-life thuggish, short, and portly Ray Winstone is now tall, blonde, and built like a tank (with one of the more impressive six-packs I've ever seen). Characters are allowed to be young, then old, without needing to bother with unconvincing old-age makeup. And the actors didn't need to work out to accomplish feats of super-human strength and dexterity. If you didn't read the epic tale in school, don't worry—Zemekis and screenwriter Neil Gaiman make Beowulf palatable for the masses. In fact, it is made clear more than once in the DVD extras that they have a sort of disdain for the original material. Like, "Wow, this story goes on wayyyy to long and doesn't really make sense. Gosh, I wonder how it managed to survive thousands of years of oral tradition? Why! Let's chop it up, add some action and intrigue, and make it more entertaining!" And you know what? It kind of works! King Hrothgar (Anthony Hopkins) is having a bit of trouble with a local pest. When he and his men party too hard, their noise disturbs the local monster named Grendel (surprisingly affecting Crispin Glover) who breaks down the door and wreaks havoc, killing men left and right. Hrothgar's kingdom lives in fear of Grendel, and puts out a message to all potential heroes that they need help. Reward will be great, but no man has succeeded thus far. That is, until Beowulf (Winstone) arrives from the sea, pounding his chest, and showing off his brute strength. Impressive as Beowulf is, he does manage to get almost all of his men killed before successfully defeating Grendel. But of course it is not that simple. King Hrothgar doesn't warn Beowulf about the mysterious and evil cave-dwelling sorceress, known simply as Grendel's Mother (Angelina Jolie... with spiked-heel FEET?).... The voice cast of Beowulf is A-list, making the film totally watchable. Brendan Gleeson plays Wiglaf, Beowulf's right-hand man, John Malkovich shows up as one of Hrothgar's pals, and Robin Wright Penn is the king's neglected wife Wealthow. (Wright Penn, by the way, somehow manages to look less hot in CGI than she does is real life. I think the animators were distracted by Jolie.) While the film is an entertaining popcorn film visually—like a really fancy-pants video game—it is the many DVD extras and featurettes that will make your jaw drop and want to give the movie another peek. Specifically, the featurette called "A Hero's Journey: The Making of Beowulf" shows all the baffled stars to the huge warehouse-like room that would become their movie set. Just an empty room with a grid on the floor. The poor actors have to pull on skin-tight jumpsuits and get covered in many many dots, to capture their motions for the computer. Anyways, I just sat there watching the making-of bits (with probably the same expression as befuddled Anthony Hopkins) I kept saying, "That is just so... WEIRD!!!" And kinda cool, I'll admit. |
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The first few seconds of Beowulf seemed to be going well, that is until the filmmakers showed a close-up of one of the characters' faces. (Wait... should we say "filmmakers" or "programmers"?) I shrieked, "Dead eyes! Dead eyes!" while my friend screamed and shielded his eyes at the super-creepiness, the still not-quite-perfected computer animation (CGI). And for some reason, director Robert Zemekis is in love with this new type of movie-making. After all, we can credit him for the nightmare-inducing 