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In this CG version of the legendary tale, King Hrothgar’s (Anthony Hopkins) village is plagued by the demon, Grendel (Crispin Glover), who storms into the mead hall during any night of celebration and kills men by the dozen – which naturally puts a damper on the partying. Hrothgar’s advisor Unferth (John Malkovich) doesn’t have any good advice and his queen Wealthow (Robin Wright Penn) doesn’t enjoy the debauchery that goes on in the mead hall, so Hrothgar plans to shut the place down until a hero comes along to slay the demon.
Fortunately for the revelers, they don’t have to wait long before Beowulf
(Ray Winstone) comes sailing into the harbor – all muscles and bravado
and pronounces that he will rid the kingdom of Grendel for half their gold.
He may be full of himself with his stories of past victories, but he certainly
makes an impression on Wealthow. When he puts down his sword and strips
down to nothing, declaring that he will fight Grendel with his bare hands,
well,,, all we can say is – he may be CG, but never has a animated character
looked this hot. They have an Austin Powers inspired sequence where helmet
and swords keep getting in the way of the goods, which is pretty amusing,
but then Beowulf gets down to hero business and the moment disappears in
a shower of blood. Beowulf thinks he’s saved the day, but he learns that
Grendel’s mother (Angelina Jolie) is the big monster and that she can shape-shift
into a gorgeous woman who wears high-heels and nothing else but gold on
her skin. She wants Beowulf and if she seduces him, Hrothgar’s story is
destined to repeat itself.
The computer-generation here is incredible to look at, although it’s a little unnerving at first to see an animated version of Anthony Hopkins in a toga. But once you get over that, it’s stunning to see, even the battle scenes, which can be graphic with severed arms and heads and impalings and any other bloody death they could throw in. This kind of story could have been told using real people and you might have gotten more real emotions out of it, but you wouldn’t have gotten a cooler dragon or sea monsters to combat and real people might have objected to the decapitations.
If you’re a die-hard Beowulf fan, you’ll be sorry to know that the movie
diverts from the plot of the poem, but somehow we’re guessing that fans
of this kind of film aren’t going to know or care about that. What they’re
going to want to see is Angelina – even if she’s the CG version of Angelina,
she’s still drop-dead sexy. And it really looks like her (with a tail)
since they used motion-capture to give that realistic look to the film
– which then makes us wonder who provided Beowulf’s body (no offense to
Ray Winstone, but we know he just provided the voice).
The movie has several moments that will bring 300 to mind, but if you can catch this at an IMAX theatre, it will still blow you away. On a standard screen, it might not be as impressive, because they story doesn’t have as much impact as the technology that’s used to make it.
© 2007 Paramount Pictures - All rights reserved
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