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Beowulf

(2007) Adventure - Rated PG-13

Directed by: Robert Zemeckis

Starring: Ray Winstone, Anthony Hopkins

Overview: A warrior battles a ferocious demon and its evil but seductive mother. Animated.

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  • OVERVIEW
  • REVIEWS
  • PHOTOS
  • USER COMMENTS (3)
  • CAST

  • Beowulf

    After destroying the demon Grendel, a mighty warrior (Ray Winstone) faces an even-more-potent enemy in the form of its seductive, vengeful mother (Angelina Jolie). Animated.

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    Reviews

    "Over the past decade, the film industry's never-ending search for bankable story ideas has yielded movies based on comic books, television shows, videogames and even toys. Now..."  [more]
    — Thomas Leupp, ReelzChannel

    User Comments and Video Reviews

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    • Uncle Pete 6657

      04/14/08 10:05 PM
      almost as bad as the first 2
      Review Rating: 0
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    • Thomas Leupp

      ReelzChannel, November 14, 2007


      Over the past decade, the film industry's never-ending search for bankable story ideas has yielded movies based on comic books, television shows, videogames and even toys. Now it appears that we're on the verge on a much more unsettling trend: movies based on homework assignments. Ray Winstone as BeowulfBeowulf, the interminably long Old English epic poem and the bane of my ninth grade English Lit existence, has gotten the Hollywood blockbuster treatment, courtesy of director Robert Zemeckis (Forrest Gump, The Polar Express) and his team of visual effects wizards. Aided by a script that amps up the action, sex, blood and gore while still somehow remaining in the lucrative realm of PG-13, this shiny new Beowulf has taken the age-old tale of the monster Grendel and his mom and turned it into the coolest-looking videogame I have ever seen.


      While the core of Beowulf's story stays essentially true to the source material (Grendel terrorizes the Danish village of Heorot, geat Beowulf kills Grendel, Grendel's mom gets pissed, Beowulf battles Grendel's mom, etc.), screenwriters Neil Gaiman and Roger Avary have added several intriguing new layers. Heorot is a now a den of Viking debauchery, Beowulf's (Ray Winstone) a cocky badass with a six-pack, monstrous Grendel (Crispin Glover) is given motivation and his mother (Angelina Jolie) looks like Angelina Jolie.


      The most dramatic new dimension added to Zemeckis' Beowulf, however, is the film's visual aesthetic. Utilizing a complex "digital performance capture" process that involves shooting real actors in live scenes and then "painting" over them with CGI, Zemeckis has created a new look that can be best described as existing somewhere in the vicinity of live action, videogames and the latest Shrek flick. The action at times is genuinely dazzling, especially during the climactic fight scene between Beowulf and Grendel's mother, but I worry that Watch out for that Dragonfolks who see it on regular 2-D screens (as opposed to critics like me who got to see it in full 3-D on a massive Imax screen) will miss out on the most appealing aspect of the movie. Without the 3-D, Beowulf is really little more than a so-so Pixar flick: riveting in spurts, but ultimately soulless.


      Zemeckis has stated that the primary goal of his approach to Beowulf was to create a heightened look that still preserved the best aspects of the actors' performances, but the result actually achieves the opposite effect, stripping them of all nuance and subtlety. It prompts one to wonder why heavyweights like Jolie, Malkovich and Sir Anthony Hopkins would sign on to a project that essentially marginalizes them. Equally perplexing is why the producers went to the expense of getting so many big names when they could have pulled a 300, used a cast of no-names and saved a ton of dough. Or, better yet, why didn't they just skip the theatrical part entirely and release Beowulf as a game for the Xbox 360? Because, ultimately, that's where it probably belongs. 


      ReelzChannel Rating:  6

  • 15 photos. Click to enlarge.

    • chester

      02/26/08 08:27 PM
      i think this is one of the best epic poem turned into a movie i have ever seen
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    • monk3y01

      03/24/08 12:52 PM
      this was one of the best movies i've seen.
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    • Uncle Pete 6657

      04/14/08 10:05 PM
      almost as bad as the first 2
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  • Crew

    Director Robert Zemeckis
    Producer Steve Starkey
    Producer Jack Rapke
    Executive Producer Martin Shafer
    Writer Neil Gaiman
    Writer Roger Avary

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  • A glimpse of Christmas future

    A painting by Joseph Mallord William TurnerWith their 3-D dazzler Beowulf debuting in theaters this weekend, director Robert Zemeckis and his team of visual effects wizards are already at work on their next CGI "performance capture" flick, A Christmas Carol, with Jim Carrey set to star as history's most notorious miser, Ebenezer Scrooge.

    At the recent Beowulf press day, Zemeckis' producer Steve Starkey described the look of their take on Charles Dickens classic as "very much like (Joseph Mallord William) Turner's paintings from the middle of the 19th century. That's what London's gonna look like -- and it's really quite beautiful...we can rebuild London from historical references and actually create the exact London of the time that Scrooge is walking through."

    "Tom Hanks is not attached," Starkey replied when asked about the rumors that Hanks had been cast in the role of Bob Cratchit.


    Next Showing: A Christmas Carol opens November 6, 2007.

    Posted 11/17/2007 by Thomas

    Robert Zemeckis | Steve Starkey | Tom Hanks | Jim Carrey | Beowulf | Beowulf 3D | A Christmas Carol

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