Screen Time

I was kicking myself for not catching “Beowulf” in 3-D as soon as the movie’s titles started flowing across the screen. The Cinemark in my hometown of Brownsville wasn’t offering the 3-D experience director Robert Zemeckis had in mind when creating this animated take on the ancient long-form poem. It’s too bad, since the 3-D gimmick probably would have made this awkward and unlikeable movie worth watching.

Unlike the “Lord of the Rings” trilogy or even the “Harry Potter” flicks, little in “Beowulf” is thrilling, visually arresting or awe inspiring. The filmmakers’ take on the mostly shapeless classic story is dull, one-note and sometimes laughable. The animation and art design is unremarkable and often ugly, especially when the human characters look and move like dead, manipulated meat puppets. There are two scenes — only two — that I found potentially engrossing and fun to look at, but that’s a sad tally for a movie marketed as a rousing holiday spectacle.

“Beowulf” opens in King Hrothgar’s (Anthony Hopkins) mead hall with the king and his knights doing an Anglo-Saxon take on “Caligula.” It’s a gross display, with the vulgar animated knights slobbering all over themselves and a Hrothgar so drunk and undiginified that he doesn’t care if his robe slips off to reveal little Hrothgar in front of everybody. These characters never become sympathetic or interesting at any point in the movie’s 113-minutes.

Eventually, the monster Grendel bursts in and kills most of these guys and the “hero” Beowulf later answers Hrothgar’s call to kill the monster. The mistake made is that Zemeckis’ Beowulf, along with most of the other human characters in this thing, is about as heroic and likeable as a boasting jock or an obnoxious brute. Instead of turning the classic character into a classic pop hero, Zemeckis and crew (including writers Neil Gaiman and Roger Avery) deliver a boring braggart no one can relate to. Ray Winstone’s voice acting is fine — and loud — but this movie had me rooting for Grendel not Beowulf.

The monster Grendel’s design is too overcooked to be appreciated, but the script turns him into a sympathetic character here, and Crispin Glover’s performance had me wanting to see more of him. Too bad he’s snuffed in an early scene that’ll be remembered, more than anything else, for a ridiculous game of hide-the-exposed genitals, ala Austin Powers.

In a lazy attempt to unify the original text’s disconnected halves, the movie grossly diverges from the poem and goes on to further kill the idea of Beowulf as a hero, leaving the audience with no one to root for and little to invest in. I won’t give away the details here, but what happens after Beowulf meets Grendel’s mother (Angelina Jolie) really sinks this thing.

“Beowulf” seems less concerned with telling a good story than it is with delivering cheap cartoon thrills and a kinda-sorta naked and spiked-heel sporting Angelina Jolie. The character close-ups look good, and the final action sequence is fun, but that’s not enough to recommend this half-baked movie. And don’t get me started on the music …

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Photos courtesy Paramount Pictures

Posted in: Action • Animated • Fantasy • In Theaters |

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