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What did you think?

Joker wrote:What did you think?

I've never really seen him, but I chat with him quite a bit. Frankly, he's not all that spectacular.

...

Wait, you mean the movie? Oh...

It was alright. Not the greatest. Angelina Jolie was hot, as always, but the effects were very uneven. Sometimes they almost looked lifelike, and other times it was very obviously CGI.

Unless you're referring to some other Beowulf movie? In which case you need to be more specific.

No, you got it right.

The worst thing was that Beowulf seemed very worried I was going to forget which movie I'd paid to be in. He kept reminded he was "BEOWULF." Still his little speech to Grendal before ripping off his arm was quite badass.

Plus his accent was weird and the did a very good job of showing us why Grendal was so pissed off, that screeching was terrible.

I saw the 3D-goggles version and it's cool to see it for the effects. As a movie, however, it's a not-really-convincing mix of decent action scenes, a plot that fails to really engage the audience and a very eclectic mix of animation quality, ranging from almost-lifelike to almost-1998 PSOne cinematic.

If you can see it in 3D, preferably on a big screen, for under $5, by all means go ahead; but if you're expecting a brilliant action epic or a faithful Beowulf adaptation, you won't walk out satisfied.

I was going to see it, but then I decided I should read the epic poem first. After that, I figured there was no way that the movie could be faithful to it, or capture the spirit of the original work. I have no doubt that it's a really badass movie, but I don't think that was the point. There's my two cents on the subject.

I liked it, even in spite of the ridiculous anachronistic castle. It was cool; it was fun; it was true to the epic (in a roundabout way - the story everyone ends up believing is the epic; the story that we, the privileged audience, get to see, is quite different); it was true to the feel of the time, with Dark Agedness to the max. No idiotic Leonidas flashing his teeth about Freedom here - Beowulf manages to integrate a set of very Dark Age characters into a good modern story. The only complaints I have are the 14th century castle that magically popped up in a few decades in the ninth century, the aforementioned mix of animation quality, and the design of the Grendel monster.

I didn't understand why everyone was so negative about it. I liked the movie and so did Rebecca.

It was awesomer, more epic, and more fun than 300. Of course, if you hated that movie, it's probably not much of an endorsement. I thought it was decently faithful to the poem, though it's more of a "the real story behind the legend" type thing, and there are significant differences.

I thot it was good fun.

I found it to be enjoyable enough that I bought the DVD. The movie is a new interpretation of 'what if' on the saga. According to the documentary, after reading the poem and finding it boreing they started peicing things together, and bringing a connecting between Grendel and the Dragon.

MKSheppard wrote:I AM BEOWULF

and this isn't sparta!!!

honestly didn't we discuss this months ago?

Darth Wong wrote:I didn't understand why everyone was so negative about it. I liked the movie and so did Rebecca.

The main complaints I saw were these:

Not faithful to the poem - Meh for me. I read some shortened High School version and I don't really remember it beyond the major highlights of the story (Beowulf fights Grendal, etc). So that doesn't bug me much.

Historical nitpickery - The castles and stuff. Since I don't give a damn about Patton not using the right tanks and things like that, again this hardly bothers me.

Uneven animation - This one I can agree with. It really did go from "almost lifelike" to "more cartoony than Shrek" pretty randomly. Not enough for me to dislike the movie but it was rather offputting.

Personally, I enjoyed it a lot.

Darth Wong wrote:I didn't understand why everyone was so negative about it. I liked the movie and so did Rebecca.

Not enough Spartan wanking and naked men.

Honestly, I saw the movie at a drafthouse theatre local to me and had great fun.

I liked it.

It was an entertaining and interesting take on the Beowulf story. I even rather liked the changes made in the story. I thought it helped it work better as a film.

The dragon swimming under water with the water boiling around it's mouth was pretty cool.


It's funny. I just saw The Thirteenth Warrior on video about a month before I saw Beowulf on video at the beginning of this month.

Over-the-top action, combined with one of the oldest epic stories, and an interesting new spin on it?

All the awesome action kept the popcorn action center of my brain going, and the duality of "Beowulf the Legend" and "Beowulf the Fallible Man" that was shown in the movie for the viewer (Whilst the characters remained oblivious!) kept the rest of my brain interested.

Also, you forgot the best line in the film.

“My mighty lust limb can transport you to ecstasy and back!”

Ghost Rider wrote:

Darth Wong wrote:I didn't understand why everyone was so negative about it. I liked the movie and so did Rebecca.

Not enough Spartan wanking and naked men.

Honestly, I saw the movie at a drafthouse theatre local to me and had great fun.

Over in Arlington right? Its been forever since I've gone to see anything there and I haven't even looked at their schedule for months to see if they have been playing anythign decent so it loks like I missed a decent bit of fun with this one.

I liked it better then 300, and unlike 300, it wasn't fucking your ears or oversaturating everything, the CGI was well done.

CmdrWilkens wrote:

Ghost Rider wrote:

Darth Wong wrote:I didn't understand why everyone was so negative about it. I liked the movie and so did Rebecca.

Not enough Spartan wanking and naked men.

Honestly, I saw the movie at a drafthouse theatre local to me and had great fun.

Over in Arlington right? Its been forever since I've gone to see anything there and I haven't even looked at their schedule for months to see if they have been playing anythign decent so it loks like I missed a decent bit of fun with this one.

LOL...yeah the very same. All, in all it's the place I hit when I completely miss a movie, because they get it around the time of the DVD(or a tad bit before it does go to DVD).

Y'know, you can rent the place out? We used it in part with one of my friend's bachelor parties.

Darth Wong wrote:I didn't understand why everyone was so negative about it. I liked the movie and so did Rebecca.

Me too, though the pomo kind of "reinterpretation" somewhat grated on me.

Illuminatus Primus wrote:Me too, though the pomo kind of "reinterpretation" somewhat grated on me.

What was post-modernist about it? It looked pretty straight forward to me.

Indeed. While I vaguely remember the epic story in Jr. High, the story depicted in the movie was fairly straight forward and good. It's not on my top ten list of all time or anything but still was a good movie and fun time.

I loved it, and I'm gonna get it on Blu-Ray the moment the price comes down ($42? Fuck off).

In relation to the "reinterpretation" - I was predicting the plot before it happens. For me, if it had been the way the story actually went, I would've been surprised. Still, it was great fun.

Adrian Laguna wrote:

Illuminatus Primus wrote:Me too, though the pomo kind of "reinterpretation" somewhat grated on me.

What was post-modernist about it? It looked pretty straight forward to me.

They take things like traditional hero stories and such and try to "deconstruct it" or turn it on its head. Hence the classic hero becomes a flawed man who dies trying to make up for the mistakes that haunted him his whole life.