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Just like everyone else here I'm a twenty something nerd who enjoys video games. It wasn't really until I was about fourteen that I really started getting into games and other mediums. As a kid my folks never bought me video games, let me watch movies, or enjoy tv and "most" music so I lived a terribly dull nonexistence. For years I had been skimming along by sneaking over to friends houses and the occasional visit to my uncles who had an original Famicom. Thankfully that all changed and I've been overdosing on everything I can get my hands on since.

Sadly I'm not rich so as much as I love video games I can only play so many so often. However movies and tv happen to be a little cheaper. I believe that all current mediums in our culture cross reference each other whether it be good or bad. Games influence movies, movies influence tv, tv acknowledges that video games exist every once and a while.

Honestly I really enjoy this community and just want to contribute what I can.
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Where's Robin Hood?
ScanCase | 1:09 AM on 05.15.2010 12 comments


Over the past ten years director Ridley Scott has had a very distinctive career formula. Starting with the award winning epic “Gladiator” Scott has gone from epic period piece to smaller drama based films like “Matchstick Men.” And lately people have started to believe that the man who gave us “Blade Runner,” “Alien,” and the before mentioned “Gladiator” is suffering from diminishing returns. Maybe they are right with his new film “Robin Hood” or maybe Scott is willing to against the grain that today’s Hollywood has established.

From the very beginning of “Robin Hood,” like many of Scott’s epics, it sets it’s self up to be a sweeping classical film. And throughout the its runtime it is able to maintain that feel for the most part. But like many epics we are left little time with each of the characters. Scott does try to correct this with some early character moments the Robin’s merry men and some decent humor. But the audience is given little time with basic cast of Robin, Little John, Will Scarlett, and Allan A’Dayle together as a team. Instead of a group we are given three side kicks and they are played as exactly that. The actors try their very best to give of their characters as much of an individual personality as possible but the film breaks down to giving them all the same joke to play off of. It may have been a different situation if each of them where given a hero moment in any of the large battles but the most the audience receives is watching Little John beating some one to death with his axe.

Of course the film isn’t called The Merry Men but Robin Hood, and this is the biggest downfall of the film. In popular culture Robin Hood is known as a jolly adventurer who does his best to help those less fortunate. He is a selfless hero that audiences have related to for centuries to do his wit and charm. Sadly much of that is missing in Scott and Crowe’s incarnation of the legendary figure. Crowe plays Robin more like a lost soul searching for his place in a world filled with war than a quick witted man trying to do the right thing. And screen writer Brain Helgoland isn’t even curious in creating a legend out of a man with no home. Instead he just dumps situations on Robin’s lap and has the character play out the situation since he doesn’t have any other real choice.

Now since this film is called Robin Hood everything above is a real problem with the film. The name holds a certain weight in the public’s subconscious. But that’s not the film Scott wanted to make. The name being thrown around by people is “Robin Hood Begins” which is more apt but the name of Robin Hood doesn’t really belong at all. Any resemblance of the character doesn’t show up until very late in the film. Up to that point the runtime is filled with political maneuvering between the newly crowned King John, the obviously evil Godfrey and the lords of England headed by William Marshal played by the seemly absent William Hurt. The character of Robin Hood does play his part but again it isn’t until late in the film.

The entire film feels like a set up to create the environment that the character of Robin Hood can actually exist in. And under the circumstances for that to take place do feel natural and makes sense. Scott uses established notions of the Robin Hood legacy and twisted them in a way that made them feel real and exist in 12th century logic(except for one glaring plot hole in spoiler territory). In most tellings of the Robin Hood story we are told that King John is evil and never shown. However here the audience is show in extreme detail that King John is a wimp and a douche.

Many people will walk away feeling robbed by this film. In my screening alone about a dozen people walked out half way through. And it’s all because Ridley Scott was not out to make a traditional Robin Hood film. This is an epic filled with a variety of characters all given their own motivations and subplots and not just about the creation of Robin Hood. This isn’t just Robin story but a story about the early strife’s and hardships of the English people. Maid Marion, played by Cate Blanchett, is the biggest example of this. Her husband was sent to war and never returned leaving her with an elderly father-in-law and an entire township to look after. The threat of taxation and starvation continually looms over her. Her people are desperate for some one to stand up for them. Enters Robin Hood and his Merry Men.

Does the film live up to Scotts previous works? Not really but it does say that he is a solid old fashion director. If this film came out fifty years ago it might have been regarded as an American classic. The pacing, character development, and large scale are all there they just don’t work with modern audiences. With Iron Man 2 still in theatre’s, giving us superheroes, and Shrek 4 giving middle America their generic laughs per minute Scott’s Robin Hood will be quickly forgotten. It does everything a classic film would do and nothing truly new.



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12 comments | showing # 1 to 12
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captpudge's Avatar - Comment posted on 05/15/2010 02:03
captpudge
So i'm going to watch it tommorow but i gotta say not very excited.
Deadly Crotch's Avatar - Comment posted on 05/15/2010 02:09
Deadly Crotch
Not surprisingly, I completely agree with you. Also, to add another point or two to your overview/opinion/whatever of Robin Hood, I will say that 1. They should've gotten a younger actor to play Robin, though Crowe did an excellent job as always. 2. To reinforce the younger actor, the direction of the movie could've been differnent as well. Instead of being some old Robin Hood, maybe they could've went with a more prologue-ish approach and went with a scrip of how Robin became the Hero he was.

(SPOILER ALERT!!!!!)

In the movie, there was only one true part where Robin actually lived up to his name with the whole steal from the rich and give to the poor. That, in my opinion, is a bullshit move simply because the rest of the movie he could've been some other type of hero and not Robin Hood. I also would've been extremely satisfied if the newly crowned king had been socked in that godamn whiny mouth of his.

Crotch out.
Chris Carter's Avatar - Comment posted on 05/15/2010 08:20
Chris Carter
What captpudge said.
Elsa's Avatar - Comment posted on 05/15/2010 11:18
Elsa
I havent' seen it yet, but it's also not at all high on my list of movies to see. There's been lots of Robin Hood movies and it was just never one of my favorites (well aside from the cartoon of Rocket Robin Hood... which I really loved as a kid!)
Occams electric toothbrush's Avatar - Comment posted on 05/15/2010 11:55
Occams electric toothbrush
I get a big ol' feeling of meh from the trailers. I'll watch it on TNT in a few years.
fightmejimmy's Avatar - Comment posted on 05/15/2010 12:46
fightmejimmy
I'd watch it as long as it doesn't have that horrible hummy, vaguely latin sounding music that has been spammed in every historic action film from Gladiator through to 300. I hate that stuff.

But does the world really cry out for another interpretation of the Robin Hood story? My world certainly doesn't. You know what they should make a big budget movie of? Attila the Hun. I'd watch that. I saw a pretty average direct to TV version once, and its a pretty interesting tale.
puduhead's Avatar - Comment posted on 05/15/2010 14:47
puduhead
@fightmejimmy

Attila the Hun would be good. or I was thinking of Vlad the Impaler. But not the ghouls & ghosts variety.
TheNomadicTroll's Avatar - Comment posted on 05/15/2010 17:17
TheNomadicTroll
Just watch Men in Tights or the Disney one, at least those are entertaining. Oh wait there is the Kevin Costner flick with the laughable acting especially with Christian Slater.
Geno27's Avatar - Comment posted on 05/15/2010 20:24
Geno27
Hm. Sounds like you recycled many other reviews I've read about the movie. I watched it today and actually enjoyed (gasp) it. Why do you let the jolly "popular culture Robin Hood" ruin it for you? Did it look from the trailers like a "jolly Robin Hood" movie to you? It looked to me like a bad ass Robin Hood's big adventure where he earns his outlaw status, and that's exactly what it was. Why would I want an exact retelling of a story I've read/seen/heard 18 times? This isn't the traditional Robin Hood (which is an incredibly unrealistic story), this is Robin Hood as he could have actually been, which is why it works (and is awesome).
ScanCase's Avatar - Comment posted on 05/15/2010 20:46
ScanCase
@Geno27

You're right we don't want to see the same story told a hundred times we just want to see it told differently. When taking an iconic figure there are certain things you have to keep. Take the new Batman films for example. Batman is dressed up as a bat and fights crime. However this film is called Robin Hood and we never see anyone really act like Robin apart from one brief scene. The new Batman films are great because they tell a classic story in a new and interesting way where as here that opportunity is squandered.
Geno27's Avatar - Comment posted on 05/15/2010 23:53
Geno27
Mmmm... see, I think I disagree with you there as well (and I do mean this as a peaceful, logical argument). I think the movie with the most similarities is indeed Batman Begins, which many have pointed out. And even in Batman Begins, he doesn't don "the batsuit" and go and fight crime until waaay on into the movie. For much of it, the "iconic figure" of Batman is dressed up like a ninja, training in some mountains to become a ninja himself. um, lolwut...? And yes, he does act like Robin Hood much of the film. "Stealing form the rich to give to the poor" isn't the only thing Robin Hood's known for. He's also a first-rate archer, which is plainly displayed the entire movie. He also falls in love with a Lady Marion. He also relies on his little gang (of merry men) (and in which Will Scarlet is brilliantly portrayed with red hair:)

And as for wanting to see the same story told differently, that's exactly what this movie is, only in a realistic manner. In Pyle's Robin Hood (which is generally considered the "canon" of the Robin Hood stories), Robin Hood's becoming an outlaw takes something like 3 or 4 paragraphs. He gets into an argument with some idiots about how good an archer he is, and he bets he shoot a deer crazy far away. He obviously does, and then they freak out and tell him that it was a "King's deer" and BAM he's an outlaw. That's it. That's also the most unrealistic, silly, and improbable way to become a hunted outlaw ever. But the rest of the book's that way too. And that's cool - for a fun, unrealistic book. But the story writers wanted something believable, and I for one am glad they did! It made me think, "If this Robin Hood fellow of legend really existed... this is totally a way it could have happened!" (in an entertaining way, of course)
Toadofsky's Avatar - Comment posted on 05/16/2010 07:54
Toadofsky
I'll rent it on Netflix, this robin hood film just doesn't interest me.
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