Escape to the Movies: Robin Hood
- Thread starter MovieBob
- Start date
My girlfriend and I were on the fence about going to see this as we're both suckers for a good Robin Hood tale, but looking at the trailers, it looked like there was a very good chance that most of it was going to be boring and ponderous. And unfortunately many of the reviews seem to have borne this out. It looks like they're going the same route as, say, 2004's King Arthur which took a similar approach to de-mythologizing its subject matter, with the intent of telling us how it supposedly "REALLY" happened. It sounds great in theory, but not in practice. In fact, one other review said that it was probably as close as we'd ever get to Magna Carta: The Movie.
Looking at this and Iron Man 2 which we haven't seen yet (we skipped opening weekend as we don't like to deal with the crowds) and deciding on which movie looked to be more fun and worth our time, looks like we're going with IM2. If we want to see a good Robin Hood movie, we'll just watch the Disney animated version or Prince of Thieves again. Hell, we could even watch the Errol Flynn version or a marathon of Robin of Sherwood. Point being that there are plenty of iterations of Robin Hood around, and it looks like any of them are more fun and entertaining than this latest version.
I was going to suggest something else Bob. But since you mentioned it in your Robin essay, I really want to ask you now: Have you considered doing a review of The Human Centipede? The movie is getting all sorts of buzz and reactions to it are all over the map. I haven't seen it myself (not sure if I want to), but I've always liked your reviews and I'd be interested to hear what your take on it is.
Looking at this and Iron Man 2 which we haven't seen yet (we skipped opening weekend as we don't like to deal with the crowds) and deciding on which movie looked to be more fun and worth our time, looks like we're going with IM2. If we want to see a good Robin Hood movie, we'll just watch the Disney animated version or Prince of Thieves again. Hell, we could even watch the Errol Flynn version or a marathon of Robin of Sherwood. Point being that there are plenty of iterations of Robin Hood around, and it looks like any of them are more fun and entertaining than this latest version.
I was going to suggest something else Bob. But since you mentioned it in your Robin essay, I really want to ask you now: Have you considered doing a review of The Human Centipede? The movie is getting all sorts of buzz and reactions to it are all over the map. I haven't seen it myself (not sure if I want to), but I've always liked your reviews and I'd be interested to hear what your take on it is.
My favorite version of robin hood will always be:
Sad to know that this movie is rather bland. I was hoping for a golden nugget. The dark grittiness of the trailer automatically made me think the movie might not live up to expectations.
And, lol, fluffernutter.
Sad to know that this movie is rather bland. I was hoping for a golden nugget. The dark grittiness of the trailer automatically made me think the movie might not live up to expectations.
And, lol, fluffernutter.
MovieBob said:
HOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO boy, are you and I going to have some disagreements here Bob.
I love Ridley Scott, some of my favorite movies are his (Gladiator, Black Hawk Down, Kingdom of Heaven, Alien, hell I even like American Gangster, although he obviously does better when he's making epics rather than smaller, gritty productions). And you know what? My and my girlfreind both LOVED this film.
Let's just look past the fact we're both English and it's obviously a film made for English people (and maybe the Welsh if they can take a cheap joke or two thrown their way), we felt everything in this film was fantastic and worked really well together as a whole despite the messy, messy, MESSY production behind it all. The only thing we didn't like is the casting.
Robin Hood, a common archer in the crusades who becomes an noble thief in Nottingham, etc etc. When you read that (and ignore all preconceptions you might have of the man, eg past-movie Robin's) what do you imagine? You know what I imagine? A scrawny, poor, nibble, good-with-his-luck but always the underdog middle-Englishman. You know what Russel Crowe is? None of the above. In this film he is portrayed as big, beefy, strong, moral man who is a natural-born hero. Definitely not how I, my girlfriend, her parents, and any other English people we've asked, imagine him to be. In fact, we imagine him more like this -
That's really the only problem we had with the film. Russel was good, don't get me wrong, but he should have been... I dunno, someone else. King Richard, Sir Loxley's father, Little John (although the guy they got to play him was suburb anyway), but not Robin Longstride. Aside from this, it's all as you say in your review (beautiful cinematography, great acting, good special effects etc), and the story was actually intriguing (if completely made up). The pace slowed down substantially in the second act, but it soon picked up again for a killer finish! And my GOD, did it make you feel proud to be English (I swear, there's something in our blood that loves to see Frenchmen get their asses kicked... that would explain all the freakin wars we had with them (there were a LOT, like if all the years of warfare we had with France added up, it would be longer than the entire history of the USA))Sturmdolch said:
Alright, nationalistic bit over, but I'm just saying that, underneath all that, beats the heart of a well made film. Not Ridley's best, by far, but it had all the ingredients of a classic, just let down by a little bit of weird casting and a stupid amount of re-writes, that's all. As a final thought, how can you possibly say Kingdom of Heaven (crusade-war epic) and Robin Hood (romantic/revenge action film) are the same genre? Nothing about them is similar except the time-period! If we're doing that, then Casablanca and Saving Private Ryan are the 'same genre'.
Also, I've only just started to like your American Peanut Butter and Jelly sandwiches, PLEASE don't ask me to like that fluffer... thing. Really, it's just... unnatural!!! Still a good review, but I respectfully disagree on a few of your points mate!
I SO called it. Looking at the trailers, this review pretty much sums up my thoughts exactly: "Oh look, a Robin Hood movie...that has nothing to do with Robin Hood...huh. Bet it sucks just cause of the story."
CALLED IT.
CALLED IT.
Obviously I can't argue with your well thought out logic there, but I can say that boats made of wood did exist back then, and judging from the limited amount of footage they get in the film, they look feasible enough to be able to sail over the English Channel (at it's narrowest point only 21 miles). What, you think Mr Higgins was the first man to come up with that design of boat? And I bet you think Alexander Graham Bell was the first man to invent the telephone too...GrinningManiac said:
Riding a horse was a good skill to have back then, probably not LIKELY he'd know how to ride one, but if we're going to buy into the fact that Robin Hood (in this film, Russel) couldn't hold down a proper English Accent for 5 seconds, we can forgive him having a skill that he could have picked up in that time period and would have been quite useful to boot! It's like someone from the 30th century saying "Oh, come on, someone in the 21st century knew how to use a Longbow when they all had guns? That's preposterous!!!" (This is the only example that comes to me atm, because my parents have taken up Archery, but not because of this film...)
Wow I was never aware that the Fluffernutter was a regional thing..... Seriously though, it's the flavor of EPIC between two slices of bread. Seriously I would mainline this stuff if I could http://cupcakerehab.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2010/04/fluff1.jpg
To be honest it never even occurred to me how dirty it sounded till now combining the words fluffer and nuts does seem a bit redundant though
To be honest it never even occurred to me how dirty it sounded till now combining the words fluffer and nuts does seem a bit redundant though
The extended version of Kingdom of Heaven is indeed awesome, so awesome that I'm prepared to overlook the historical inaccuracies. This is coming from a History Student who wrote about the events portrayed in the film yesterday during an exam.
Incidentally the guy who played Salah ah-din in that film was fucking awesome. Just thought I would mention that..........
Oh Americans have some weird-arse sandwiches.
Incidentally the guy who played Salah ah-din in that film was fucking awesome. Just thought I would mention that..........
Oh Americans have some weird-arse sandwiches.
Wow, I'm surprised by all the commments on this topic by people saying how much they liked "Men in Tights." I thought it was Mel Brooks' most underrated movies ever. I get a kick out of it whenever I watch it.
Oh yeah, I've had a fluffernutter before. Don't know if I didn't use enough marshmellow fluff, but I didn't find any difference in it and how regular peanut butter sandwiches tasted. Also tried fluffernutter with jelly before too. Well in any case, fluffernutter's are ok.
Oh yeah, I've had a fluffernutter before. Don't know if I didn't use enough marshmellow fluff, but I didn't find any difference in it and how regular peanut butter sandwiches tasted. Also tried fluffernutter with jelly before too. Well in any case, fluffernutter's are ok.
I would go into the big standard speak about there being no British accent (and even saying there are English, Irish, Scottish and Welsh accents is a bit iffy), but it seems Russell Crowe is the one who is most tetchy about accents. On BBC Radio4 he got pissed off when the presenter said he sounded more Irish - http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/audio/2010/may/14/russell-crowe-robin-hood-accent-dead-ears
Personally, I think he's not far off the Nottingham accent, but he drifts around a bit and most of the time in the clips I've seen goes for a more Yorkshire sounding accent...
Personally, I think he's not far off the Nottingham accent, but he drifts around a bit and most of the time in the clips I've seen goes for a more Yorkshire sounding accent...
I'd heard of that "Nottingham" idea, but I can't say I liked it. Robin Hood is one of the classic English legends who was a symbolic representation of everything the common Saxon folk wished they could do against their Norman lords. Banned from hunting in the forests because the Normans are using them to hunt deer. Fine, get Robin Hood to live in the forests and feast on those same deers. Normans organising tax collecting with ruthless efficiency? Fine, get Robin Hood to steal their riches and hand it back. Robin Hood is an ex-nobleman himself, who surrounds himself with bandits (eg. Little John) and commoners (eg. Much the Miller's Son) which shows rejection of that class of life. Making Hood a simple crook basically misses the entire point of his legend. It would be like us Brits making a film where Benedict Arnold is the good guy.
I've seen the plot of this new film and my basic reaction was "Wha-?". Robin starts out as a commoner and simply steals the identity of the landowner of Loxley, both the traditional antagonists (Sheriff of Nottingham and Guy of Gisbourne) have been replaced by the Mark Strong character, there is some random invasion by the French that history conveniently forgot about, and the Magna Carta gets brought up within days of John ruling instead of years. It looks like a complete mess but I might go see it anyway
I've seen the plot of this new film and my basic reaction was "Wha-?". Robin starts out as a commoner and simply steals the identity of the landowner of Loxley, both the traditional antagonists (Sheriff of Nottingham and Guy of Gisbourne) have been replaced by the Mark Strong character, there is some random invasion by the French that history conveniently forgot about, and the Magna Carta gets brought up within days of John ruling instead of years. It looks like a complete mess but I might go see it anyway