Flick Flak: Robin Hood
Robin Hood
Director: Ridley Scott
With: Russell Crowe, Cate Blanchett, William Hurt
12A, 140mins
Appropriately enough for a film about Britain's most famous archer, this film is a near miss.
While I truly admire what it set out to do, I felt that it fell short, and the result was a slightly boring and over-long film.
When I first heard that a new version of Robin Hood was being made, I was interested in the 'new take' on the old story.
The original idea had been to tell the story with the Sheriff of Nottingham as the 'good' guy and Robin Hood as the dangerous outlaw. I love the sound of that; it sounds like it could have been well worth watching. While somewhere along the line this idea was dropped in favour of a more traditional version of the story, Ridley Scott's vision for the hero is still pretty original.
As a history student I really liked the idea behind this film: to take the fictional character, look at English history and try to work out when the social and political conditions would have been most likely to spawn the rabble-rousing outlaw.
They hit upon 1199, and an England whose King (Richard the Lionheart) is away crusading, whose people are poverty-stricken from paying for said wars, and who are oppressed by the barons and monarchy. Seeking to capitalise, the King of France prepares to invade with the help of insider Godfrey.
I was thoroughly impressed by the attempt to basically create a prequel to the traditional Robin Hood legend, as it chronicles his journey from archer in the Lionheart's army to national hero, before being declared an outlaw (all in the trailer, so no spoilers there!) so, the idea was great in theory.
The next good point is that, however much Ridley Scott may take flak for some of his films, he is still one of the best at directing an action sequence. Like Gladiator and Kingdom Of Heaven, Robin Hood boasts exhilarating scenes of sword-and-shield battles, including a great scene at the siege of a castle, and the climactic fight on a beach (filmed in Wales no less.) Pleasingly the film is also light on CGI-use, which is one of the things that make the battles and the film as a whole feel gritty and realistic.
The main problem for me was that the film was just a bit boring... The character development, while admirable (Robin's background is revealed to be more important than it at first seems), is not all that interesting, and while I have studied some of the topics involved in this film, I still struggled to follow what exactly it was that was being suggested some of time.
Again, attempts to root the Robin Hood story in the creation of the Magna Carta are very intelligent and admirable, but I felt it was messily done, so that in the end the story rambled. This film is over two hours long and unfortunately does feel it at times.
The film also suffers from some quirks, chief among them being Russell Crowe's accent (though he is far from being alone in sounding odd). The actor has recently stormed out of a couple of interviews when asked if he thought perhaps he sounded a bit Irish [Sub-Ed Note: Rude words ahoy!]. Hopefully he will not be reading this, because I have to agree, at times he does. At others though he moves through his standard grizzly grumbly voice, before gloriously emerging in a Yorkshire accent for his big motivational speech.
Now, the accent is not a big deal for me - yes it is funny, but you can get over it a few minutes after each geographical accent change. I didn't really feel Russell Crowe had to try too hard for this role, acting-wise. He is effectively a slightly cheerier version of Maximus, and so we get the fairly normal 'intense expression, mumbly angry voice' performance, admittedly with a little humour too.
Cate Blanchett puts in a good performance as a dignified and no-nonsense Marion, but I really was not convinced by her relationship with Russell Crowe, to the extent that when Robin declares his love for her before riding off to battle, it felt a little out of the blue. They seemed good friends, if that.
Mark Strong is back in another film, playing yet another villain (Godfrey), and playing him very well. Part of me enjoys his characters; they are always truly menacing and believable. Part of me is a bit bored that he is always the same. As my friend put it, if he'd played a fairy ballerina convincingly, he'd really have added to his repertoire.
Just to top off the oddity list are a couple of confusing moments, such as the distances involved and the time in which they are covered (Nottingham to the south coast in how long?), a scene which is literally Saving Private Ryan but with medieval Frenchmen, and the truly baffling appearance of some children on Shetland ponies during a cavalry charge.
Robin Hood took me often between admiration and boredom, puzzlement and laughter (not intentionally generated). I think that overall it is bloated and a little dull, despite having a great basis and lively action sequences.
Some would say that you could just re-watch Gladiator, Kingdom Of Heaven or perhaps Lord Of The Rings. Sadly this is probably true, as it doesn't quite make its promising premise count. For some reason I still like to watch Kingdom Of Heaven. Perhaps it is the subject matter which can raise my interest above my dislike for Orlando Bloom and the rambling plot, perhaps it is the fantastic battles.
Either way, neither of those things will make me want to watch Robin Hood again and again.
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