movie: Beyond Sherwood Forest
Jun. 5th, 2010 11:44 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
serynToday we finished Beyond Sherwood Forest.
It reminded me of the book Eragon in that it's visibly and noticeably cribbed from every other fantasy book and movie out there.
Most of the acting in this was mediocre. Julian Sands was great, as usual, despite having some really bad scripting. Without him, this would have been almost unwatchable.
You'll have to excuse my enjoyment of this because, really, a large part of it is what I bring with me. Robin Hood is one of my favorite mythos.
[I tried and tried to like Arthurian legend stuff, but Arthur is a rat-bastard who should have been drowned in the cradle lest he grow up to be the oath-breaker he was. As much as Arthur is fictional, I hate him for destroying the actual world. There's enough historical evidence for Arthur's story to have been at least cobbled together from actual people. So, in my mind, Arthur is the cornerstone of the successful spread of the religious plague called Christianity. That he did so while relying upon the magic of the people is appalling and tyrannical. He's not a hero. He's the asshole villain who won and rewrote history.]
Robin Hood is an early Batman for me. He's a normal kid in a well-to-do family until tragedy strikes. Then he works really hard and develops mad skills, but they are skills anyone could learn with enough effort. Then he uses those skills to help regular people. In some ways I like Robin Hood better because he gets the girl too. Batman has always suffered in that regard.
So. I came to this movie thinking, Robin Hood and a dragon, it's going to have to try in order to suck. But oh oh oh they tried. Cliche after cliche after cliche. They used the iconic shot from Robin Hood Prince of Thieves, flaming arrow and all. They had villain with the dragon's heart. They had sword fights that were choreographed by watching Star Wars movies and stealing those moves, including the whole narrow walkway business. There were bits from Labyrinth. There's the whole quest stuff with the hero climbing to the top of a mountain. There was "You killed my father, prepare to die." motivation throughout. There wasn't a single thing in this that was original. The way it was strung together from so many pieces made it not plagiarism, but it's not at all original.
Mediocre dialogue, severely underlit scenes--- though in this case, obviously so that the scenery could be cheaply done--- actors who shift accents, lousy costuming, bad action scenes, actors who can't actually hold weapons as if to fight (they looked awkward, then there's the cut and the fight begins with the stunt people doing it. The equivalent of a kindergartner suddenly going from adding to calculus.)
The dragon rendering was good. And the dragon was actually almost a sympathetic character, except for oh ho the baaaad acting and worse dialogue.
And I still loved it. But you probably will not.
It reminded me of the book Eragon in that it's visibly and noticeably cribbed from every other fantasy book and movie out there.
Most of the acting in this was mediocre. Julian Sands was great, as usual, despite having some really bad scripting. Without him, this would have been almost unwatchable.
You'll have to excuse my enjoyment of this because, really, a large part of it is what I bring with me. Robin Hood is one of my favorite mythos.
[I tried and tried to like Arthurian legend stuff, but Arthur is a rat-bastard who should have been drowned in the cradle lest he grow up to be the oath-breaker he was. As much as Arthur is fictional, I hate him for destroying the actual world. There's enough historical evidence for Arthur's story to have been at least cobbled together from actual people. So, in my mind, Arthur is the cornerstone of the successful spread of the religious plague called Christianity. That he did so while relying upon the magic of the people is appalling and tyrannical. He's not a hero. He's the asshole villain who won and rewrote history.]
Robin Hood is an early Batman for me. He's a normal kid in a well-to-do family until tragedy strikes. Then he works really hard and develops mad skills, but they are skills anyone could learn with enough effort. Then he uses those skills to help regular people. In some ways I like Robin Hood better because he gets the girl too. Batman has always suffered in that regard.
So. I came to this movie thinking, Robin Hood and a dragon, it's going to have to try in order to suck. But oh oh oh they tried. Cliche after cliche after cliche. They used the iconic shot from Robin Hood Prince of Thieves, flaming arrow and all. They had villain with the dragon's heart. They had sword fights that were choreographed by watching Star Wars movies and stealing those moves, including the whole narrow walkway business. There were bits from Labyrinth. There's the whole quest stuff with the hero climbing to the top of a mountain. There was "You killed my father, prepare to die." motivation throughout. There wasn't a single thing in this that was original. The way it was strung together from so many pieces made it not plagiarism, but it's not at all original.
Mediocre dialogue, severely underlit scenes--- though in this case, obviously so that the scenery could be cheaply done--- actors who shift accents, lousy costuming, bad action scenes, actors who can't actually hold weapons as if to fight (they looked awkward, then there's the cut and the fight begins with the stunt people doing it. The equivalent of a kindergartner suddenly going from adding to calculus.)
The dragon rendering was good. And the dragon was actually almost a sympathetic character, except for oh ho the baaaad acting and worse dialogue.
And I still loved it. But you probably will not.
