Beowulf & Grendel (2005)

A troll and his son were enjoying the outdoors when suddenly a band of riders appeared.  The troll scooped up his son and raced toward the shore.  It was a cliff far above the sea; there was no escape.  He hid his son on a ledge and turned to face the Danes.  Spears, arrows, and fire forced him over the cliff to his death.  Hrothgar (Stellan Skarsgard) looked over the ledge to the dead troll but spotted the child.  What to do?  He left the child and rode away with the others.  Nearly 20 years later, the young troll, Grendel, attacked Hrothgar's newly built hall.  Though Hrothgar himself tried to fight the troll, it ignored him; it only killed his men, specifically Danes.

Over the sea in Geatland, Beowulf (Gerald Butler) and his friends discussed the good times in Geatland.  With all well in the lands, the king agreed that Beowulf and his men should aid Hrothgar in his time of need.  Though Beowulf repeatedly sought battle with the troll, it refused to fight him or his men.  He had given in no reason to kill him.  Hrothgar had not revealed his history with the troll's father.  Beowulf consulted a witch, Selma (Sarah Polley), to discover how to fight the troll.  Eventually, he and his men provide a reason for the troll to kill them.

The movie does a good job with the setting.  The gear, ships, armor, clothing, buildings, and such fit in the early 6th century.  However, the geography is wrong for Denmark.  It is far too rugged and craggy; it was filmed in Iceland.  Though Beowulf has plenty of ego, this version of him also has humility.  He's not nearly the boaster like Ray Winstone's Beowulf (2007).  However, his reputation precedes him wherever he goes.  Even when he is washed ashore near a humble fisherman's wharf, the fisherman knew the tales of Beowulf.

The story is faithful to the source material, but adds a lot too.  After Grendel has died, there follows a battled with Grendel's mother.  She had been shown as an eventual foe when they sailed; her pale white hand would grab men near the rail and try to drag them into the sea.  In the poem, the death of Grendel's mother concluded the troubles.  It does here too, but there are loose ends.  Grendel had a son himself and Beowulf - like Hrothgar before him - was unable to kill the child.  Will a new vengeance cycle start in another decade or so?

It is strange to embrace trolls and sea hags but then have no magic.  The witch says she can foretell death, which appears true.  Was the sword that Beowulf grabbed from her stash a magic one, thus being able to kill the sea hag?  Maybe.  That there was mention of Clovis (466-511) and the presence of Father Brendan (Eddie Marsan) put it firmly in the historical setting, rather than mythical.

Just okay.

Outlander

Here is a disappointing take on the Beowulf story that I saw in June 2009:

The movie opens with a spacecraft's fiery descent into Earth's atmosphere and eventually plunging into a lake in Norway. Two figures rise from the lake's bottom, wearing what might best be described as powered armor. In the morning, only one is alive. Kainen (James Caviezel) queries a computer/signal buoy where he is. The computer tells him he is on a primitive planet with an abandoned colony. The year is 709 AD.

After setting his distress beacon and learning the local language via computer implant, he sets out with his blaster to hunt the Moorwen that escaped from his ruined ship. He soon discovers the smoldering remains of a village though there are no bodies. The Moorwen has been here. He immediately sets to pursue but is overcome by a mounted Viking. His blaster tumbles down a hillside and washes away in a stream. Bound, he is dragged back to the fortress of King Rothgar (John Hurt).

This rather disappointing introduction of our hero does not much improve through the movie. The Moorwen proves to be truly devastating, virtually invulnerable to the weapons of the era, ridiculously fast, and somewhat larger than a draft horse. Very quickly, I was wondering how Kainen expected to face this thing without his gun. I was also wondering why he left his powered armor behind. Continually, Kainen seeks to face the Moorwen with nothing more than a crude sword but, as luck would have it, the Moorwen leaves him be.

Kainen's and the Moorwen's back story is told in occasional flashbacks and eventually he tells the King's daughter (Sophia Myles) his sad history. His people had found a planet suitable for colonization but the Moorwen were dangerous. Viewed as nothing more than animals, his people had committed genocide to prepare the world for colonists. As a warrior, he was granted land on the new planet and settled his wife and son there. But not all the Moorwen were dead and Kainen was off-world when it came for revenge.

All efforts to kill the Moorwen fail as more and more folk are slaughtered. There are now two Moorwen, the younger having infiltrated the Viking fort via the well. Finally, after the sword he was given breaks on the Moorwen's hide, he decides it's time for a return to his ship. So, does he recover his powered armor? Does he raid the weapons' locker for a spare blaster? No, he recovers parts of the hull so that the blacksmith can forge some stronger swords. Right. We are never told what that alloy is but one wonders if the blacksmith's forge is even capable of getting hot enough to affect it. So, armed with these better weapons, Kainen and the handful of remaining warriors set out in search of the Moorwen's den.

As the younger Moorwen had come up from the well, Kainen decides the well will lead to the den. Sure enough, after a brief swim, he finds a tunnel. Once the others join him, they stumble about in this entirely unbelievable subterranean lair. At one point they are traversing a precarious bridge over a river of lava and the next they are on a towering cliff over the fjord with a huge waterfall. It goes without saying that Kainen succeeds in killing the Moorwen and its offspring. Kainen opts to live out his days on Earth with the King's daughter, becoming the new king in the process.

Since it is Vikings, it must be a variant of Beowulf. Yes, this is Beowulf where Moorwen stands in for Grendel/Grendel's mother/the Dragon. The Moorwen is finally slain when its arm is lopped off, just like Grendel. The Moorwen assaults the shield hall of Rothgar again and again, just as Grendel had assaulted the mead hall of Hrothgar. I suppose you could even say that the Moorwen avoided killing Kainen in much the same way that Grendel avoided killing Hrothgar. Beowulf slew Grendel and his mother and later became king; Kainen slays the Moorwen and becomes king. The names have been changed (in most cases) to protect the innocent.

Since every bit of technology is abandoned in the film's opening, the sole point of the crash is to introduce a non-historical monster to the time period. Surely, that could have been done better. Also, it would have been nice if Kainen had something, maybe just a flashlight or a lighter. Nope, he went for total immersion in the setting.

Beowulf

Beowulf was released in November 2007 but I apparently didn't get around to seeing it until April 27, 2008.

In this telling, King Hrothgar (Anthony Hopkins) is the father of Grendel (Crispin Glover), thus explaining why Grendel refuses to fight the King. Grendel wreaks havoc upon Hrothgar's realm until Beowulf (Ray Winstone) arrives. Learning that no weapon can harm Grendel, Beowulf determines to fight him unarmed. Grendel proves a fearsome monster but Beowulf succeeds in pulling his arm from its socket. Grendel retreats and dies in his mother's cave. Thinking his troubles are now at an end, Hrothgar rewards Beowulf with his most precious possession, a golden drinking horn in the shape of a dragon. However, Grendel's mother (Angelina Jolie) seeks revenge for her son's death, attacking Hrothgar's realm and slaying many. Beowulf thus takes it upon himself to kill her as well, venturing alone into the depths of the swamp with the golden horn to light his way. Rather than slay her, Beowulf is seduced. He makes a bargain with her, leaving the golden horn to seal the deal. He exits the cave with Grendel's head as a trophy and a tale of having slain Grendel's mother. Hrothgar, who had long ago been seduced, knows the truth. He wills his kingdom to Beowulf then jumps to his death. Twenty or more years later, Beowulf is king and the golden horn he left with Grendel's mother has returned to him, a sign that the bargain is at an end. Now it is Beowulf's son, a dragon, that terrorizes the kingdom. Only Wiglaf (Brendan Gleeson) is brave enough to go with him to fight the dragon. In the epic battle that follows, Beowulf slays the dragon but dies in the process. Now Wiglaf shall be king. Wiglaf stands upon the beach with the golden dragon horn in his hands, watching Beowulf's burial ship burn (Viking funeral). Then, suddenly, he sees Grendel's mother. She comes to him and he wades into the water toward her. Shall there be yet another bargain, another terrible offspring? Fade to black.

The CGI movie of Beowulf is most entertaining and does follow the poem, more or less, but also expands upon it. For instance, there are two distinct parts of Beowulf, the more famous part where as a young man he kills Grendel then Grendel's mother, and the less famous part where, as an old king he slew a dragon. These two events have nothing in common except Beowulf. However, in the movie, they are intimately bound. Some aspects of the dragon episode are included in the Grendel part while some of the Grendel part likewise carry over. For example, Wiglaf was a youthful warrior who accompanied old King Beowulf to fight the dragon, the only man brave enough to do so. In the movie, Wiglaf becomes Beowulf's right hand while fighting Grendel and remains so years later when the dragon attacks. Another tie-in would be the golden goblet stolen from the dragon that incurred its wrath. In this version, it is a magical drinking horn that binds the possessor to Grendel's mother. One of the significant inconsistencies with the poem is that Beowulf's kingdom was in Sweden, while Hrothgar's was in Denmark. Also, though Beowulf was cremated, his remains were buried in a barrow atop a cliff, not sent out to sea.

Most differences between the poem and the movie are cleverly explained away by making Beowulf an unreliable source. Only he was there to witness the fight with Grendel's mother. Did it really happen as he said? This Beowulf is painted as a braggart with an immense ego who is nonetheless a great hero. Of course, one wonders why a man with such incomparable accomplishments would feel the need to embellish them.