Friday 20 January 2012

Robin Hood

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Year:2010
Country of origin:USA / UK
Director:Ridley Scott
Genre:Robin reimagined.
Starring:Russell Crowe, Cate Blanchett, Max von Sydow, Mark Strong
Rating:2/5
IMDB link:http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0955308/
Tagline:No tagline
Favourite line:None worth mentioning

What a disappointment.
I wanted to like this movie. I really did.
Though never being particularly interested in the Robin Hood story, even as a child, the very mention of the name brings back painful memories of deathly dull Sunday afternoons, my mother lying on the sofa, inflating over time like a fucking bull frog, stuffing her face full of Liquorice Allsorts as the Enya-bot wailed out the opening sequence to Robin of Sherwood.
I'm haunted by it, shivering a little as I type these words.
Even with all of that, I genuinely hoped to enjoy this new version, not least because of Ridley Scott at the helm, a director I greatly admire, even if I don't always like the movies he makes. For every Alien there's a Hannibal, every Black Hawk Down there's a G.I. Jane.
Know what I mean?

The plot:
King Richard is killed waging war in France, a death that leads to the potential for a French invasion, as Britain is left leaderless and rudderless.
Robin Longstride leads a group of men against both the invading French and the treacherous Godfrey, portrayed with genuine zeal by Mark Strong, the shining star in this gloopy, flabby tale.

That's about it for the plot, aside from a crushingly tedious romance angle between Wobin and Marian, that follows the same path as any one of those God awful romantic comedies. You know how it works: When first they meet she can't stand him, he finds her too cold but, gradually, as they become more acquainted, the frostiness thaws and true love blossoms. Please, someone, pass me that filleting knife, I want to stab out my own guts.
The plot rambles on, in no great hurry for anything to actually happen, all the action far too mellow, far too restrained, lacking the muscular spectacle of, say, Gladiator, the makers clearly keen to ensure a low enough rating to get the kids in. And it's a shame, as a blood drenched version of the tale could be very interesting indeed.
Special mention must be made of Crowe's accent, which meanders between Wales, Liverpool, Ireland and even Scotland but, crucially, never once settling on The East Midlands, you know, Nottinghamshire, his attempts to sound British a dismal failure.
The Aussie tit.
As a measure of how dull this movie was, I fell asleep for about fifteen minutes and, roughly half an hour from the end, I left the cinema to go and have a fag.
Truthfully.
Disappointingly dull, then.

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