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''Beowulf'' is a 2007 American animated
fantasy Fantasy is a genre of speculative fiction that involves supernatural or Magic (supernatural), magical elements, often including Fictional universe, imaginary places and Legendary creature, creatures. The genre's roots lie in oral traditions, ...
action film The action film is a film genre that predominantly features chase sequences, fights, shootouts, explosions, and stunt work. The specifics of what constitutes an action film has been in scholarly debate since the 1980s. While some scholars such as D ...
produced and directed by
Robert Zemeckis Robert Lee Zemeckis (born May 14, 1952) is an American filmmaker known for directing and producing a range of successful and influential movies, often blending cutting-edge visual effects with storytelling. He has received several accolades incl ...
, written by
Neil Gaiman Neil Richard MacKinnon Gaiman (; born Neil Richard Gaiman; 10 November 1960) is an English author of short fiction, novels, comic books, audio theatre, and screenplays. His works include the comic series ''The Sandman (comic book), The Sandma ...
and Roger Avary, based on the Old English epic poem ''
Beowulf ''Beowulf'' (; ) is an Old English poetry, Old English poem, an Epic poetry, epic in the tradition of Germanic heroic legend consisting of 3,182 Alliterative verse, alliterative lines. It is one of the most important and List of translat ...
'', and featuring the voices of
Ray Winstone Raymond Andrew Winstone (; born 19 February 1957) is an English television, stage, and film actor with a career spanning five decades. Having worked with many prominent directors, including Martin Scorsese and Steven Spielberg, Winstone is known ...
,
Anthony Hopkins Sir Philip Anthony Hopkins (born 31 December 1937) is a Welsh actor. Considered one of Britain's most recognisable and prolific actors, he is known for List of Anthony Hopkins performances, his performances on the screen and stage. Hopkins ha ...
,
Robin Wright Robin Gayle Wright (born April 8, 1966) is an American actress, producer and director. She has received accolades including a Golden Globe Award, and nominations for eight Primetime Emmy Awards. Wright first gained attention for her role ...
,
Brendan Gleeson Brendan Gleeson (born 29 March 1955) is an Irish actor. He has received various accolades, including a Primetime Emmy Award, two British Independent Film Awards and three IFTA Awards, along with nominations for an Academy Award, three BAFTA Aw ...
,
John Malkovich John Gavin Malkovich (born December 9, 1953) is an American actor. He is the recipient of several accolades, including a Primetime Emmy Award, in addition to nominations for two Academy Awards, a BAFTA Award, two Screen Actors Guild Awards, and ...
,
Crispin Glover Crispin Hellion Glover (born April 20, 1964) is an American actor, filmmaker and artist. He is known for portraying eccentricity (behavior), eccentric Character actor, character roles on screen. His breakout role was as George McFly in ''Back to ...
, Alison Lohman, and
Angelina Jolie Angelina Jolie ( ; born Angelina Jolie Voight, , June 4, 1975) is an American actress, filmmaker, and humanitarian. The recipient of List of awards and nominations received by Angelina Jolie, numerous accolades, including two Academy Awards ...
. The film depicts a modern interpretation of the poem, with certain changes to aspects of its narrative. It was produced by Shangri-La Entertainment and Zemeckis's
ImageMovers ImageMovers, L.L.C. (IM) (formerly known as South Side Amusement Company), is an American production company which produces CGI animation, motion-capture, live-action films and television shows. The company is known for producing such films as ' ...
and features characters animated using motion-capture animation, which was previously used in '' The Polar Express'' (2004) and '' Monster House'' (2006). ''Beowulf'' premiered at
Westwood, Los Angeles Westwood is a commercial and residential neighborhood in the northern central portion of the Westside (Los Angeles County), Westside region of the city of Los Angeles, California. It is the home of the University of California, Los Angeles (UCL ...
on November 5, 2007, and was released theatrically in the United States on November 16, 2007, by
Paramount Pictures Paramount Pictures Corporation, commonly known as Paramount Pictures or simply Paramount, is an American film production company, production and Distribution (marketing), distribution company and the flagship namesake subsidiary of Paramount ...
, with Warner Bros. Pictures handling international distribution. It grossed over $196 million and was generally well received by most critics, though there was criticism towards its deviations from the original poem.


Plot

In 507,
Geatish The Geats ( ; ; ; ), sometimes called ''Geats#Goths, Goths'', were a large North Germanic peoples, North Germanic tribe who inhabited ("land of the Geats") in modern southern Sweden from antiquity until the Late Middle Ages. They are one of ...
warrior
Beowulf ''Beowulf'' (; ) is an Old English poetry, Old English poem, an Epic poetry, epic in the tradition of Germanic heroic legend consisting of 3,182 Alliterative verse, alliterative lines. It is one of the most important and List of translat ...
travels to
Denmark Denmark is a Nordic countries, Nordic country in Northern Europe. It is the metropole and most populous constituent of the Kingdom of Denmark,, . also known as the Danish Realm, a constitutionally unitary state that includes the Autonomous a ...
with his band of soldiers, to slay
Grendel Grendel is a character in the Anglo-Saxon epic poem ''Beowulf'' (700–1000 AD). He is one of the poem's three antagonists (along with his mother and the dragon), all aligned in opposition against the protagonist Beowulf. He is referred to as b ...
, a creature that killed King
Hrothgar Hrothgar ( ; ) was a semi-legendary Danish king living around the early sixth century AD. Hrothgar appears in the Anglo-Saxon epics ''Beowulf'' and '' Widsith'', in Norse sagas and poems, and in medieval Danish chronicles. In both Anglo-Saxon ...
's people during a celebration in the
mead hall Among the early Germanic peoples, a mead hall or feasting hall was a large building with a single room intended to receive guests and serve as a center of community social life. From the fifth century to the Early Middle Ages such a building was t ...
Heorot Heorot (Old English 'hart, stag') is a mead-hall and major point of focus in the Anglo-Saxon poem ''Beowulf''. The hall serves as a seat of rule for King Hrothgar, a legendary Danish king. After the monster Grendel slaughters the inhabitants of ...
. Beowulf becomes attracted to Hrothgar's wife Queen Wealtheow. To lure out Grendel, the men loudly celebrate in Heorot. Grendel arrives and as they fight, an unarmed and naked Beowulf discovers that Grendel has hypersensitive hearing and ruptures the creature's eardrum. After Beowulf severs his arm, Grendel escapes back to his cave and dies.
Grendel's mother Grendel's mother () is one of three antagonists in the anonymous Old English poem ''Beowulf'' (c. 700–1000 AD), the other two being Grendel and the dragon. Each antagonist reflects different negative aspects of both the hero Beowulf and the h ...
swears revenge. In thanks for defeating the monster, Hrothgar gives Beowulf his golden drinking horn, which commemorates Hrothgar's victory over the dragon Fafnir. Grendel's mother travels to Heorot and slaughters Beowulf's men in the night. Hrothgar informs Beowulf and Beowulf's best friend
Wiglaf Wiglaf ( Proto-Norse: *'' Wīga laibaz'', meaning "battle remainder"; ) is a character in the Anglo-Saxon epic poem ''Beowulf''. He is the son of Weohstan, a Swede of the Wægmunding clan who had entered the service of Beowulf, king of the G ...
that Grendel's mother is the last of the Water Demons. Hrothgar's adviser,
Unferth In the Old English epic poem ''Beowulf'', Unferth or Hunferth is a thegn (a retainer, servant) of the Danish lord Hrothgar. He appears five times in the poem — four times by the name 'Hunferð' (at lines 499, 530, 1165 and 1488) and once by ...
, offers Beowulf his sword Hrunting to slay Grendel's mother. Beowulf and Wiglaf travel to the demon's cave, where Beowulf enters alone and confronts the demon, who takes the form of a gold-covered naked woman. He tries to kill her but she uses magic to melt Hrunting. She seduces Beowulf and promises to make him king in exchange for the horn and a son. Beowulf accepts the deal and they kiss. Beowulf returns to Heorot with Grendel's head and announces that he has killed Grendel's mother, recounting embellished stories of a fight, claiming that he left Hrunting impaled in the body of Grendel's mother and lost the horn in the battle. In private, Hrothgar asks Beowulf if he truly killed Grendel's mother. Despite Beowulf's calling Grendel's mother a hag, Hrothgar is not fooled and indirectly reveals that he had also been seduced by the demon, their tryst resulting in Grendel. As a shocked Beowulf realizes that Hrothgar is Grendel's father and that the demon's curse has now been passed on to him, Hrothgar declares Beowulf to be king upon his death; he then commits suicide by jumping from the castle parapet onto the sea below. Hrothgar's corpse vanishes into the sea as Grendel's mother claims him and the crowd kneels to the newly crowned King Beowulf, fulfilling their bargain. Fifty years later, the elderly Beowulf is the estranged husband of Wealtheow, who has converted to Christianity. Beowulf has a mistress, Ursula, but his tryst with Grendel's mother has left him sterile to both his wife and mistress. On the anniversary of Beowulf's victory against Grendel, Unferth returns the horn, which was found on the moors. That night, a nearby village is razed by a
dragon A dragon is a Magic (supernatural), magical legendary creature that appears in the folklore of multiple cultures worldwide. Beliefs about dragons vary considerably through regions, but European dragon, dragons in Western cultures since the Hi ...
. It transforms into a golden humanoid figure, who gives a message to Beowulf: the sins of the father have returned to him (referencing the Faustian bargain that he agreed to). Beowulf privately confesses to Wealtheow about his affair with Grendel's mother and they reconcile. Beowulf and Wiglaf go to the cave once again, and Beowulf enters alone. When Grendel's mother appears, Beowulf throws her the horn, but she refuses it. The dragon attacks Beowulf's castle, threatening Wealtheow and Ursula. Beowulf arms himself and confronts the dragon. Despite severing his own arm and losing his sword, Beowulf kills the dragon by ripping its heart out. They tumble to the rocky beach below the castle. The dragon transforms into its golden humanoid form, before being washed out to sea. A dying Beowulf reveals to Wiglaf his affair with Grendel's mother and acknowledges his son, but Wiglaf insists on keeping his legacy intact. As the new king, Wiglaf gives Beowulf a Norse funeral. Wiglaf finds the horn in the sand and sees Grendel's mother give Beowulf a final kiss as his burning ship sinks into the sea. Grendel's mother floats on the water's surface and seductively beckons Wiglaf towards her. He wades into the sea, while holding the horn, before pausing halfway in the surf. They both stare at each other, with Grendel's mother waiting and Wiglaf tempted but showing resistance as the film fades in a
cliffhanger A cliffhanger or cliffhanger ending is a plot device in fiction which features a main character in a precarious situation, facing a difficult dilemma or confronted with a shocking revelation at the end of an episode of serialized fiction or bef ...
ending.


Cast

*
Ray Winstone Raymond Andrew Winstone (; born 19 February 1957) is an English television, stage, and film actor with a career spanning five decades. Having worked with many prominent directors, including Martin Scorsese and Steven Spielberg, Winstone is known ...
as
Beowulf ''Beowulf'' (; ) is an Old English poetry, Old English poem, an Epic poetry, epic in the tradition of Germanic heroic legend consisting of 3,182 Alliterative verse, alliterative lines. It is one of the most important and List of translat ...
, the
title character The title character in a narrative work is one who is named or referred to in the title of the work. In a performed work such as a play or film, the performer who plays the title character is said to have the title role of the piëce. The title o ...
. Zemeckis cast Winstone after seeing his performance as the
title character The title character in a narrative work is one who is named or referred to in the title of the work. In a performed work such as a play or film, the performer who plays the title character is said to have the title role of the piëce. The title o ...
of the 2003 ITV serial ''
Henry VIII Henry VIII (28 June 149128 January 1547) was King of England from 22 April 1509 until his death in 1547. Henry is known for his Wives of Henry VIII, six marriages and his efforts to have his first marriage (to Catherine of Aragon) annulled. ...
''. On the topic of the original poem, Winstone commented during an interview, "I had the beauty of not reading the book, which I understand portrays Beowulf as a very one-dimensional kind of character; a hero and a warrior and that was it. I didn't have any of that baggage to bring with me." Winstone enjoyed working with motion-capture, stating that "You were allowed to go, like theater, where you carry a scene on and you become engrossed within the scene. I loved the speed of it. There was no time to sit around. You actually cracked on with a scene and your energy levels were kept up. There was no time to actually sit around and lose your concentration. So, for me, I actually really, really enjoyed this experience." Unlike some of his castmates, Winstone's animated counterpart bears little resemblance to the actor who was in his early 50s when he filmed the role; Winstone noted that his computer-generated counterpart resembled himself at the age of eighteen, although the filmmakers did not have a photo for reference. Winstone also played a dwarf performer, and the "Golden Man"/Dragon. *
Crispin Glover Crispin Hellion Glover (born April 20, 1964) is an American actor, filmmaker and artist. He is known for portraying eccentricity (behavior), eccentric Character actor, character roles on screen. His breakout role was as George McFly in ''Back to ...
and
Angelina Jolie Angelina Jolie ( ; born Angelina Jolie Voight, , June 4, 1975) is an American actress, filmmaker, and humanitarian. The recipient of List of awards and nominations received by Angelina Jolie, numerous accolades, including two Academy Awards ...
as
Grendel Grendel is a character in the Anglo-Saxon epic poem ''Beowulf'' (700–1000 AD). He is one of the poem's three antagonists (along with his mother and the dragon), all aligned in opposition against the protagonist Beowulf. He is referred to as b ...
and his mother, the antagonists. Glover had previously worked with Zemeckis in ''
Back to the Future ''Back to the Future'' is a 1985 American science fiction film directed by Robert Zemeckis and written by Zemeckis and Bob Gale. It stars Michael J. Fox, Christopher Lloyd, Lea Thompson, Crispin Glover, and Thomas F. Wilson. Set in 1985 ...
'' when he portrayed George McFly. Zemeckis had found Glover tiresome on set, because of his lack of understanding of shooting a film, but realized this would not be a problem as on a motion-capture film he could choose his angles later. Glover's dialogue was entirely in
Old English Old English ( or , or ), or Anglo-Saxon, is the earliest recorded form of the English language, spoken in England and southern and eastern Scotland in the Early Middle Ages. It developed from the languages brought to Great Britain by Anglo-S ...
. Jolie had wanted to work with Zemeckis, and had read the poem years before but could not remember it well until she read the script and was able to recall basic themes. The actress recounted her first impression of her character's appearance by saying "... I was told I was going to be a lizard. Then I was brought into a room with Bob, and a bunch of pictures and examples, and he showed me this picture of a woman half painted gold, and then a lizard. And, I've got kids and I thought 'That's great. That's so bizarre. I'm going to be this crazy reptilian person and creature. Jolie filmed her role over two days when she was three months pregnant. She was startled by the character's nude human form, stating that for an animated film "I was really surprised that I felt that exposed." *
Anthony Hopkins Sir Philip Anthony Hopkins (born 31 December 1937) is a Welsh actor. Considered one of Britain's most recognisable and prolific actors, he is known for List of Anthony Hopkins performances, his performances on the screen and stage. Hopkins ha ...
as King Hrothgar. Hopkins noted in an interview that since Zemeckis is an American, he was not certain what accent Hopkins should use for the role of Hrothgar. Hopkins told him, "Well, Welsh would be my closest because that's where I come from." It was also his first time working with motion-capture technology. Hopkins noted, "I didn't know what was expected. It was explained to me, I'm not stupid, but I still don't get the idea of how it works. I have no idea ..you don't have sets, so it is like being in a Brecht play, you know, with just bare bones and you have nothing else." When asked if he had to read the original poem of ''Beowulf'' in school, Hopkins replied: "No, I was hopeless at school. I couldn't read anything. I mean I could read, but I was so inattentive. I was one of those poor kids, you know, who was just very slow, didn't know what they were talking about... So I tried to get around to reading ''Beowulf'' just before I did this movie, and it was a good modern translation. It was Trevor Griffiths, I'm not sure, but I couldn't hack it, and I tend to like to just go with the script if it's a good script." *
John Malkovich John Gavin Malkovich (born December 9, 1953) is an American actor. He is the recipient of several accolades, including a Primetime Emmy Award, in addition to nominations for two Academy Awards, a BAFTA Award, two Screen Actors Guild Awards, and ...
as
Unferth In the Old English epic poem ''Beowulf'', Unferth or Hunferth is a thegn (a retainer, servant) of the Danish lord Hrothgar. He appears five times in the poem — four times by the name 'Hunferð' (at lines 499, 530, 1165 and 1488) and once by ...
. Malkovich became involved in the project because one of his friends, who had worked with Zemeckis, "spoke very highly of him. I had always found him a very interesting and innovative filmmaker. I liked the script very much and I liked the group involved and the process interested me a great deal also." He found the experience of working with motion capture to be similar to his experiences working in the theater. He also found the process intriguing: "Say you do a normal day of filmmaking. Sometimes that's 1/8 of a page, sometimes it's 3/8th of a page, normally let's say it's 2½ pages, maybe 3. Now it's probably a little more than it used to be but not always. So you may be acting for a total of 20 minutes a day. In this, you act the entire day all the time except for the tiny amount of time it takes them to sort of coordinate the computer information, let's say, and make sure that the computers are reading the data and that you're transmitting the data. It interests me on that level because I'm a professional actor so I'd just as soon act as sit around." Malkovich also recalled that he studied the original poem in high school, and that "I think we got smacked if we couldn't recite a certain number of stanzas. It was in the Old English class and I think my rendition was exemplary." *
Brendan Gleeson Brendan Gleeson (born 29 March 1955) is an Irish actor. He has received various accolades, including a Primetime Emmy Award, two British Independent Film Awards and three IFTA Awards, along with nominations for an Academy Award, three BAFTA Aw ...
as
Wiglaf Wiglaf ( Proto-Norse: *'' Wīga laibaz'', meaning "battle remainder"; ) is a character in the Anglo-Saxon epic poem ''Beowulf''. He is the son of Weohstan, a Swede of the Wægmunding clan who had entered the service of Beowulf, king of the G ...
, Beowulf's
lieutenant A lieutenant ( , ; abbreviated Lt., Lt, LT, Lieut and similar) is a Junior officer, junior commissioned officer rank in the armed forces of many nations, as well as fire services, emergency medical services, Security agency, security services ...
*
Robin Wright Robin Gayle Wright (born April 8, 1966) is an American actress, producer and director. She has received accolades including a Golden Globe Award, and nominations for eight Primetime Emmy Awards. Wright first gained attention for her role ...
as Queen Wealtheow * Alison Lohman as Ursula, Beowulf's concubine when he is an old king *
Costas Mandylor Costas Mandylor (born Costas Theodosopoulos; 3 September 1965) is an Australian actor. He made his film debut with a supporting role in '' Triumph of the Spirit'' (1989) before a lead role as Frank Costello in the crime drama film '' Mobsters'' ...
as Hondshew * Sebastian Roche as Wulfgar * Greg Ellis as Garmund * Tyler Steelman as Young Cain, Unferth's disabled slave which he continually abuses for the slightest mistake. *
Dominic Keating Dominic Keating (né Power; born 1 July 1961) is a British television, film and theatre actor best known for his portrayals of Tony in the Channel 4 sitcom '' Desmond's'' and Lieutenant Malcolm Reed on '' Star Trek: Enterprise''. Early life ...
as Adult Cain * Rik Young as Eofor * Charlotte Salt as Estrith * Leslie Harter Zemeckis as Yrsa * Fredrik Hiller as Finn of Frisia


Production

Though not explicit, Grendel's mother is implied to be the mermaid that seduces Beowulf during the swimming race; the mermaid's tail and the dragon's were made to look the same in order to emphasize the link between the two.


Development

Author
Neil Gaiman Neil Richard MacKinnon Gaiman (; born Neil Richard Gaiman; 10 November 1960) is an English author of short fiction, novels, comic books, audio theatre, and screenplays. His works include the comic series ''The Sandman (comic book), The Sandma ...
and screenwriter Roger Avary wrote a screen adaptation of ''Beowulf'' in May 1997 (they had met while working on a film adaptation of Gaiman's '' The Sandman'' in 1996 before
Warner Bros. Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc. (WBEI), commonly known as Warner Bros. (WB), is an American filmed entertainment studio headquartered at the Warner Bros. Studios complex in Burbank, California and the main namesake subsidiary of Warner Bro ...
canceled it). The script had been optioned by
ImageMovers ImageMovers, L.L.C. (IM) (formerly known as South Side Amusement Company), is an American production company which produces CGI animation, motion-capture, live-action films and television shows. The company is known for producing such films as ' ...
in the same year and set up at DreamWorks with Avary slated to direct and
Robert Zemeckis Robert Lee Zemeckis (born May 14, 1952) is an American filmmaker known for directing and producing a range of successful and influential movies, often blending cutting-edge visual effects with storytelling. He has received several accolades incl ...
producing. Avary stated he wanted to make a small-scale, gritty film with a budget of US$15–20 million, similar to ''
Jabberwocky "Jabberwocky" is a Nonsense verse, nonsense poem written by Lewis Carroll about the killing of a creature named "the Jabberwock". It was included in his 1871 novel ''Through the Looking-Glass'', the sequel to ''Alice's Adventures in Wonderland' ...
'' or ''
Excalibur Excalibur is the mythical sword of King Arthur that may possess magical powers or be associated with the rightful sovereignty of Britain. Its first reliably datable appearance is found in Geoffrey of Monmouth's ''Historia Regum Britanniae''. E ...
''. The project eventually went into turnaround after the option expired, to which the rights returned to Avary, who went on to direct an adaptation of '' The Rules of Attraction''. In January 2005, producer Steve Bing, at the behest of Zemeckis who was wanting to direct the film himself, revived the production by convincing Avary that Zemeckis' vision, supported by the strength of digitally enhanced live action, was worth relinquishing the directorial reins. Zemeckis did not like the poem, but enjoyed reading the screenplay. Because of the expanded budget, Zemeckis told the screenwriters to rewrite their script, because "there is nothing that you could write that would cost me more than a million dollars per minute to film. Go wild!" In particular, the entire fight with the dragon was rewritten from a talky confrontation to a battle spanning the cliffs and the sea.


Animation and visual effects

Zemeckis drew inspiration for the visual-effects of ''Beowulf'' from experience with '' The Polar Express'', which uses motion-capture technology to create
three-dimensional In geometry, a three-dimensional space (3D space, 3-space or, rarely, tri-dimensional space) is a mathematical space in which three values (''coordinates'') are required to determine the position (geometry), position of a point (geometry), poi ...
CGI images of characters. Appointing Jerome Chen, whom Zemeckis worked with on ''The Polar Express'', the two decided to chart realism as their foremost goal. Animation supervisor Kenn MacDonald explained that Zemeckis used motion capture because "Even though it feels like live-action, there were a lot of shots where Bob cut loose. Amazing shots. Impossible with live-action actors. This method of filmmaking gives him freedom and complete control. He doesn't have to worry about lighting. The actors don't have to hit marks. They don't have to know where the camera is. It's pure performance." A 25 × 35-foot stage was built, and it used 244 Vicon MX40 cameras. Actors on set wore seventy eight body markers. The cameras recorded real-time footage of the performances, shots which Zemeckis reviewed. The director then used a virtual-camera to choose camera angles from the footage which was edited together. Two teams of animators worked on the film, with one group working on replicating the facial performances, the other working on body movement. The animators said they worked very closely on replicating the human characters, but the character of
Grendel Grendel is a character in the Anglo-Saxon epic poem ''Beowulf'' (700–1000 AD). He is one of the poem's three antagonists (along with his mother and the dragon), all aligned in opposition against the protagonist Beowulf. He is referred to as b ...
had to be almost reworked, because he is a monster, not human. Over 450 graphic designers were chosen for the project, the largest team ever assembled for a
Sony Pictures Imageworks Sony Pictures Imageworks Inc. (simply known as Imageworks) is a visual effects and computer animation studio headquartered in Vancouver, British Columbia and Montreal, Quebec, with an additional office on the Sony Pictures Studios lot in Culver C ...
-produced movie as of 2007. Designers at Imageworks generated new animation tools for facial, body and cloth design especially for the movie, and elements of keyframe animation were incorporated into the film in order to capture the facial expressions of the actors and actresses. The mead hall battle scene near the beginning of the film, among others, required numerous props that served as additional markers; these markers allowed for a more accurate manifestation of a battlefield setting as the battle progressed. However, the data being collected by the markers slowed down the studios' computer equipment and five months were spent developing a new save/load system that would increase the efficiency of the studios' resources. To aid in the process of rendering the massive quantities of information, the development team used
cache Cache, caching, or caché may refer to: Science and technology * Cache (computing), a technique used in computer storage for easier data access * Cache (biology) or hoarding, a food storing behavior of animals * Cache (archaeology), artifacts p ...
d data. In the cases that using cached data was not possible, the scenes were rendered using foreground occlusion, which involves the blurring of different overlays of a single scene in an attempt to generate a single scene film. Other elements of the film were borrowed from that of others created by Imageworks: ''
Spider-Man 3 ''Spider-Man 3'' is a 2007 American superhero film based on the Marvel Comics character Spider-Man. Produced by Columbia Pictures, Marvel Entertainment, and Laura Ziskin Productions, and distributed by Sony Pictures Releasing, it was directe ...
'' lent the lighting techniques it used and the fluid engine present in the Sandman, while the waves of the ocean and the cave of Grendel's mother were modeled after the wave fluid engine used in '' Surf's Up''. The 2007 film '' Ghost Rider'' lent ''Beowulf'' the fluid engine that was used to model the movements of protagonist Johnny Blaze. Jerome Chen worked to process large crowd scenes as early as possible, as additional time would be needed to process these scenes in particular. As a result, the film's development team designed a priority scale and incorporated it into their processors so graphic artists would be able to work with the scenes when they arrived. So much data was produced in the course of the creation of the film, the studio was forced to upgrade all of its processors to multicore versions, which run quicker and more efficiently. The creation of additional rendering nodes throughout
Culver City, California Culver City is a city in Los Angeles County, California, United States. As of the 2020 census, the population was 40,779. It is mostly surrounded by Los Angeles, but also shares a border with the unincorporated area of Ladera Heights, Californi ...
was necessitated by the movie's production. Mark Vulcano, who had previously worked on ''
VeggieTales ''VeggieTales'' is an American Christian media, Christian Computer animated, CGI-animated series and multimedia franchise created by Phil Vischer and Mike Nawrocki under Big Idea Entertainment. The series stars Bob the Tomato and Larry the Cucumb ...
'' and '' Monster House'', served as Senior Character Animator for the film. In designing the dragon, production designer
Doug Chiang Doug Chiang (; born 16 February 1962) is an American film designer and artist. He is vice president and executive creative director of Lucasfilm and previous Chief Creative Officer (CCO) at Lucasfilm. Early life and education Chiang was born i ...
wanted to create something unique in film. The designers looked at
bat Bats are flying mammals of the order Chiroptera (). With their forelimbs adapted as wings, they are the only mammals capable of true and sustained flight. Bats are more agile in flight than most birds, flying with their very long spread-out ...
s and
flying squirrel Flying squirrels (scientifically known as Pteromyini or Petauristini) are a tribe (biology), tribe of 50 species of squirrels in the family (biology), family Squirrel, Sciuridae. Despite their name, they are not in fact capable of full flight i ...
s for inspiration, and also designed its tail to allow underwater propulsion. As the beast is Beowulf's son with Grendel's mother, elements such as Winstone's eyes and cheekbone structure were incorporated into its look. The three primary monsters in the film share a golden color scheme, because they are all related. Grendel has patches of gold skin, but because of his torment, he has shed much of his scales and exposed his internal workings. He still had to resemble
Crispin Glover Crispin Hellion Glover (born April 20, 1964) is an American actor, filmmaker and artist. He is known for portraying eccentricity (behavior), eccentric Character actor, character roles on screen. His breakout role was as George McFly in ''Back to ...
though: the animators decided to adapt Glover's own parted hairstyle to Grendel, albeit with bald patches. Zemeckis insisted that the character Beowulf resemble depictions of Jesus, believing that a correlation could be made between Christ's face and a universally accepted appeal. Zemeckis used Alan Ritchson for the body model for the title character of ''Beowulf''. Avary had the idea to make Beowulf fight Grendel naked as a reference to Richard Corben's comic book '' Den'', while also taking inspiration from legendary
berserker In the Old Norse written corpus, berserkers () were Scandinavian warriors who were said to have fought in a trance-like fury, a characteristic which later gave rise to the modern English adjective ''wikt:berserk#Adjective, berserk'' . Berserkers ...
s, who purportedly fought in battles while naked.


Music

The music for ''Beowulf'' was composed and conducted by
Alan Silvestri Alan Anthony Silvestri (born March 26, 1950) is an American composer, conductor, orchestrator and music producer of film scores. He has received two Grammy Awards and two Primetime Emmy Awards as well as nominations for two Academy Awards and two ...
and performed by the
Hollywood Studio Symphony The Hollywood Studio Symphony (sometimes the Hollywood Freelance Studio Symphony) is the credited name of the symphony orchestra behind many major soundtracks, including '' The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe'', ''Suc ...
. A soundtrack was released November 20, 2007. Silvestri was largely responsible for the production of the soundtrack album, although actresses
Robin Wright Penn Robin Gayle Wright (born April 8, 1966) is an American actress, film producer, producer and film director, director. List of awards and nominations received by Robin WShe has received accolades including a Golden Globe Award, and nominations ...
and
Idina Menzel Idina Kim Menzel ( ; ; born May 30, 1971) is an American actress and singer. Particularly known for her work in Musical theatre, musicals on Broadway theatre, Broadway, she has been Honorific nicknames in popular music, nicknamed the "Queen of ...
performed several songs in the soundtrack's score.


Track listing


Score Credits

*Music Composed and Conducted by: Alan Silvestri *Score Produced by: Alan Silvestri and David Bifano *Orchestrated by: John Ashton-Thomas and Alan Silvestri *Music Performed by: The Hollywood Studio Symphony *Score Contracted by: Sandy DeCrescent and Peter Rotter *Choir Performed by: Page LA Studio Voices and Hollywood Film Chorale *Vocal Contracting: Bobbi Page and Sally Stevens *Score Coordination: David Bifano *Score Preparation: JoAnn Kane Music Services *Recorded and Mixed by: Dennis Sands *Digital Recording by: Erik Swanson *Recordists: Tom Hardisty and Adam Olmsted *Score Recorded at: Todd-AO Scoring Stage *Music Editor: Ryan Rubin *Assistant Music Editor: Jeannie Marks *Supervising Music Editor: Kenneth Karman


Instrumentation

* Strings: 28 violins, 12 violas, 10 violoncellos, 8 double basses * Woodwinds: 3 flutes, 3 oboes, 3 clarinets, 3 bassoons * Brass: 8 French horns, 4 trumpets, 4 trombones, 2 tubas * Percussion: 7 players * 2 harps, 2 pianos * Choir: 38 singers


Songs Credits


Tracks 3, 7, 17

*Written and Produced by: Glen Ballard and Alan Silvestri *Strings Arranged and Conducted by: Alan Silvestri *Recorded by: Scott Campbell *Additional Engineer: Bill Malina *Mixed by: Scott Campbell at Pacifique Studios, Hollywood CA *Contractor for Glen Ballard: Jolie Levine *Aerowave Coordinators: Stephanie Kubiak and Angela Vicari *Recorded at: The High Window, Hollywood CA


"A Hero Comes Home" (End Credits Version)

*Performed by:
Idina Menzel Idina Kim Menzel ( ; ; born May 30, 1971) is an American actress and singer. Particularly known for her work in Musical theatre, musicals on Broadway theatre, Broadway, she has been Honorific nicknames in popular music, nicknamed the "Queen of ...
*Guitar: Tim Pierce *Drums: Blair Sinta *Programming, Keys and Guitar: Glen Ballard


Soundtrack Album Credits

*Album Mastered by Stephen Marcussen at Marcussen Mastering


Differences from the poem

One objective Zemeckis, Gaiman and Avary shared was to expand on the original poem as it has been recorded. ''Beowulf'' is generally considered to be a
pagan Paganism (, later 'civilian') is a term first used in the fourth century by early Christians for people in the Roman Empire who practiced polytheism, or ethnic religions other than Christianity, Judaism, and Samaritanism. In the time of the ...
tale written down by
Christian A Christian () is a person who follows or adheres to Christianity, a Monotheism, monotheistic Abrahamic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus in Christianity, Jesus Christ. Christians form the largest religious community in the wo ...
monks, which for Zemeckis and Avary represented the possibility that the original story had been tampered with in order to better fit Christian sensibilities. They found this to be a reasonable explanation for critical elements to the story that are absent from the poem, such as the identity of Grendel's father, why he abstains from attacking Hrothgar, and the lack of proof that Grendel's mother had been slain. In order to restore those points, they offered their own interpretation for motivations behind Grendel's behavior and for what happened in the cave of Grendel's mother, justifying it by arguing that Beowulf acts as an
unreliable narrator In literature, film, and other such arts, an unreliable narrator is a narrator who cannot be trusted, one whose credibility is compromised. They can be found in a wide range from children to mature characters. While unreliable narrators are al ...
in the portion of the poem in which he describes his battle with Grendel's mother. Avary said their goal was "to remain truer to the letter of the epic but to read between the lines and find greater truths that had been explored before", while Gaiman commented, "the glory of ''Beowulf'' is that you are allowed to retell it" due to the presence of many other adaptations that offered their own take on it. These choices also helped them to better connect the third act to the second of their screenplay, which is divided in the poem by a 50-year gap. Some of the changes made by the film as noted by scholars include: * The portrayal of Beowulf as a flawed man * The portrayal of Hrothgar as a womanizing alcoholic * The portrayal of Unferth as a Christian * The portrayal of Grendel as a sickly-looking and child-like creature (somewhat similar to Tolkien's
Gollum Gollum is a Tolkien's monsters, monster with a distinctive style of speech in J. R. R. Tolkien's fantasy world of Middle-earth. He was introduced in the 1937 Fantasy (genre), fantasy novel ''The Hobbit'', and became important in its sequel, ' ...
character), rather than a savage demon-monster * Beowulf's funeral * The portrayal of Grendel's mother as a beautiful seductress, more of a
succubus A succubus () is a female demon who is described in various folklore as appearing in the dreams of male humans in order to seduce them. Repeated interactions between a succubus and a man will lead to sexual activity, a bond forming between them, ...
rather, who bears Grendel as Hrothgar's child and the dragon as Beowulf's child (this is also the case in the plot of the 1999 film ''Beowulf'', with the exception that the dragon is entirely absent there) * The fact that Beowulf becomes ruler of Denmark instead of his native Geatland This is not the first time that the theme of a relationship between Beowulf and Grendel's mother was explored by Gaiman. In his 1998 collection of short stories, '' Smoke and Mirrors'', the poem ''Bay Wolf'' is a retelling of Beowulf in a modern-day setting. In this story, Beowulf as the narrator is ambiguous about what happened between Grendel's mother and himself.


Themes

Drawing extensively on the theories of
Freud Sigmund Freud ( ; ; born Sigismund Schlomo Freud; 6 May 1856 – 23 September 1939) was an Austrian neurologist and the founder of psychoanalysis, a clinical method for evaluating and treating pathologies seen as originating from conflicts in t ...
, Kristeva, Lacan and
Jung Carl Gustav Jung ( ; ; 26 July 1875 – 6 June 1961) was a Swiss psychiatrist, psychotherapist, and psychologist who founded the school of analytical psychology. A prolific author of over 20 books, illustrator, and correspondent, Jung was a c ...
, as well as Žižek, many scholars have discussed the themes of the film. In particular, the portrayal of Grendel and his kin appeals to multiple forms of sexual unease, among them the
castration anxiety Castration anxiety is an overwhelming fear of damage to, or loss of, the penis—a derivative of Sigmund Freud's theory of the castration complex, one of his earliest psychoanalytic theories. The term can refer to the fear of emasculation in ...
, the monstrous feminine and the challenging of traditional
gender role A gender role, or sex role, is a social norm deemed appropriate or desirable for individuals based on their gender or sex. Gender roles are usually centered on conceptions of masculinity and femininity. The specifics regarding these gendered ...
s. According to Nickolas Haydock, the film reflects the "American obsession with sex as the root of all evils", to the extent to compare Beowulf's and Hrothgar's portrayals to
Bill Clinton William Jefferson Clinton (né Blythe III; born August 19, 1946) is an American politician and lawyer who was the 42nd president of the United States from 1993 to 2001. A member of the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party, ...
and the history of sexual misconduct that caused his political decline. Nadine Farghaly also argues the story makes the point that unbridled desire only causes ruin. Grendel's mother is represented in the film as a castrating, monstrous female who threatens
masculinity Masculinity (also called manhood or manliness) is a set of attributes, behaviors, and roles generally associated with men and boys. Masculinity can be theoretically understood as Social construction of gender, socially constructed, and there i ...
. While Beowulf embodies
phallic A phallus (: phalli or phalluses) is a penis (especially when erect), an object that resembles a penis, or a mimetic image of an erect penis. In art history, a figure with an erect penis is described as ''ithyphallic''. Any object that symbo ...
power through his physical strength, recurrent
nudity Nudity is the state of being in which a human is without clothing. While estimates vary, for the first 90,000 years of pre-history, anatomically modern humans were naked, having lost their body hair, living in hospitable climates, and not ...
and usage of a sword, all those prove useless against her, as she symbolically emasculates him by subsuming his phallus into the feminine power. This is metaphorized by Beowulf being seduced in her
womb The uterus (from Latin ''uterus'', : uteri or uteruses) or womb () is the organ in the reproductive system of most female mammals, including humans, that accommodates the embryonic and fetal development of one or more fertilized eggs until bi ...
-like cave, where his sword strike magically fails at harming her body. After copulating with Grendel's mother, both Hrothgar and Beowulf find themselves unable to maintain fulfilling
sexual relationship An intimate relationship is an interpersonal relationship that involves emotional or physical closeness between people and may include sexual intimacy and feelings of Romance (love), romance or love. Intimate relationships are Interdependence ...
s with Wealtheow or other women, becoming aged, bitter and even feminized in their impotency. In turn, Grendel's mother remains immortal and young, and through her offspring she proves capable to wield herself the robbed phallus. Grendel and the dragon act as extensions of her will, "mindless embodiments of feminine aggressiveness" who represent their fathers' emasculation and loss of
patriarchal Patriarchy is a social system in which positions of authority are primarily held by men. The term ''patriarchy'' is used both in anthropology to describe a family or clan controlled by the father or eldest male or group of males, and in fem ...
power. Later Beowulf claims to have vanquished the mother, having supposedly rendered her dead with his sword in her cave, but the falsity of this only translates as a wishful, pretended triumph of the male over the female. His defeat to her, as well as his bargain for prestige and glory, transmits that male power "not only comes from the feminine, but remains eternally subject to it". However, authors have noted that he ultimately breaks the Oedipian triangle caused by his destructive son, as he manages to kill the dragon and seemingly thwart the cycle at the cost of his life. This has been interpreted as a last exaltation of masculinity, electing to die in
self-sacrifice Self-sacrifice is the giving up of something that a person wants for themselves, so that others can be helped or protected, or so that other external values can be advanced or protected. Generally, an act of self-sacrifice conforms to the rule tha ...
rather than living in his impotent, feminized state. He already refers to himself as "dead long time ago" in a previous scene. The film still underlines the irresistibility of female power, as even Wiglaf, who had been shown to be abstinent from
lust Lust is an intense desire for something. Lust can take any form such as the lust for sexuality (see libido), money, or power. It can take such mundane forms as the lust for food (see gluttony) as distinct from the need for food or lust for red ...
in contrast to his partners, is hinted to be similarly seduced by Grendel's mother. The film contrasts those points to the original poem, using the "
postmodern Postmodernism encompasses a variety of artistic, cultural, and philosophical movements that claim to mark a break from modernism. They have in common the conviction that it is no longer possible to rely upon previous ways of depicting the wo ...
techniques of metatextuality and
deconstruction In philosophy, deconstruction is a loosely-defined set of approaches to understand the relationship between text and meaning. The concept of deconstruction was introduced by the philosopher Jacques Derrida, who described it as a turn away from ...
". Whereas in the poem the
hero A hero (feminine: heroine) is a real person or fictional character who, in the face of danger, combats adversity through feats of ingenuity, courage, or Physical strength, strength. The original hero type of classical epics did such thin ...
ic values of ancient warrior culture is reaffirmed, in the film it is shown to be in decline, even explicitly failing along with Beowulf. In the film, the character laments the old, heroic pagan religion is being replaced by
Christianity Christianity is an Abrahamic monotheistic religion, which states that Jesus in Christianity, Jesus is the Son of God (Christianity), Son of God and Resurrection of Jesus, rose from the dead after his Crucifixion of Jesus, crucifixion, whose ...
, which encourages weakness in his view. In the poem Beowulf slays Grendel's mother and defeats her challenge on gender roles, but her film version is victorious over him, also using seduction instead of strength, which updates the ways in which the story views female power. The gold covering her skin and the Faustian bargain she offers embody similar modern views on the relationship between wealth and sex, particularly societal compulsions to enjoy them at the fullest, "not prohibited but demanded, which becomes a postmodern variation of Freud's death wish". However, the main difference from the poem is portraying Beowulf as a flawed hero destroyed by his own negative qualities, like lust for power and unchecked male desire, which raises questions about the morality underlying heroism. Despite the superficial characterization of the Water Demons as Others, the film blurs the line between heroes and monsters, as Grendel can talk, and the dragon's human form resembles Beowulf himself, representing his repressed wishes. In turn, Beowulf and Hrothgar are rendered impotent just like Grendel, who lacks
genitalia A sex organ, also known as a reproductive organ, is a part of an organism that is involved in sexual reproduction. Sex organs constitute the primary sex characteristics of an organism. Sex organs are responsible for producing and transporting ...
altogether, and then Beowulf ends up losing an arm like Grendel does. At the end, although the men from the film pretend to be champions against demonkind, they are ultimately revealed to be only its very originators.


Release

At
San Diego Comic-Con San Diego Comic-Con is a comic book convention and multi-genre entertainment event held annually in San Diego, California, at the San Diego Convention Center. Founded in 1970, originally showcasing primarily comic books and science fiction/fant ...
in July 2006, Gaiman said ''Beowulf'' would be released on November 22, 2007. The following October, ''Beowulf'' was announced to be projected in 3D in over 1,000 theaters for its release date in November 2007. The studios planned to use 3D projection technology that had been used by ''Monster House'' (another motion-captured animated film that Zemeckis was involved on, but only as an executive producer), '' Chicken Little'' and the 3D re-release of ''
The Nightmare Before Christmas ''The Nightmare Before Christmas'' (formerly known as ''Tim Burton's The Nightmare Before Christmas'') is a 1993 American stop motion Animation, animated Gothic film, gothic musical film, musical fantasy film directed by Henry Selick in his f ...
'', but on a larger scale than previous films. ''Beowulf'' would additionally be released in 35 mm alongside the 3D projections. Originally,
Columbia Pictures Columbia Pictures Industries, Inc., Trade name, doing business as Columbia Pictures, is an American film Production company, production and Film distributor, distribution company that is the flagship unit of the Sony Pictures Motion Picture Group ...
(which also distributed ''Monster House'') was set to distribute the film, but Steve Bing did not finalize a deal and instead arranged with
Paramount Pictures Paramount Pictures Corporation, commonly known as Paramount Pictures or simply Paramount, is an American film production company, production and Distribution (marketing), distribution company and the flagship namesake subsidiary of Paramount ...
for North American distribution and
Warner Bros. Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc. (WBEI), commonly known as Warner Bros. (WB), is an American filmed entertainment studio headquartered at the Warner Bros. Studios complex in Burbank, California and the main namesake subsidiary of Warner Bro ...
for international distribution. ''Beowulf'' was also set to premiere at the 2007
Venice Film Festival The Venice Film Festival or Venice International Film Festival (, "International Exhibition of Cinematographic Art of the Venice Biennale") is an annual film festival held in Venice, Italy. It is the world's oldest film festival and one of the ...
, but was not ready in time. Instead, the film's world premiere was held in
Westwood, Los Angeles Westwood is a commercial and residential neighborhood in the northern central portion of the Westside (Los Angeles County), Westside region of the city of Los Angeles, California. It is the home of the University of California, Los Angeles (UCL ...
on November 5, 2007. Critics and even some of the actors expressed shock at the
British Board of Film Classification The British Board of Film Classification (BBFC) is a non-governmental organization, non-governmental organisation founded by the British film industry in 1912 and responsible for the national classification and censorship of films exhibited ...
rating of the film—12A—which allowed children under twelve in Britain to see the film if accompanied by their parents.
Angelina Jolie Angelina Jolie ( ; born Angelina Jolie Voight, , June 4, 1975) is an American actress, filmmaker, and humanitarian. The recipient of List of awards and nominations received by Angelina Jolie, numerous accolades, including two Academy Awards ...
called it "remarkable it has the rating it has", and said she wouldn't be taking her own children to see it. In the United States, the
Motion Picture Association of America The Motion Picture Association (MPA) is an American trade association representing the Major film studios, five major film studios of the Cinema of the United States, United States, the Major film studios#Mini-majors, mini-major Amazon MGM Stud ...
gave the film a PG-13 rating for "intense sequences of violence including disturbing images, some sexual material and nudity".


Marketing

To promote the film, a
novelization A novelization (or novelisation) is a derivative novel that adapts the story of a work created for another medium, such as a film, TV series, stage play, comic book, or video game. Film novelizations were particularly popular before the advent ...
of the film, written by Caitlín R. Kiernan, was published in September 2007. The novelization includes Sigga, a fortune teller who reveals to Unferth about Beowulf and Hrothgar's affairs with Grendel's mother, and implies Grendel's mother to have been the mermaid. This was followed by a four-issue comic book adaptation by
IDW Publishing IDW Publishing is an American publisher of comic books, graphic novels, art books, and comic strip collections. It was founded in 1999 as the publishing division of Idea and Design Works, LLC (IDW) and is recognized as the fifth-largest comic ...
released every week in October 2007. A
video game A video game or computer game is an electronic game that involves interaction with a user interface or input device (such as a joystick, game controller, controller, computer keyboard, keyboard, or motion sensing device) to generate visual fe ...
based on the film entitled '' Beowulf: The Game'' was released on
Xbox 360 The Xbox 360 is a home video game console developed by Microsoft. As the successor to the Xbox (console), original Xbox, it is the second console in the Xbox#Consoles, Xbox series. It was officially unveiled on MTV on May 12, 2005, with detail ...
,
PlayStation 3 The PlayStation 3 (PS3) is a home video game console developed and marketed by Sony Computer Entertainment (SCE). It is the successor to the PlayStation 2, and both are part of the PlayStation brand of consoles. The PS3 was first released on ...
, PC and PSP formats. The game was announced by
Ubisoft Ubisoft Entertainment SA (; ; formerly Ubi Soft Entertainment SA) is a French video game publisher headquartered in Saint-Mandé with development studios across the world. Its video game franchises include '' Anno'', '' Assassin's Creed'', ' ...
on May 22, 2007, during its Ubidays event in
Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, largest city of France. With an estimated population of 2,048,472 residents in January 2025 in an area of more than , Paris is the List of ci ...
. It was released on November 13, 2007, in the United States. The characters are voiced by the original actors who starred in the film, with the exception of John Malkovich, Robin Wright, Alison Lohman Crispin Glover and Angelina Jolie. On November 1, 2007, ''Beowulf: The Game'' was released for mobile phones. The side-scrolling action video game was developed by
Gameloft Gameloft SE is a French video game company based in Paris, founded in December 1999 by Ubisoft co-founder Michel Guillemot. The company operates 18 development studios worldwide, and publishes games for mobile devices, video game consoles, and ...
. Several cast members, including director
Robert Zemeckis Robert Lee Zemeckis (born May 14, 1952) is an American filmmaker known for directing and producing a range of successful and influential movies, often blending cutting-edge visual effects with storytelling. He has received several accolades incl ...
, gave interviews for the film
podcast A podcast is a Radio program, program made available in digital format for download over the Internet. Typically, a podcast is an Episode, episodic series of digital audio Computer file, files that users can download to a personal device or str ...
"Scene Unseen" in August 2007. This is noteworthy especially because it marks the only interview given by Zemeckis for the film.


Home media

''Beowulf'' was released for Region 1 on
DVD The DVD (common abbreviation for digital video disc or digital versatile disc) is a digital optical disc data storage format. It was invented and developed in 1995 and first released on November 1, 1996, in Japan. The medium can store any ki ...
February 26, 2008. A director's cut was also released as both a single-disc DVD and two-disc HD-DVD alongside the theatrical cut. The theatrical cut includes ''A Hero's Journey: The Making of Beowulf'' while the single disc director's cut features four more short features. The HD DVD contains eleven short features and six deleted scenes. The director's cut was released on
Blu-ray Disc Blu-ray (Blu-ray Disc or BD) is a Digital media, digital optical disc data storage format designed to supersede the DVD format. It was invented and developed in 2005 and released worldwide on June 20, 2006, capable of storing several hours of ...
in the United Kingdom on March 17, 2008, and in the United States on July 29, 2008. The Blu-ray edition includes a "picture-in-picture" option that allows one to view the film's actors performing their scenes on the soundstage, before animation was applied (a notable exception to this is Angelina Jolie, whose scenes are depicted using storyboards and rough animation rather than the unaltered footage from the set).


Reception


Box office

''Beowulf'' ranked #1 in the United States and Canada box office during its opening weekend date of November 18, grossing $27.5 million in 3,153 theaters. At the end of its theatrical run, the film had grossed an estimated domestic total of $82.3 million and a foreign box office total of $114.1 million for a worldwide gross of $196.4 million.


Critical response

On the
review aggregator A review aggregator is a system that collects reviews and ratings of products and services, such as films, books, video games, music, software, hardware, or cars. This system then stores the reviews to be used for supporting a website where user ...
website
Rotten Tomatoes Rotten Tomatoes is an American review aggregator, review-aggregation website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by three undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee ...
, ''Beowulf'' has received an approval rating of 71% based on 194 reviews, with an average score of 6.50/10. The website's consensus reads, "Featuring groundbreaking animation, stunning visuals, and a talented cast, ''Beowulf'' has in spades what more faithful book adaptations forget to bring: pure cinematic entertainment." On
Metacritic Metacritic is an American website that aggregates reviews of films, television shows, music albums, video games, and formerly books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted average). Metacritic was created ...
, the film has a
weighted average The weighted arithmetic mean is similar to an ordinary arithmetic mean (the most common type of average), except that instead of each of the data points contributing equally to the final average, some data points contribute more than others. The ...
score of 59 out of 100 based on 35 reviews, indicating "mixed or average" reviews. Audiences polled by
CinemaScore CinemaScore is an American market research firm based in Las Vegas. It surveys film audiences to rate their viewing experiences with letter grades, reports the results, and forecasts box office receipts from the data. Background Ed Mintz, who ...
gave the film an average grade of "B−" on an A+ to F scale. Giving ''Beowulf'' three out of four stars,
Roger Ebert Roger Joseph Ebert ( ; June 18, 1942 – April 4, 2013) was an American Film criticism, film critic, film historian, journalist, essayist, screenwriter and author. He wrote for the ''Chicago Sun-Times'' from 1967 until his death in 2013. Eber ...
commented that the film is a
satire Satire is a genre of the visual, literary, and performing arts, usually in the form of fiction and less frequently non-fiction, in which vices, follies, abuses, and shortcomings are held up to ridicule, often with the intent of exposin ...
of the original poem. ''
Time Time is the continuous progression of existence that occurs in an apparently irreversible process, irreversible succession from the past, through the present, and into the future. It is a component quantity of various measurements used to sequ ...
'' magazine critic
Richard Corliss Richard Nelson Corliss (March 6, 1944 – April 23, 2015) was an American film critic and magazine editor for ''Time''. He focused on movies, with occasional articles on other subjects. He was the former editor-in-chief of ''Film Comment ...
described the film as one with "power and depth" and suggested that the "effects scenes look realer, more integrated into the visual fabric, because they meet the traced-over live-action elements halfway. It all suggests that this kind of a moviemaking is more than a stunt. By imagining the distant past so vividly, Zemeckis and his team prove that character capture has a future." Corliss later named it the tenth-best film of 2007. ''
Rolling Stone ''Rolling Stone'' is an American monthly magazine that focuses on music, politics, and popular culture. It was founded in San Francisco, California, in 1967 by Jann Wenner and the music critic Ralph J. Gleason. The magazine was first known fo ...
'' critic
Peter Travers Peter Joseph Travers (born June 27, 1943) is an American film critic, journalist, and television presenter. He reviews films for ABC News and previously served as a movie critic for ''People'' and ''Rolling Stone''. Travers also hosts the film i ...
praised the motion capture used in the film and argued that "The eighth-century ''Beowulf'', goosed into twenty-first century life by a screenplay from sci-fi guru Neil Gaiman and ''
Pulp Fiction ''Pulp Fiction'' is a 1994 American independent crime film written and directed by Quentin Tarantino from a story he conceived with Roger Avary.See, e.g., King (2002), pp. 185–7; ; It tells four intertwining tales of crime and violence ...
''s Roger Avary, will have you jumping out of your skin and begging for more... I've never seen a 3-D movie pop with this kind of clarity and oomph. It's outrageously entertaining." Tom Ambrose of ''
Empire An empire is a political unit made up of several territories, military outpost (military), outposts, and peoples, "usually created by conquest, and divided between a hegemony, dominant center and subordinate peripheries". The center of the ...
'' gave the film four out of five stars. He wrote that ''Beowulf'' is "the finest example to date of the capabilities of this new technique ..Previously, 3D movies were blurry, migraine-inducing affairs. ''Beowulf'' is a huge step forward ..Although his Cockney accent initially seems incongruous ..Winstone's turn ultimately reveals a burgeoning humanity and poignant humility." Ambrose also argues that "the creepy dead eyes thing has been fixed". Justin Chang of '' Variety'' thought that the screenwriters "have taken some intriguing liberties with the heroic narrative .. theresult is, at least, a much livelier piece of storytelling than the charmless '' Polar Express''". He also stated that "Zemeckis prioritizes spectacle over human engagement, in his reliance on a medium that allows for enormous range and fluidity in its visual effects yet reduces his characters to 3-D automatons. While the technology has improved since 2004's ''Polar Express'' (particularly in the characters' more lifelike eyes), the actors still don't seem entirely there."
Kenneth Turan Kenneth Turan (; born October 27, 1946) is an American retired film critic, author, and lecturer in the Master of Professional Writing Program at the University of Southern California. He was a film critic for the ''Los Angeles Times'' from 1991 ...
of
NPR National Public Radio (NPR) is an American public broadcasting organization headquartered in Washington, D.C., with its NPR West headquarters in Culver City, California. It serves as a national Radio syndication, syndicator to a network of more ...
criticized the film, writing: "It's been 50 years since Hollywood first started flirting with 3-D movies, and the special glasses required for viewing have gotten a whole lot more substantial. The stories being filmed are just as flimsy. Of course ''Beowulf'' does have a more impressive literary pedigree than, say, ''
Bwana Devil ''Bwana Devil'' is a 1952 American adventure B movie written, directed, and produced by Arch Oboler, and starring Robert Stack, Barbara Britton, and Nigel Bruce. ''Bwana Devil'' is based on the true story of the Tsavo maneaters and filmed wi ...
''. But you'd never know that by looking at the movie. Beowulf's story of a hero who slays monsters has become a fanboy fantasy that panders with demonic energy to the young male demographic."
Manohla Dargis Manohla June Dargis ( ) is an American film critic. She is the chief film critic for ''The New York Times''. She is a five-time finalist for the Pulitzer Prize for Criticism. Career Before being a film critic for ''The New York Times'', Dargis ...
of ''
The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''NYT'') is an American daily newspaper based in New York City. ''The New York Times'' covers domestic, national, and international news, and publishes opinion pieces, investigative reports, and reviews. As one of ...
'' compared the poem with the film, stating that "If you don't remember this evil babe from the poem, it's because she's almost entirely the invention of the screenwriters Roger Avary and Neil Gaiman and the director Robert Zemeckis, who together have plumped her up in words, deeds and curves. These creative interventions aren't especially surprising given the source material and the nature of big-studio adaptations. There's plenty of action in ''Beowulf'', but even its more vigorous bloodletting pales next to its rich language, exotic setting and mythic grandeur." Diana F. Ye gave the film three out of five, praising the effects and action scenes, Peter Bradshaw, reviewing for ''
The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in Manchester in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'' and changed its name in 1959, followed by a move to London. Along with its sister paper, ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardi ...
'' criticized the effects and sexual jokes but praised the story. Bradshaw rated the film 3 stars out of 5. Ted Alvarez criticized the story, gags and motion effects.


Academic response

Scholars and authors criticized the changes made to the poem's story.
Southern Methodist University Southern Methodist University (SMU) is a Private university, private research university in Dallas, Texas, United States, with a satellite campus in Taos County, New Mexico. SMU was founded on April 17, 1911, by the Methodist Episcopal Church, ...
's Director of Medieval Studies Bonnie Wheeler is "convinced that the new Robert Zemeckis movie treatment sacrifices the power of the original for a plot line that propels Beowulf into seduction by Angelina Jolie—the mother of the monster he has just slain. What man doesn't get involved with Angelina Jolie?' Wheeler asks. 'It's a great cop-out on a great poem.' ... 'For me, the sad thing is the movie returns to... a view of the horror of woman, the monstrous female who will kill off the male,' Wheeler says. 'It seems to me you could do so much better now. And the story of ''Beowulf'' is so much more powerful. Other commentators pointed to the theories elucidated in John Grigsby's work ''Beowulf and Grendel'', where Grendel's mother was linked with the ancient Germanic fertility goddess
Nerthus In Germanic paganism, Nerthus is a goddess associated with a ceremonial wagon procession. Nerthus is attested by first century A.D. Roman historian Tacitus in his ethnographic work ''Germania''. In ''Germania'', Tacitus records that a group of G ...
. However, there were also positive academic reviews. Philosophy professor Stephen T. Asma argued that "Zemeckis's more tender-minded film version suggests that the people who cast out Grendel are the real monsters. The monster, according to this charity paradigm, is just misunderstood rather than evil (similar to the version presented in John Gardner's novel ''
Grendel Grendel is a character in the Anglo-Saxon epic poem ''Beowulf'' (700–1000 AD). He is one of the poem's three antagonists (along with his mother and the dragon), all aligned in opposition against the protagonist Beowulf. He is referred to as b ...
''). The blame for Grendel's violence is shifted to the humans, who sinned against him earlier and brought the vengeance upon themselves. The only real monsters, in this tradition, are pride and prejudice. In the film, Grendel is even visually altered after his injury to look like an innocent, albeit scaly, little child. In the original ''Beowulf'', the monsters are outcasts because they're bad (just as
Cain Cain is a biblical figure in the Book of Genesis within Abrahamic religions. He is the elder brother of Abel, and the firstborn son of Adam and Eve, the first couple within the Bible. He was a farmer who gave an offering of his crops to God. How ...
, their progenitor, was outcast because he killed his brother), but in the film ''Beowulf'' the monsters are bad because they're outcasts ..Contrary to the original ''Beowulf'', the new film wants us to understand and humanize our ''monsters''." Andrew E. Larsen criticized the film for its changes from the poem, criticizing the characters of Hrothgar and Beowulf as well as Wealtheow and Grendel's mother, and felt the script to be "misogynistic".


See also

* Lists of historical films *
Late antiquity Late antiquity marks the period that comes after the end of classical antiquity and stretches into the onset of the Early Middle Ages. Late antiquity as a period was popularized by Peter Brown (historian), Peter Brown in 1971, and this periodiza ...
*
Germanic Heroic Age The Germanic (or "German") Heroic Age, so called in analogy to the Heroic Age of Greek mythology, is the period of early historic or quasi-historic events reflected in Germanic heroic poetry, often expressed in alliterative verse. Periodisation ...


References


Bibliography

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External links

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Beowulf Production Notes
* Nick Haydock, "Making Sacrifices: Beowulf and Film",
The Year's Work in Medievalism
' 27 (2012). *
Beowulf Soundtrack site
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