Patrick,

In regards to your previous post about most of Beowulf's men not having maille. The poem refers in line 321 that "Their maille shirts glinted, hard and hand-linked; the high-gloss iron of their armour rang." I don't know if it is just this translation, but the poet goes through a sizable passage in and around these lines regarding the armour and weapons of the whole group. This leads me to believe that all of Beowulfs men are remarked as being so armoured.


Regarding the issue of decorated helms, a near passage of the text states "Boar-shapes flashed above their cheeck-guards, the brightly forged work of goldsmiths, watching over those stern-faced men." Again, the poet is writing of the group of warriors as a collective. This also leads me to believe that most or all of Beowulf's men are regarded as having finely forged and gilt helments.

One must take into account that these men were seasoned professional warriors renowned as the best of their people. If anyone would be armed to the hilt in the manner of the era, it would be these fellers.

I have just read this poem again for a pre-1700 Brit Lit course. I don't mean to throw dirt at anyone. The text is just fresh in my mind and I figured some food for thought might be entertaining.
Jonathan.

Jonathan,

Those are all very good points and I would agree with them all except for one thing: The movie is not a literal translation of the poem, but is instead an interpretation of possibly real events that would have inspired the poem. When judged in that context I would have rather seen a bit more variation in the accoutrements of Beowulf and his men.

The film doesn't appear to have had a cinema release in Australia as yet, and I've not seen any of it, but the scale armour can't be as egregious as the scale on the English soldiers in Braveheart - can it?

Tim Harris

Unfortunately, it is. :wtf:

Otherwise the movie is great, I just re-watched it yesterday... was better the second time (the first time I had some problem to understand the scotish accent of Beowulf... ;)).

FYI for the Americans out there.

Since Beowulf and Grendel wasn't released in US theaters (except for possibly NYC and San Fran) you may be interested to learn that the DVD is available for purchase at your local Walmart now.

I bought mine for $14.87, but Walmart.com is claiming $19.87.

Personally, I didn't find the leather all that bad (it's actually an upper layer that covers the mail, not worn seperately) since the mail IS rivetted. The other nice thing, is that the daily accutrements in the movie look like they walked on set from the Mastermyr dig.

It did take a me couple of times to catch some of the interspersed dry humor thanks to accent. Especially the fisherman at the beginning of the movie talking about eating eel only to eaten by eel when he dies; his accent was real rough to decern.

When when they were tracking Grendel and lost him, a voice from the back of the tracking party said:

"Well, we could split up... and meet back here in a year".

I practically fell off my couch laughing. I was SO anticipating they the typical Hollywood "Yeah, good idea. Let's go men!" type of scene. It was such a nice break from what I was expecting.

I finally got around to watching this movie last night (rented it from Netflix). The maille looked good, the rest of the movie was utter crap.

The scene where the celtic priest was praying in Latin, and Grendel got in his face mumbling at him was kinda funny, though.

Yes, it's supposed to be him. But, I didn't catch that until I watched it with the director's commentary on. The other thing was that the scene where Brendan makes land fall is cut. So, instead of understanding that he's exhausted and malnourished when he meets the Dane King (and subsiquent keels over), he just looks like a spazz.

Where can I get this movie for U.S.? Did I understand that it isn't here yet? How do you see it? Rent, Buy? Hmm?

Stephen D. Sharp wrote:

Where can I get this movie for U.S.? Did I understand that it isn't here yet? How do you see it? Rent, Buy? Hmm?

Buy it from Amazon.com
through myArmoury.com

[ Linked Image ]

Cheapest price currently is $12.74 from our bookstore.

I got a previously rented one from Family Video for $10.

Nathan Robinson wrote:

Stephen D. Sharp wrote: Where can I get this movie for U.S.? Did I understand that it isn't here yet? How do you see it? Rent, Buy? Hmm? Buy it from Amazon.com through myArmoury.com [ Linked Image ]

Netflix has it too.

On a side note, I saw Sarah Polly (the witch) ice skating in Bryant Park last week...

Great movie........just got it via Netflix.

Im mostly in consensus with what has been already said. There are some minor issues here and there which I can see could irritate some people.

Beowulf & Grendel does a terrific job of creating an atmosphere of brutal melancholy, and recreating the feeling of living in this time period. The Icelandic scenery is gorgeous to watch. This is the only movie I remember seeing in a long time where I scan every scene back and forth, up and down to take it all in.

I went into this movie predjudiced against it. Anytime anyone tries to "re-tell the story for modern times" usually means that they are going to slaughter the story, and produce a music video with a shallow plot and thinly veiled political dialogue. I really like the grittyness and conflict that comes through here.

The only thing I would have liked to have seen would have been the "disarming" scene being done a bit differently. I knew this movie would be coming out so I re-read the poem before ordering from netflix. I would put this on a Christmas list to own before 13th Warrior.