The story of Robin Hood first made its appearance on the silver screen in 1922 with Douglas Fairbanks in the title role. There have been many versions since, but it is safe to say that Ridley Scott has put a very individual stamp on the story. He has decided that he will not tell the legend that we all know, but instead focus on the story that preceded the legend. He wants to tell us how Robin Hood ended up in Sherwood Forest.
There have been some less than glittering attempts to put a new gloss on the Robin Hood story, and one might have thought that Kevin Costner’s gloomy and brooding Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves (1991) and Mel Brooks’ laboriously unfunny Robin Hood: Men in Tights (1993) might have been the last we would see of this particular hero. But Scott has found a political dimension to the Robin Hood story that goes beyond just taking from the rich and giving to the poor, and this is what drives this new production.
Having been brought up on the Robin Hood legend with the image of Errol Flynn in the title role, Russell Crowe seemed to me a highly improbable Robin Hood, and judging by the trailer, this was going to be something like Gladiator, except in Merry England. It is both more and less than that, because Scott has decided to take a stab at explaining, in simplified cinematic terms, something of the blurred division between Norman England and France, as well as some of the ideas floating around that in England led to the Magna Carta. It is a complicated job, and it takes every ounce of Scott’s very considerable filmmaking talent to package it all up. With its large slabs of action and a romantic involvement, it’s an ungainly package, but it holds together after a fashion.
The story starts out with Robin Longstride (Russell Crowe) as an archer in the army of Richard the Lion Heart, which is ravaging its way through France. In a minor engagement, Richard is killed, and Longstride and a bunch of friends return to England. For various complex reasons, Robin is adopted into the family of Sir Walter Loxley, and is presented to all around as Loxley’s son returned from 10 years of war. There is a The Return of Martin Guerre plot element here, which cleverly deals with the many personas of the Robin Hood legend, and sets up the most powerful relationship of the movie, that between Longstride, Loxley (Max von Sydow) and Marion (Cate Blanchett). Von Sydow and Blanchett provide a depth that Crowe’s rough-and-ready action hero can play off, acquiring detail and shading without having to drop his tough guy carapace.
Scott is a master of making big exciting cinema, and there are plenty of exciting action sequences. An opening set piece of King Richard laying siege to a minor French castle is particularly well done, conveying the organized chaos of medieval warfare. Unfortunately, the demands of romantic storytelling get the better of Scott, and the final battle to repel a French invasion is woefully unconvincing.
The supporting cast is generally excellent, but the demands of Scott’s historical agenda get in the way of character development, and Mark Strong, who plays Godfrey, a noble who shifts allegiance between France and England, is, through no fault of his own, an utterly one-dimensional villain.
In its style, Robin Hood owes too much to both Gladiator and Scott’s 2005 Crusader film, Kingdom of Heaven. It doesn’t feel fresh, and despite all that is good about it, remains unengaging. Scott has recently confirmed that he will soon be embarking on two 3D Alien prequels. Is Robin Hood just a first step toward cannibalizing his body of work in a desperate attempt to keep the films coming? Let’s hope not.
Growing up in a rural, religious community in western Canada, Kyle McCarthy loved hockey, but once he came out at 19, he quit, convinced being openly gay and an active player was untenable. So the 32-year-old says he is “very surprised” by the runaway success of Heated Rivalry, a Canadian-made series about the romance between two closeted gay players in a sport that has historically made gay men feel unwelcome. Ben Baby, the 43-year-old commissioner of the Toronto Gay Hockey Association (TGHA), calls the success of the show — which has catapulted its young lead actors to stardom -- “shocking,” and says
Inside an ordinary-looking townhouse on a narrow road in central Kaohsiung, Tsai A-li (蔡阿李) raised her three children alone for 15 years. As far as the children knew, their father was away working in the US. They were kept in the dark for as long as possible by their mother, for the truth was perhaps too sad and unjust for their young minds to bear. The family home of White Terror victim Ko Chi-hua (柯旗化) is now open to the public. Admission is free and it is just a short walk from the Kaohsiung train station. Walk two blocks south along Jhongshan
The 2018 nine-in-one local elections were a wild ride that no one saw coming. Entering that year, the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) was demoralized and in disarray — and fearing an existential crisis. By the end of the year, the party was riding high and swept most of the country in a landslide, including toppling the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) in their Kaohsiung stronghold. Could something like that happen again on the DPP side in this year’s nine-in-one elections? The short answer is not exactly; the conditions were very specific. However, it does illustrate how swiftly every assumption early in an
Snoop Dogg arrived at Intuit Dome hours before tipoff, long before most fans filled the arena and even before some players. Dressed in a gray suit and black turtleneck, a diamond-encrusted Peacock pendant resting on his chest and purple Chuck Taylor sneakers with gold laces nodding to his lifelong Los Angeles Lakers allegiance, Snoop didn’t rush. He didn’t posture. He waited for his moment to shine as an NBA analyst alongside Reggie Miller and Terry Gannon for Peacock’s recent Golden State Warriors at Los Angeles Clippers broadcast during the second half. With an AP reporter trailing him through the arena for an
RSS