BEOWULF

"I've come to kill your monster"

Terrorised by the monster Grendel (Glover) for decades, King Hrothgar (Hopkins) sends out a plea for a warrior to come to rid them of the beast. When Beowulf (Winstone) answers the call, he and his men engage the creature in battle only for Beowulf to fatally wound the creature and drive it back into cave from whence it came. As he follows the monster back into the cave, Beowulf meets a much greater threat in the form of Grendal's beautiful demonic mother (Jolie), who makes him an other that he cannot refuse.

The eternal folk tale of Beowulf has been told for centuries but can a computer generated version bring this story to life like never before?

Director Robert Zemeckis and his animation company Imageworks have been pioneering computer generated movies and the technology of Performance capture since the hit 'Polar Express' in 2004. Following that up with the excellent 'Monster House' in 2006, Zemeckis and Imageworks moved onto a different approach to animation, moving away from the usual children oriented demographic and onto a fantasy epic that would hopefully drawing in an older audience and for the most part 'Beowulf' succeeds but only just.

The story of Beowulf's confrontation with Grendal and his demonic mother has been regaled in story, verse and song since its first telling as an old English heroic poem back in the 8th century. With themes of temptation, lust, revenge, fear and regret running throughout and with a large dollop of supernatural mysticism thrown in for good measure, the story of Beowulf is one crying out for a modern Hollywood update but was computer generation the right medium for the job?

While it cannot be argued that the computer generated characters and settings are some of the best to ever grace the silver screen. Zemeckis' decision to make the story using CGI and his pioneering performance capture technique, were the real actors actually act out their roles using motion capture suits and computer capture every aspect of their performance, seems like a wasted opportunity however. The problem is that the film could have easily have been made as a live action epic following the success of 'The Lord of the Rings' and 'The Chronicles of Narnia' because Zemeckis and his creative team decided to make the characters look like the actors that are playing them. With the exception of Ray Winstone as Beowulf and Crispin Glover as Grendal, Anthony Hopkins, John Malkovich, Robin Wright Penn, Brendan Gleeson, Alison Lohman and Angelina Jolie look like themselves, only computer generated. This takes a lot away from the development of the characters, with the whole point of animation was to allow actors to create a character that they could never be in real life and use a vocal performance to breathe life into a character. The decision to make the character look like the actors playing them takes any possibility of this away and makes you wonder why they recreated them so precisely in the computer when they could have just filmed them in live action.

For as much as 'Beowulf' succeeds it also fails, meaning that it doesn't quite deliver on its potential. While the story is enthralling and grandiose, as it needs to be, the computer generated versions of the actors take you away from what could have been a complete piece of escapism. Seeing the likes of Angelina Jolie and Anthony Hopkins in CG form may appeal for a few minutes but then you think that with the graphics not been quite photo realistic yet, what was the point in trying to recreate a person that already exists, making 'Beowulf' feel like only half as adventurous as it could have been.

PICTURE & SOUND

The Blu-Ray disc presents the movie in High Definition widescreen 2:40:1 up to 1080p, with Dolby TrueHD 5.1 surround sound.

BONUS FEATURES

A Hero's Journey: The Making of Beowulf (25.09 mins/High Definition)
Director Robert Zemeckis, writers Roger Avery and Neil Gaiman, director of photography Robert Priesley, stunt coordinator Garret Warren, supervising art director Norm Newberry and stars Ray Winston and Crispin Glover take you behind the scenes of 'Beowulf'. Looking at how performance capture works, the construction of key scenes, creating Grendel and a visit from a major star to see how the technology has progressed, this is a good featurette that shows you how this new way of making movies works.

Beowulf: Mapping the Journey (22.02 mins/High Definition)
Split into short featurettes entitled 'The Volume', ''T' Pose Prep', 'What is E.O.G.?', 'Lay of the Land', 'Givin' props', 'Scanners', 'Stunts and Rigs', 'Plan of Attack', 'Fight Me' and 'Baby it's cold inside', these behind the scenes movies show you the complexity of making a performance capture film.

The Origins of Beowulf (5.13 mins/High Definition)
Director Robert Zemeckis, writers Roger Avery and Neil Gaiman and producer Steve Starky provide a brief history of the legendary poem and the challenges the filmmakers faced bringing the epic story to the big screen.

The Art of Beowulf (5.25 mins/High Definition)
Director Robert Zemeckis, writer Neil Gaiman and production designer Doug Chiang take you through the pre-production and design process for 'Beowulf'

Beasts of Burden - Designing the creatures of Beowulf (6.56 mins/High Definition)
Director Robert Zemeckis, writers Roger Avery and Neil Gaiman, production designer Doug Chiang, director of photography Robert Priesley and star Crispin Glover take you through the designs for the sea monster, the dragon, Grendel and his Mother.

Creating the ultimate Beowulf (1.59 mins/High Definition)
See how Robert Zemeckis solved the impossible task of finding the perfect six feet, six inch Beowulf of his imagination.

Additional Scenes (11.31 mins)
Watch six deleted scenes shown in computerised animatic format.

OVERALL

The Blu-Ray treatment for 'Beowulf' is one that fans of the film will enjoy. With a director's cut of the film and bonus features that reveal the fascinating way that performance capture works, the only thing missing from this release is a commentary track. This isn't that much different to the DVD version however, as Warner Bros. still haven't really seen the full potential of the new high definition Blu-Ray disc.

BLU-RAY

The Polar Express

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