Catholic News Service Movie Review

Beowulf & Grendel

By David DiCerto
Catholic News Service

NEW YORK (CNS) -- As a student at Oxford, the poet W.H. Auden was awed by a then-unknown don's rousing recitation of the Anglo-Saxon epic poem "Beowulf," composed sometime around the eighth or ninth century. The professor was J.R.R. Tolkien, author of "Lord of the Rings."

Years later, according to Tolkien's biographer Humphrey Carpenter, Auden wrote to his old teacher, calling the lecture "an unforgettable experience." The same praise cannot be heaped on director Sturla Gunnarsson's grim and tepid, if earnest, retelling of the saga in "Beowulf & Grendel" (Union Station Media/Truly Indie).

Stripping the poem of its fantasy trappings but remaining faithful to its outline, the film tells the story of how the Norse hero Beowulf (Gerard Butler) leads a troop of warriors across the sea to help the long-suffering Danish king Hrothgar (Stellan Skarsgard) rid his lands of a murderous troll, Grendel (Ingvar Sigurdsson), who is exacting revenge on Hrothgar for an earlier wrong by brutally slaughtering the Danes during nighttime raids on the king's newly erected Mead Hall.

To make the medieval yarn more accessible to modern audiences, Gunnarsson opted in favor of more contemporary-sounding dialogue (including frequent use of the f-word and other expletives) and breaks up the overall broodiness with savage swordplay and severed limbs and heads.

Another modification involves Grendel himself, who is no longer a mindless, evil fiend, but a misunderstood outcast, an object worthy of empathy like Frankenstein's monster. The trade-off in humanizing him is that the story, while gaining pathos, loses much of its mythic luster, an alteration that would probably not have sat well with Tolkien who, writing in 1956, argued that "it is the monstrosity and fairy-tale quality of Grendel that really makes the tale important."

Here, Beowulf is not so much a hero, but a hatchet man, albeit a conflicted one who returns home weighed down more with guilt than gold.

Icelandic born Gunnarsson does, however, do a good job at establishing the dark, dank and brutish world of the poem's Scandinavian setting, the ruggedly beautiful, wave-assaulted landscapes of Iceland standing in for Denmark. The casting is also superb, except for Sarah Polley, who seems incongruously modern as the witch Selma.

The poem's inherent Christian elements are minimized, with Beowulf portrayed as a Viking agnostic with a humanist conscience. As for the Danes, some convert, others hold to their pagan ways. Hrothgar remains on the fence, though he is eventually baptized, but that decision seems less about faith than playing it safe with an angry troll on the prowl. (He covers all his bases by wearing both a cross and hammer-shaped pendant -- the symbol of the Norse god Thor -- around his neck.)

Overall the film's treatment of religion is superficial, including a buffoonish Irish missionary, Brendan the Celt (Eddie Marsan), a cartoon cleric who, though ablaze with zeal to save the Northern heathens, comes across as little more than a joke. In spite of all this, however, the film suggests that Christian ideals of mercy and kindness are morally superior to the pagan warrior code.

The film contains assorted bloody violence, including dismemberment, some gruesome images, a rape flashback, an implied sexual encounter, a crass scene of urination, and recurring rough and crude language. The USCCB Office for Film & Broadcasting classification is L -- limited adult audience, films whose problematic content many adults would find troubling. The Motion Picture Association of America rating is R -- restricted. Under 17 requires accompanying parent or adult guardian.

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DiCerto is on the staff of the Office for Film & Broadcasting of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops. More reviews are available online at www.usccb.org/movies.

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