The rather lame film that was Beowulf
So I saw the Beowulf movie. In a lot of ways it reminded me of the Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within movie. It had some cool special effects, and most of the the movie was carried on the special effects. So while it was cool eye candy, it will be something I’ll probably never revisit again, as CGI eye candy never ages well. It might make for novelty in some future ‘History of Film 231′ class, but the motion capture technology, and not the story line will be up for discussion.
For one, they make the claim that this is the ‘true’ story of Beowulf. You pretty much know that is going no where. I felt like it was that King Arthur movie a few years back, that made so many blunders in the scope of real history with in the first ten minutes that I had to laugh. (Case in point, all the ‘Christian’ soldiers of Rome with their Crusader style shields). Beowulf was no different, if there was a way to take a jab at Christianity they did it.
At one point a character asks if they should pray to the new Roman God Christ Jesus. He is specifically told that they do not need a savior, they need a hero. Then there is a further comment about the death of the hero culture and the birth the the martyr culture. Now I realize that one of the themes found is many of the sagas is of Christianity replacing the older Paganism and the tension it created. So all in all it was called for and I did not feel that was to far fetched.
Of course the irony of it was the movie was a testament as to why sinful man needed a savior. If it was a court room scene, it went as follows: I am Beowulf, here is my defense attorney Pelegius. Pelegius opens his mouth and there is the sound of many men of valor sucking wind through thousands of those small, red coffee straws. Every body on the jury laughs at the pathetic attempt. They do not even bother to pass judgment, instead wandering to the nearest culinary establishment and getting a round on the house.
We don’t need a savior, we need a hero. But what happens when we need to be saved from the actions of our hero? We are back to the original problem.
On an interesting side note, I remember reading some papers regarding Beowulf and Christ. Apparently there are several places in Beowulf where the author is quoting and reworking material from the Christian liturgy of the time. As such there is a large amount of Christian imagery applied to Beowulf. Now, while Beowulf is the Christ figure in many of the scenes, he is not ‘Christ.’ The author appears to be working in the ancient Judaeo-Christian literary tradition of typology.
In typology, a person in a story can take on roles and traits of a larger archetype, but still be separate and distinct from what he is representing. Think along the lines of a shadow of things to come. In this way, we see some foreshadowing of Christ in a flawed figure such as Samson. Once you begin to see the thing, and the shadow of the thing, much of the imagery that Bible employs begins to make sense. We can see that the office a person holds is not something they have created, but something they have entered into. Then that office is reflected, often in poor ways, but reflected none the less, into their story.
In that respect, I found it strange that a clearly Christian story could be reworked into a story that seemed rather far from its Christianity. But then I can see the deeper humor that God likes to indulge in, where an anti-Christian message, can become a very strong Christian message.