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Is it possible to make a universally liked "Robin Hood" film?

posted 6 years ago by JakeSWITCH (504)
33 replies | jump to latest

Ridley Scott tried to make a grittier, more realistic "Robin Hood" film. I thought it was quite boring.

Now, Otto Bathurst has made a lighter, more superhero-ish "Robin Hood" ... and it looks a little silly, based on the trailers.

Even Disney's "Robin Hood" from 1973 only has a 52% approval rating on RT with an average rating of 5.4/10 based on 25 reviews.

It leaves me wondering: what do people want from a Robin Hood film? What is the right tone to strike with the character?

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[–] kuku (3510) 6 years ago

Robin Hood from Errol Flynn (1938) is considered one of the greatest adventure movies ever. It was included in the Top100 adventure/action movies by the American Film Institute

And Robin&Marian, with Sean Connery and Audrey Hepburn, is a delightful little cult classic. Quite universally praised, and highly recommended.

[–] [deleted] 6 years ago

I agree.

[–] kuku (3510) 6 years ago

And I forgot 'Ivanhoe'.

It's an amazing adventure movie (and novel), and Robin appears both in the novel and the movie. It's true that he appears only as a secondary character, but this novel was highly influential in the Robin Hood's mythology.

[–] [deleted] 6 years ago

That is a very good story. The first time I saw the 1950s "Ivanhoe" movie, I wasn't familiar with the book, so the appearance of Loxley took me completely by surprise!

[–] mikeflatley (761) 6 years ago

I thought dis 1 hit ze spot

[–] liscarkat (18388) 6 years ago

Yes, it was done in 1938 by Warner Bros.

[–] momur (107) 6 years ago

No. For the simple reason that it's impossible to make any film "universally liked". Honestly, I think we're just going through some fatigue with regard to Robin Hood thanks to the less-than-stellar "by the numbers" efforts since Prince Of Thieves.

Honestly, I think the best thing to do would be to take it back to the original legends. Get rid of the "Robin=Richard's personal BFF in the Crusades and literally for some reason the ONLY ONE who can save England" stuff and go back to Robin just being a fairly morally-ambiguous arrogant little git of a peasant who pretty much falls into the "rob from the rich, give to the poor" thing by accident and actually see him become "Robin Hood: general all-round good guy and capitalists' nightmare" rather than just have him be the generic hero all the way through. At least it would be something new (despite ironically being older than the version we're now familiar with) and not just essentially the same story that's being rehashed over and over.

[–] PrimeMinisterX (8711) 6 years ago

To be fair to Ridley Scott's film, while I don't think that movie totally worked, I did think it was an interesting and original take on the legend and certainly wasn't a "by the numbers" effort.

Personally, I think we're ready for another traditional telling of the story: Fun, high adventure, classic. Not a reimagining. Not stylistically modernized. Just a good, old fashioned Robin Hood story on a big budget.

[–] momur (107) 6 years ago

You know, I totally forgot about Ridley Scott's version! Yeah, there were a lot of issues with it but at least it was something different...

I'd agree with your second paragraph. The sad thing is that I think this film had potential, it ultimately just had the air of the writer/director wanting to make an "original" V For Vendetta style poor-against-rich-revolution movie and the studios or whoever said "Nope! Robin Hood!" so that in the end it just became a mess of things that never quite fit together. I think the main issue is that it took itself far too seriously for what it was - the closest Robin Hood films to being "universally liked" (1938; Disney; and Prince of Thieves) all have a feeling of fun when you're watching them. The 1938 version is the most serious but even that has a sense of just enjoying watching this guy swan about occasionally getting his ass kicked but then laughing it off seconds later. I guess this version was trying to be fun with the way it was stylised but it just came off as awkward, like they couldn't quite commit to it one way or the other.

[–] PrimeMinisterX (8711) 6 years ago

Full disclosure: I have not seen the new one yet.

The trailers were a complete turn-off, with the director seemingly doing his best Guy Ritchie impression (how did that turn out for Ritchie's King Arthur?), but even after seeing the trailers I still thought it might be a fun film.

However, then I heard that the movie is laden with political subtext and the director is making a political statement as much as he's making a film, and I just didn't want to deal with that bullshit.

I will probably watch it after it hits DVD just to see what it's all about, but I'm definitely not paying to see it at the theater.

[–] momur (107) 6 years ago

I'm lucky - I work at a cinema so I got to see it for free. I wouldn't have paid for a ticket though...

To be fair, I think it's very hard to NOT make a film about Robin Hood into something a little political, especially in this day and age where politics gets dragged into absolutely everything. I mean, the whole premise of the thing is that this is a guy who robs from the rich and gives to the poor. That right there is already practically impossible to make "not political". This version...it's just a little too on-the-nose with it. Like...I'm fairly sure these won't count as spoilers but at one point Robin literally talks about "redistribution of wealth" and Marian (who's a peasant in this version) tells the Sheriff that it's his fault there's going to be a revolution and she faces absolutely no consequences for it even though this Sheriff is legitimately messed up. There's virtually nothing left to subtext which I guess is what rubbed people up the wrong way about the political stuff.

[–] PrimeMinisterX (8711) 6 years ago

What do you think about this post:

https://moviechat.org/tt4532826/Robin-Hood/5bf661b3efa7ad38fee1fc09/Politically-Correct-things-you-can-learn-in-this-movie

Do you think it accurately reflects some of the film's political leanings?

[–] momur (107) 6 years ago

Ehh...to a point. I think the OP is going a little overboard with how "pro-Muslim" the film is. The only explicitly Muslim main character is Jamie Foxx's and his religion is only really brought up twice in the film. Morgan Freeman in Prince of Thieves had more references to religion than Jamie Foxx does. Same with "fighting Muslim invaders is wrong". Trying not to give anything away, the Crusades are presented fairly neutrally; it's just that one particular faction of fighters happens to go out of control, which isn't really that far from the truth from any and all sides in a lot of wars. And let's be honest here, trying to talk about the Crusades using 21st century political stances is just asking for trouble. Really, the only stance the film seems to definitively have towards religion is anti-organised-Christianity.

Also, that post overstates the "evil white male" thing too, IMO, considering that all the named good guys in the film barring Jamie Foxx are white too with only one female among them. Though Nottingham does seem to be the hub of racial diversity in this, which bugs me only because there's no internal logic for it to be so, especially when Jamie Foxx's character is treated like an anomaly by practically everyone else.

[–] PrimeMinisterX (8711) 6 years ago

Well thanks for the info.

I'm sure I'll get around to it eventually, but from everything I've heard about the film, it sounds like a missed opportunity. They spent almost a hundred million dollars and the result was, well, this movie.

[–] QuickieCalzone (378) 6 years ago

There already is one.
The Kevin Costner one.

[–] PrimeMinisterX (8711) 6 years ago

I think Prince of Thieves is very entertaining, but it's not quite universally liked.

The RT score is only 51%, so critics were divided. Even the audience scores is only 72%. That's obviously better, but not universal acclaim.

Still though, as I believe I said earlier in this thread, I think Prince of Thieves is probably the best Robin Hood movie we've ever gotten. It's at least the best we've gotten in the last 30 years.

[–] KevMill (243) 6 years ago

No, Because there will always be a bunch of jackass sheep, hating on something, only because others like it.

[–] Ace_Spade (9544) 6 years ago

Adventures of Robin Hood (Errol Flynn)?

That's the best one I've seen. It gets the lore and the fun and goes to the hilt with it.

If you're asking whether or not they can do that again, yes. I think they need to consider the first Pirates of the Caribbean as inspiration: fun, swashbuckling, epic quest, takes itself seriously, but never morose.

[–] JakeSWITCH (504) 6 years ago

Modelling it off the first "Pirates of the Caribbean" or Martin Campbell's "The Mask of Zorro" is a great idea!

Unfortunately, judging by the sequels (by the same directors, no less), it looks like the quality of those initial films was something of a fluke.

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You can read all of my latest film reviews here: https://www.maketheswitch.com.au/about/Jake

[–] Ace_Spade (9544) 6 years ago

Yeah, Zorro is another great jumping-off point. Unfortunately, there are a few genres that Hollywood sorta stopped making entirely. Swashbuckler is one of them. Epics are another. They don't really make them any more, and when they do, they rarely do them right. Pirates is an exception (Lord of the Rings for epics). Few and far between. Oh, well. At least I've got Errol on DVD.

[–] Xcalat3 (3748) 6 years ago

Impossible.