…………………………………………………

Robin Hood Movie Review

Robin Hood is a 2010 historical action adventure directed by Ridley Scott and starring Russell Crowe. It’s a very mediocre, misguided movie.

………………………………………………….

“Rise and rise again until lambs become lions“

…………………………………………………..

Robin Longstride and his fellow crusaders are drawn to the village of Nottingham, where they tackle the issue of corruption. Their efforts against the crown alter the balance of power in the world. I watched this film first time back when it was released and I didn’t care for it back then. Watching it now, I still fail to see what Ridley Scott intended with this feature. It’s an odd one for sure.

Errol Flynn’s Robin Hood remains by far the best take on this famous story. This one, however, ranks among the worst. I do realize that Scott is known for his epic spectacles that are grounded in reality albeit not fully historically accurate. This was probably his attempt to make an original take on this often told tale, one that is more realistic and historically driven.

But it did not work unfortunately. This is because Robin Hood is very much not a real person. He’s a myth and the story is a fictional one. It’s supposed to be fun and exciting, so when you take the fun out of it, you are left with just a spectacle movie that is also highly historically inaccurate, so it ended up being a pointless endeavor.

This Robin Hood also lacks memorable characters. Russell Crowe was overly gloomy and serious in the main role. He was not a good fit for this character at all. Others were also miscast, especially Cate Blanchett who deserved a much better role than Marian, who is here an overly feminist, implausible heroine. There are actors who were effective here, such as William Hurt and Mark Strong, but most of them got very small roles.

…………………………………………………..

The movie is also overly dark in tone and look. The cinematography is overly gloomy, the score is solid but familiarly rousing while the production design and attention to detail are excellent, but far from Scott’s best works. The movie is very badly paced as it runs over two hours, becoming dull very quickly. It also has numerous action set pieces, becoming overwhelming in the process, though some of those scenes are very well executed predictably from the director. The dialogue is clichéd and the plot just goes through the motions. There is some intrigue to be had with this fresh take on this concept at first, but it very rapidly grew tiresome.