::A Geek in Korea::

Looking over CineCine for a movie worth watching, I saw that Beowulf was available in 3-D at Lotte Cinema ONLY early in the morning. The first show was at 8 am! The last showing was 1:00 PM! Holy crap that’s early! We decided to split the difference and hit the 11:00AM showing.

From everything I hear on the ‘Net, if you are going to see Beowulf, see it in 3-D. I have already been burned once on the new “3-D” fad with Superman Returns. What a waste that was to see in the theater. I was more optimistic about Beowulf better using the technology because it’s filmed entirely in 3-D. It wasn’t like Superman Returns, where only certain scenes were barely adapted to use the glasses. (Seriously. Superman Returns in 3-D sucked. Hard.)

The last “Burly Near Naked Men Fighting” movie I saw was 300, which I came away conflicted. Now that I’ve seen 300 Rifftrax’d, I’ve made my peace with the genre and was willing to go back to seeing swords and gore in the theater once again. Beowulf is better than 300. Much, much better, and I’m glad I went to see it.

The story of Beowulf is about power, lust, betrayal, and naked people fighting deformed things. I liked how they adapted the story, and I thought that the 3-D enhanced the storytelling. It wasn’t always subtle, but they always made good use of the technology during the action scenes. As good as the effects and the digital performances are, there was a great story going on here too. Unlike 300, you can actually care about the characters. There are BRUTAL fights that are as intense as anything in 300. I wonder what the 5 year old child at the viewing we attended will be dreaming about tonight. It was entirely over the top and completely awesome.

The bizarre double standard about nudity was in full effect. The character acted by Angelina Jolie was a dripping golden goddess that had every inch of her anatomy on display for the camera. Beowulf, on the other hand, fought in an Austin Powers like set of scenes where something was comically placed in front of his genitalia. Everything SUGGESTED he was naked, but they never showed anything more than a digital ass. I mean, a CANDLE between the legs of a naked man? A SWORD? We GET what you are trying to say movie. I don’t go to movies for their nudity, but when you’ve got a guy wresting a monster ripping people’s legs off, is nudity REALLY the most shocking thing on the screen?

Anyway, the direction the movie took was ambiguously enough that I had to respect the courage of the director to end it in the manner he did. There were a few cliches along the way, but it worked on a deeper level. I’d HIGHLY recommend checking it out in 3-D. There was a scene where I actually flinched and rubbed my head because I felt like I had been hit by something. That’s an amazing effect. I really enjoyed the film, and so did my wife. We had a nice talk about it at lunch. I’m not sure if I like the early movie in the morning, but I felt like I got out of the house and did something early in the day. We had the best seats in the theater too. We might have to try it again.

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Tags: Beowulf, 300 sucked, movies, 3-D