I don’t want to give anything away, but some of those who walk away from this might find themselves shrugging way more than their deltoids will allow them to feel comfortable with. I was certainly confused when the credits rolled and not one confrontation between the Sheriff and Robin occurred. But names are tough. And they’re made all that much more perplexing when you name a movie “Robin Hood” and only one overt act of larceny is ever committed onscreen. In fact, true fans of previous versions of the Sherwood brigands might even find themselves scowling as though they’ve discovered a rat turd in their gruel. What is this madness which they doth dare to label the Hood of Robin?! Court intrigue between King Philip and King John? Gallic mistresses? Lots of big dogs running around? BEEKEEPERS?! And what's this? You say there are only minimal amounts of swordplay?
But before you harrumph this and go begging for a prequel about Legolas or some other arrow-slinging crap, you should at least appreciate some minutiae aside from the obvious departures; because what the movie lacks in gentleness or nostalgia, Scott’s update is fully-endowed in the immersion sector. And, like all of his detail-heavy epics, the film is quickly gaining interest with memory.
Lately I’ve become partial to second appraisals and though much of Scott’s latest work hasn’t really screamed me into submission upon a first viewing, more and more I find myself catching snippets of the Bourne-esque “Body of Lies” or the funkadelic “American Gangster” on HBO and I’m reminded of why we took to him in the first place. I even remember when “Gladiator” was a big fuss and people were on it like laurels on Caesar. But then I also remember when my sophomore history teacher told us that "Gladiator" was about as historically accurate as “Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow”. Honestly, before you sit down with Scott you have to remember that we don’t necessarily see his movies for the thematic material or the highly provocative story-telling (thought it certainly helps), we see it for the atmosphere. Remember the orbital grunginess of the Nostromo’s rusted, dripping cargo bays or a 2019 Los Angeles’ geisha with Coca-Cola?
Scott has always had an eye for the little things and “Robin Hood” seems to be no exception. Even his last medieval epic “Kingdom of Heaven” is a stand-alone in ways that I’m still not entirely able to fathom. But the nuances were surely there as they are here.
On a final note I’ll concede that this is decidedly not the rousing crowd-tickler that a tall tale should be, but it commits itself to a line of reasoning and sticks to it. The fact that Scott’s impeccable attention to detail only serves to freshen the mix.
There’s a blue-collar mentality to Longstride (it’s unclear as to where the ‘Hood’ comes in), who participates in the Third Crusade as a wearied common archer, but hardly to the point of being romantic. It’s more modest than anything that Kevin Costner could have come up with. Concepts of honesty, truth and memory are tossed around to some effect yet none of it really does pans out in the end. At some moments there is even a folksy dizziness to the action which is something I’ve never seen in a Scott film before. Yet perhaps the most resonant note the film strikes are the way in weaves the economic burden incurred by Richard the Lionheart’s campaigns abroad. And in that way I was truly surprised. There’s a geopolitical sensibility that expands the archer’s legend in ways that seem all too familiar, both in terms of our current political and economic…situation.
It’s all a very convoluted array of odds n’ ends but ultimately I felt that it worked, which is a miracle considering the film dons a paper trail of rewrites that wags from this epic like a tail. Worth seeing at least once.
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