Remember What I Said...
About people's ignorance making me feel smart?
Well, that goes double for the ignorance of movie reviewers.
Long story shortly told: I'm looking for pictures to use as visual aids for a 17th Century era Buffy the Vampire Slayer game I'm going to be running soon. So I've sifting through the web looking for pictures of pirate or at least pirate like actors and actresses.
So anyhoo, I'm poking around a site that has some pictures from the 13th Warrior. Now I highly enjoy and recommend this film and the site's reviewer didn't love the film as much as I, but he did enjoy it.
After all, as he said, it was supposed to be a Norse Excalibur.
A. Norse. Excalibur.
For those who don't know, the movie follows an Arab courtier who ends up helping a bunch of Norsemen deal with a threat to a king in Geatland, Hrothgar.
So the Arab (played by Antonio Banderas) hooks up with a bunch of Vikings led by Buliwyf successor to the old king who has just died.
So the Viking get to Rthogar's Kingdom and find out a menace known as the Wendol, have been attacking the king's hall and have already killed 30 men. So wackiness ensues and the Wendol are enocuntered and one of their "claws" (a clawed war club) is hefted up over the hall's door.
Then the warriors go about trying to protect the king after a brief encounter with the king's spoiled son.
So the Wendol, in this story a tribe of neanderthal-like throwback who eat men, fight Buliwylf and his men. The whole story involves going deep into the Earth to kill the Wendol's "Mother" (a high preistess), having to swim for a really long time at one point, fight a "fire dragon" (which ends up being a long line of cavalry with torches), and ends with a big last stand where all the evils are beaten and the king to be Buliwyf dies a great hero to be always remembered.
So does any of this ring a bell. Wendol? Buliwyf? Wendol's Mother? Hanging Wendol's Claw over Hrothgar's hall? Fighting a Dragon?
Anyone? Anyone?
Here's a hint...it ain't King Arthur.
What? Has no one heard of fucking Beowulf anymore? They didn't even really try to hide it. Wendol/Grendel, Buliwyf/Beowulf, etc...
So please, film reviewers and would be reviewers of anything...know your shit. It calls your opinions into question when you don't...and it makes you look like a fucking twit.
And please don't use the "Roger Ebert reviews a super-hero film" tactic and just shrug off all your misconceptions and mistakes as things only fanboys will care about...it doesn't work when Roger does it and he's got more cred than most reviewers.
The Shadow is not a Batman rip-off*, Superman is not only vulnerable to Kryptonite**, 13th Warrior is not a riff of Arthurian myth, the excessive blood in Kill Bill was not inspired by Monty Python and the Holy Grail, and the central message of Buddhism is not every man for himself. Those are all mistakes. I know, I looked them up.
And yet I see such statements in review after review. And lest you think I'm picking on online reviewers I'll tell you the Shadow bit came from a review in the Indianapolis Star and the Superman bit was from Ebert's Superman Returns review.
So really, please, if you're going to review or critique something check a few facts or just go for the less clever but actually correct observations. Or y'know, don't...but then don't complain and cry the fanboys are after you when someone points out how damned wrong you were and rightly suggests that might not be the only error of which you could be reasonably suspected.
* He precededs him by many years in fact.
** Magic, a lack of yellow sun radiation, or just a really good pounding by someone as powerful can do wonders.
Well, that goes double for the ignorance of movie reviewers.
Long story shortly told: I'm looking for pictures to use as visual aids for a 17th Century era Buffy the Vampire Slayer game I'm going to be running soon. So I've sifting through the web looking for pictures of pirate or at least pirate like actors and actresses.
So anyhoo, I'm poking around a site that has some pictures from the 13th Warrior. Now I highly enjoy and recommend this film and the site's reviewer didn't love the film as much as I, but he did enjoy it.
After all, as he said, it was supposed to be a Norse Excalibur.
A. Norse. Excalibur.
For those who don't know, the movie follows an Arab courtier who ends up helping a bunch of Norsemen deal with a threat to a king in Geatland, Hrothgar.
So the Arab (played by Antonio Banderas) hooks up with a bunch of Vikings led by Buliwyf successor to the old king who has just died.
So the Viking get to Rthogar's Kingdom and find out a menace known as the Wendol, have been attacking the king's hall and have already killed 30 men. So wackiness ensues and the Wendol are enocuntered and one of their "claws" (a clawed war club) is hefted up over the hall's door.
Then the warriors go about trying to protect the king after a brief encounter with the king's spoiled son.
So the Wendol, in this story a tribe of neanderthal-like throwback who eat men, fight Buliwylf and his men. The whole story involves going deep into the Earth to kill the Wendol's "Mother" (a high preistess), having to swim for a really long time at one point, fight a "fire dragon" (which ends up being a long line of cavalry with torches), and ends with a big last stand where all the evils are beaten and the king to be Buliwyf dies a great hero to be always remembered.
So does any of this ring a bell. Wendol? Buliwyf? Wendol's Mother? Hanging Wendol's Claw over Hrothgar's hall? Fighting a Dragon?
Anyone? Anyone?
Here's a hint...it ain't King Arthur.
What? Has no one heard of fucking Beowulf anymore? They didn't even really try to hide it. Wendol/Grendel, Buliwyf/Beowulf, etc...
So please, film reviewers and would be reviewers of anything...know your shit. It calls your opinions into question when you don't...and it makes you look like a fucking twit.
And please don't use the "Roger Ebert reviews a super-hero film" tactic and just shrug off all your misconceptions and mistakes as things only fanboys will care about...it doesn't work when Roger does it and he's got more cred than most reviewers.
The Shadow is not a Batman rip-off*, Superman is not only vulnerable to Kryptonite**, 13th Warrior is not a riff of Arthurian myth, the excessive blood in Kill Bill was not inspired by Monty Python and the Holy Grail, and the central message of Buddhism is not every man for himself. Those are all mistakes. I know, I looked them up.
And yet I see such statements in review after review. And lest you think I'm picking on online reviewers I'll tell you the Shadow bit came from a review in the Indianapolis Star and the Superman bit was from Ebert's Superman Returns review.
So really, please, if you're going to review or critique something check a few facts or just go for the less clever but actually correct observations. Or y'know, don't...but then don't complain and cry the fanboys are after you when someone points out how damned wrong you were and rightly suggests that might not be the only error of which you could be reasonably suspected.
* He precededs him by many years in fact.
** Magic, a lack of yellow sun radiation, or just a really good pounding by someone as powerful can do wonders.
posted by Jack at 4:41 AM
2 Comments:
If you ask me, the whole things reeks of "dumbing down".
I have a theory that this sort of thing is more common place in commercial media, which has to appeal to as broad a medium of people as possible, hence the pitch towards the lowest common denominator. I tried to find the BBC review of 13th Warrior to see if they mentioned Beowulf, but I couldn't find it. the theory being that the BBC, which isn't dependant on advertising revinue, would have a slightly higher quality of review as it doesn't have to appeal to the lowest common denomenator in an attempt to grab market share.
Yeah I considered that it was just an attempt to simplify things but either way it was just very odd.
Especially considering there are two Beowulf films around...one that came out this past year and another that Neil Gaiman is writing the screenplay for. I guess I just figured it was a bit better known that apparently it is outside English Lit geeks.
Though to be fair that review was a few years old. I tried and dig it up again but I can't seem to find it again (probably because I was Googling images and then tried to find it with search terms).
Also, really the specific incident is just indicative of what I see too often in some reviews. People stop analyzing as soon as they think they've got it figured.
Which is fine when they're right.
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