Robin Hood. Could have been good, too.

[erastes]

Watched Robin Hood last night. Underneath all the Hollywood clap trap and tropes there was probably a pretty decent film but gah!

I can't comment on the technology and stuff although I'm sure somebody already has but there was so much to boggle at.  My first boggle was Marion stringing a long bow WHILE WALKING DOWN A CORRIDOR! Men had to train for years to be able to string these things, if you couldn't string it, you sure couldn't draw it. I love you Cate, and you were spectacular in it, but no no no no no.

John was twenty years OLDER than Isabella. But the timeline was pretty good, otherwise.

Richard's death—all wrong. He didn't die on the way back from a Crusade, pillaging a few castles on the way. He was shot by a lucky archer though, but not during battle. And he died IN THE ARMS OF HIS MOTHER. What always annoys me is the films always show Richard and LURVING England and wanting to get back to it. He HATED the place, and he spent almost no time there. Aquitaine was his heaven.

But the invasion?  The CLIFFS OF DUNGENESS?  I think the director had had some kind of mental brainstorm by that time.

And the horses which only go at one speed. Cantering everywhere.

And horses that used the Famous Kevin Costner Shortcut from Prince of Thieves – because they could canter from Nottingham to Dungeness (Kent, on the south coast) in 2 days – OVER A HUNDRED MILES A DAY. no. Just NO.

There's a massive list of other stuff here. 

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0955308/goofs

Hollywood pap. What a blooming shame because many of the performances (let's gloss over the "everyone is Irish and Robin Hood can't keep the same accent for two seconds altogether)were stellar

Comments

[ali-wilde.livejournal.com]

Archery is my son's sport of choice and I have learnt a lot about it. You can not string any bow while walking along a corridor, while walking anywhere. I totally agree with you.

These days, they use bow stringers (http://www.archeryacademy.com.au/index.php/page/shop/browse/category_id/afd21fcf14ab024a155e16f5e1d686b0?PHPSESSID=cb9mccssnlhcu0m81nvfr1vru7).

There's a little diagram there, too, that shows you how it's done. Mind you, that's not a long bow, but I have just been informed that a long bow is strung the same way.

[erastes.livejournal.com]

Nod nod - and it was a right of passage - we didn't get good at the longbow because of any magic, the children trained and developed their muscles over years--it was a law that every man had to practice archery--and when they were able to string a bow - they were men. If you didn't have the strength to string it, you didn't have the strength to fire it.

I refuse to believe, even standing still that Cate Blanchett could have even bent the damned thing, let alone string and fire it.

gah. such a shame.

[aunty_marion]

Actually, bows come in different 'draw weights', and always have. She'd have a 'ladies' bow', like mine, which is only 35lb draw weight. Some of our blokes have about 50lb draw weight bows, which is (mind you) pitiful compared to the over 100lb bows found on the Mary Rose!

I've drawn an 80lb bow. Wouldn't want to shoot it, though. (Or try to string it, even with a stringer!) I had a chance to try a 100lb bow, but decided discretion was the better part of my back/shoulder muscles...

[beckyblack]

At the Mary Rose exhibition in Portsmouth they've got a couple of longbows mounted up so you can have a try at drawing them. I could barely budge one! So yeah, just casually stringing one while walking along doesn't sound convincing!

[erastes.livejournal.com]

Damned right--much as I love Blanchett, I don't think she could have shifted it an inch.

[valarltd.livejournal.com]

I haven't seen it yet. It will only annoy the living daylights out of me.

Robin Hood movies that do the legend all backassward always do. The Crusade darkening Robin is canon. But that comes at the END of his banditry career, not the beginning. It's why Marion leaves him, not a draw.

The (pardon the expression) lionization of Richard and despising of John always struck me as totally backward. John inherited a broken, bankrupt country stuck in a war from his brother. He simply lacked the vision to fix it properly.
(yes, it does sound rather like the US at this point in time...)

[erastes.livejournal.com]

Exactly--trouble is, Shakespeare had a big hand in demonizing John (and others) because he wanted to please Elizabeth and slagging off the Plantagenets helped do that -- he was quite a canny king as kings go. So was Richard III - far better than Shakespeare paints him.

Yes, it would annoy you INCREDIBLY. and the whole 3 hours or however long ass it was all leg up to him being outlawed - so all the RH we KNOW was all AFTERthe ending.

[essayel.livejournal.com]

Himself and I made the decision NOT to see it because we knew we'd spend our whole time bitching sotto voce about the archery, geography ad infinitum.

For some reason we let Kevin Costner through on the nod, mostly because of Alan Rickman's mad sheriff, but we expected more from this one and were deeply irritated by just the trailer.

[seraphim-grace.livejournal.com]

I watched this with my mother who thought the whole thing was hilarious, in fact I'm not convinced she didn't think it was a parody
all you could get was "oh god!" at these things

the longbow thing, didn't Penelope set the challenge that she would marry any many who could string Odysseus' bow and it kept them trying for like ten years so.....
Hollywood should leave Robin alone, the only version i can bear is Disney's (the only disney film i like with the exception of Lilo and Stitch because stitch is evil) and that's because i like the soundtrack!
still more historically accurate than the beeb version - even if less boy kissing

[gehayi.livejournal.com]

Actually, John wasn't a bad administrator--sharp, shrewd and able to think circles around a lot of people. The problem was that he wasn't a warrior, and most of the men around him felt that a man who wasn't any good in war couldn't possibly be a good leader...or a real man. (Which was the reason that John, who had dozens of illegitimate children, was nicknamed John Softsword.)

Richard was perceived as being a good leader, though he wasn't. He sucked as a leader and as a king. But he was a great soldier--and for many people in the Middle Ages, as now, that was all they needed.

[cerisaye.livejournal.com]

What really got up my nose after I watched the film and visited IMDB were all the posters saying Cate is too old and plain looking and why couldn't they cast Keira Knightley or Eva Green instead. A pox on them!

The D-Day Landings style French invasion was laughable.

[erastes.livejournal.com]

Yes! The Saving Private Ryan boats! LOL!!!

[markprobst.livejournal.com]

Just how many more versions of RH do we need, anyway? Personally I love Errol Flynn the best. I'll probably watch the Ridley Scott film at some point, but I wasn't champing at the bit to see it.

[aunty_marion]

There were a fair few things that made my mediaeval mind go *twitch*, but not, in general, the archery! (Actually, at least three members of the archery club I'm in were in there as extras - haven't managed to pick them out, though, even on the DVD! So some of the archery was done right, at least...)

Marion, as a married woman, with loose hair.

A friend pointed out the 'trace-cut' horse. And I think I spotted a horse-collar too...

Yes, cantering the horses everywhere - good way to knacker them (in the exact and precise sense of the word...).

Yup, Isabella was about 12 when John married her, wasn't she?

At least they didn't get from Dover to Sherwood via Hadrian's Wall!