Just what the movie-going audience was clamoring for–another remake of Robin Hood. We’ve only had a couple dozen takes on this, so I guess the Hollywood suits thought we needed another one, complete with all the gimmicky, cliched “edginess” that passes for story in too many movies lately. For those who want to save some time, I’ll just say at the outset that Robin Hood was absolute crap from beginning to end. There was nothing good about this movie. For those who want the gory details, read on.
For starters, this thing must be set in a parallel universe, because it doesn’t even vaguely resemble any time period in our history. Taking liberties is one thing, but having the entire film full to bursting with bizarre anachronisms is quite another. We’re told it takes place during the crusades, but the armor and clothing are all over the place. And no, you don’t have to be a hard-core history buff to notice. The main cast looks like they just stepped out of a high-end boutique. Marian (Eve Hewson) sports a very stylish black leather jacket over a modern-cut, red dress and suede high heel boots. Robin (Taron Egerton) and Little John (Jamie Foxx) look like they just finished a GQ photo shoot. But the worst offender has to be the Sheriff of Nottingham (Ben Mendelsohn), who spends the entire movie in a full-length, dove grey leather coat.
Ben Mendelsohn in Robin Hood (2018). IMDb.com.
The weapons are no better. Ranulf from Hawk the Slayer wants his magazine-fed machine gun crossbow back. (For the military buffs, I know the Chinese had a repeating crossbow, but it didn’t use a detachable magazine, and it wasn’t powerful enough to pierce metal armor or shatter stone.) The sheriff’s men carry riot shields with vision slots cut out. Robin, himself, becomes a god-like archer when Little John hands him a recurve bow with built in brass knuckles. And boy, does he use them to deliver some serious bow beatdowns. I guess bows double as melee weapons in his timeline. Must be amazing technology, because no bow ever created in our universe could stand up to that much physical abuse.
Jamie Foxx and Taron Egerton in Robin Hood (2018). IMDb.com.
Most of the film takes place in Nottingham and a nearby settlement referred to only as The Mines. Both places vary dramatically in size and architecture over the course of the movie. The Mines, in particular, inexplicably grow to the size of a small city when the script calls for an extended chase scene.
How about the acting? Everyone was terrible. Everyone. If someone told me the actors were having a contest to see who could do the worst job without getting fired, I would believe it. Special dishonorable mention goes to Tim Minchin, who played a neurotic Friar Tuck, and F. Murray Abraham, who played the Cardinal as the most cliched stock villain imaginable. He might as well have gone ahead and twirled his mustache and tied Marian to the railroad tracks.
The plot is laughable. What the Sheriff and Cardinal are plotting doesn’t make a lick of sense even in the context of the bizzaro world the movie takes place in. Robin has zero difficulty ingratiating himself with the Sheriff and being taken into the highest confidence. The only character with a coherent motivation is Little John, and his very existence bugs me. I’m sick to death of every iteration of Robin Hood since Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves insisting on including a Saracen/Moorish sidekick.
To answer the obvious question, Robin Hood does not fall into the “so bad it’s good” category. It’s just bad. Really bad. The fact that I saw The Room last January is the only thing saving this travesty from being the worst movie I’ve seen all year.
Overall rating: 1/10