Beowulf

The fact that Angelina Jolie stars as Grendel's mother is probably enough to get many of us to see this movie, but Beowulf is worth seeing just to see the classic tale brought to life. Although the movie is a little different from the book, I recommend it to anyone reading the book to help sort out the events and themes.

Beowulf is an old world version of a mercenary who travels to Denmark to vanquish the demon, Grendel, who has been terrorizing the country. Beowulf has an epic battle with Grendel and wins. However, the story is not done with Grendel's death. Grendel's mother comes to avenge her son's death leading to yet another epic battle.

On its own, the movie is not that great. The use of some animation does not work well in the movie and the characters don't have the emotion of the book's characters. Maybe the creators tried too hard to make an action movie and forgot that there is so much more to the tale than battles.

Directed by Robert Zemickis; Starring Ray Winstone, Anthony Hopkins, John Malkovich, Robin Wright, Crispin Glover, and Angelina Jolie

Movie; 14+; Paramount, 2007