Russell Crowe’s Historic Motion Flop On HBO Max Deserves A Second Likelihood – SlashFilm – The Imperial Wire Insider

Hollywood cannot cease, will not cease making “Robin Hood” motion pictures. The 2010s alone gave us not one however two big-budget prequel movies concerning the legendary English outlaw, each of that are merely titled, effectively, “Robin Hood.” Of the pair, nonetheless, “Robin Hood” (2018) is much extra consistent with what you’d anticipate from this period of tentpole cinema: It is a gritty historic journey film (within the Christopher Nolan mode) the place everyone seems to be horny, the villain is performed by Ben Mendelsohn (he is the Sheriff of Nottingham, to be actual), and it ends on a observe blatantly teeing up a sequel that by no means got here to move.

Nonetheless, that specific “Robin Hood” has its charms, and so does “Robin Hood” (2010), itself directed by none aside from Sir Ridley Scott. However the place the previous is clearly angling to make the Robin Hood mythology extra interesting to youthful viewers, Scott’s movie is an deliberately downbeat and unromanticized affair. In his and co-writer Brian Helgeland’s model of this story, for instance, Robin (Russell Crowe) is already middle-aged and roundly disillusioned after years of warring within the muck and dirt as an archer serving King Richard the Lionheart (Danny Huston). Scott’s interval motion epic can also be staunchly anti-Crusades, which should not come as a shock for many who’ve seen his director’s reduce of “Kingdom of Heaven.”

It isn’t simply Robin; all of the famed heroes of Sherwood Forest are older, extra drained, and grimier right here, together with Marian (as portrayed by Cate Blanchett). Positive sufficient, Scott’s “Robin Hood: The Bummer Model” did not gentle the field workplace on fireplace, both, although that was primarily resulting from its way-too-high finances. That being stated, it is charting on HBO Max stateside proper now (by way of FlixPatrol), and for honest motive: It is the type of flop that is value testing on streaming.

Look, I get that twenty first century Ridley Scott movies aren’t simple sells. They’re lengthy, sluggish, and shot with filters that make all the things look steely and stone-cold. However the director has additionally gotten extra irreverent and subversive with time. His days of making an attempt to redeem Christopher Columbus (a factor he really did) are lengthy behind him, and his revisionist strategy fits this model of “Robin Hood,” a film that is all about bringing the titular swashbuckler and his adventures right down to earth.

Not all the things works in Scott’s “Robin Hood,” clearly. Mark Sturdy as Godfrey, an English knight who’s secretly conspiring in opposition to England with the French monarchy, was fairly uninspired villain casting even again in 2010, and the movie might’ve benefitted from some tightening. All the identical, Oscar Isaac (who was mainly an unknown when he made this film) is spot-on because the sneering, lecherous Prince John, and Matthew Macfadyen is equally as much as snuff because the buffoonish and vile Sheriff of Nottingham. Equally, you possibly can’t miss with Cate Blanchett, and also you simply know that Scott’s going to ship the products as soon as the arrows begin flying and the swords start clanging within the large fight sequences.

That motion price a fairly penny, too. Scott’s “Robin Hood” sported a $200 million finances (not together with advertising bills) and solely managed to herald $322 million in theaters, as neither critics nor common audiences had been that enthused by it. Nonetheless, those that favor their Russell Crowe/Ridley Scott joints to be stoic, thunderous, and skeptical in the direction of the tales we inform about historical past would do effectively to stream it whereas it is on HBO Max.

And, sure, unhappy outdated Robin Hood himself will return (simply not in “Avengers: Doomsday”).