Normally I loathe CGI, but here, it's necessary. And it works - well.

Here's my breakdown:

STORY: As I understand it, the story was originally just a poem, but it was filled out nicely.

Warrior stories are endless, but this has a plot twist I've not seen or read before, and it's pivotal for the story.

I could have done without Jolie and the copious amount of lust, but men like their stories of war and women. Oy ...

ACTING: This includes the "acting" of Anthony Hopkins, a brilliant British actor who I've followed since his earlier years.

Otherwise I thought the characters were decent, though their development is not the emphasis.

ENTERTAINMENT: Moderate to high value, but as always, it depends on your tastes

TEMPO: Quite good, though it must have crazed blood and carnage to satiate the lusts of men

CINEMATOGRAPHY: For a CGI film I was very impressed. What's intriguing is how difficult it is to "draw" the human mouth while speaking.

There are so many muscles in the face, jaw, and tongue so those subtleties are lost, but an excellent attempt.

MUSIC / SOUND: A beautiful song "Hero comes home" but otherwise far too much "epic" music

DIRECTING / WRITING: Director: Zemeckis has a very impressive resume, and this reinforces his ability to handle a wide variety of genre.

I've seen many of his films, and nearly all have left strong impressions.

Writers: While I thought this story was reasonably well done, the combined works of the two screenplay writers is flat or filled with TV waste.

Is it a good film? Yes

Should you watch this once? Yes

Rating: 7.5.

I have read Beowulf a couple of times. It's great northern European mythology, and mandatory reading when you are young in my opinion (Along with Norse, Greek and Roman Mythology as well). And though the movie wants to re-write some of the epic, you will need to separate the Hollywood version from the beautiful measure of the original works. Being a work of CGI, you will also have to allow for the flaws of pure CGI work. Very stylized and beautifully colored, it is an epic adventure that elevated Zemeckis' previous work "The Polar Express" to a new level. Polar was beautifully modeled after Chris Van Allsburg illustrations for his book, but Zemeckis' adaptation to the story went a little over the top when it became a musical. Even though most of Beowulf's story line is answered here, it did make me pause and wonder:

Why didn't Robert Zemeckis just direct this thing in real life instead of virtual?

With the capabilities of dropping in CGI into real life action, this telling of the story could have had so much more of an impact if the expressions were more poignant. Look what he did with "Who Framed Roger Rabbit?"? Zemeckis is fully capable of it. Also, to add to this, when you have CGI characters like Jacksons Gollum and King Kong to compare notes with, the modeling here just isn't up to snuff. I felt the entire movie came off like a gigantic "cut-scene" to a video game than a full featured animated project. I can only give this a little better than a good, hence the exclamation. I do this sadly. You really should see this in a theater, bigger than life. The dragon is excellent, the ugly v/s the beautiful is wild, the sequencing is uneven, though at the end it takes you on a great ride. Oh, and for you people that want to go see Angela Jolie nekkid? IT'S CGI!!! I've seen harder stuff on Fox networks! Seeing my wife and I saw this as a matinée, the crowd was on the sparse side and there was literally no kids present. I couldn't get a solid feeling from the audience though most people as they left seemed genuinely happy with their experience. I'm sure it was PG13'd because of the sequences with Angela, otherwise it would be a solid PG. I wouldn't suggest this for a kid under 8.

Take a thousand year old heroic subject matter, spice it up with a dose of „modern" morals such as „men's only weakness is women" , add a few females according to type – e.g. saints and whores – and shoot this script as a CGI-mix of „Shrek", „300" and popular computer-games: The result is Robert Zemecki's version of „Beowulf". Works alright, the flick, as long as you don't take it seriously. However, whenever the „Shrek"-Elements dominate the scene, the film runs into problems. Queen Wealtheow for instance fatally resembles the green Oger's mom. Besides, almost all Characters have a squint that would make Christopher Lambert at his best look good. Wet hair is still a problem of computer-graphics, too. Otherwise, the film is technically well made and gives you an idea how far Ralph Bakshi might have gone with his concept of graphically alienated live-action.

Still, over long stretches the motion-capture-technique is too reminiscent of computer-games to be convincing, and thus one is left with the question which audience this film is aimed at. Gaming kiddies can't watch it because all the ripping and tearing is far too bloody; adult Lord-of-the-Rings-fans will miss the depth of the original poem, despite some nice touches in the script – such as King Hrothgar talking of „Scops" or giving out rings to his thanes in the initial sequence, or Grendel and his mother seeming to talk Anglo-Saxonish. The linguistic climax of the movie is elsewhere, anyway: King Hrothgar, embodied (well, sort of) by Anthony Hopkins, telling his followers that Beowulf „killed the monster and laid his mother... in her grave". How do you translate that for synchronized versions? This sequence gets to the heart of the difference of plot between the script and the heroic poem, i.e. the introduction of the eternal female temptation as motif for the hero's curse. Not a bad idea, really, especially in view of the traditional sword-penis-symbolism that is being exploited thoroughly in this film. Unfortunately, the way they put the idea on screen is cheesy to say the least. Thus Angelina Jolie's computerized curves seem designed to lure the average movie-goer, male, mid-twenties, meager intellect (is that according to statistics?). The hero Beowulf (one can't speak of actors or characters in this film) is modeled on the Gladiator but lacks his character; the monster is a crossbreed of Ent and skinned Gollum; the jokes are laconic (example: "How is your father? – Dead."). Amusing – and once in a while appealing in a darkly beautiful manner, especially when a whiff of northern Epic or landscape transcends the CGI. In these moments one gets an inkling of what might have been done with this script. Even the final fight with the dragon is impressive. But why does the dragon have a heart, small as a cow's? Why does the coast-guard sit in front of his fire in the pouring rain? And why does the final, unbearably long shot have to be so unbearably kitsch? Shame, really. You can either have grim realism, or you can have exaggerated, bad-taste fantasy. Try to amalgamate both, and the thing falls apart.