The Beowulf book and movie were both made differently. There is always an argument of which was better: the book, or the movie. Some people feel as if the movie didn’t include crucial parts from the book and that the differences between them ruined the film. Sometimes the movie makers were able to keep those big changes at bay and stay on track with the novel. Though, no matter how hard they work to keep the changes contained, the book lovers will always stand on the side of the book, and the people who loved the movie better won’t cross the thick line between author and producer because the changes were much too big to become accustomed to. If you read the book, you’d be able to point out every one of them, as countless as they are. Some …show more content…
In Beowulf, it was the biggest area of the differences. Grendel and his mother changed. Instead of being the typical green, chubby monster, Grendel was pale and as skinny as his bones. Instead of His mother being ugly and black, she was gold and beautiful. Even Unferth changed, the drunk, insane one with a boil on his neck. Caught between good and evil, he never got the chance to feel the joy others got to touch before he was killed by Grendel’s mother. Unferth didn’t die in the movie, and was better-looking to the eye. Beowulf, short and kind in words, was tall and intimidating in the movie. He fought better when he was naked and fell in love with - and cheated on - Wealtheow, Hrothgar’s wife. Hrothgar was the king of the land of the Danes. He was young and had red hair in the book, but was old enough to be Wealtheow’s father in the movie. He was drunk in the opening and appeared to be drinking all the time with his clumsiness and the way he treated Wealtheow. But the biggest change made to the characters was that Hrothgar killed himself when he discovered Beowulf slept with Grendel’s mother, who later gave birth to the firedrake, Beowulf’s son. Hrothgar didn’t die in the book, nor did Beowulf sleep with Grendel’s mother. It pushed the movie in the opposite direction, giving it twists and bumps that weren’t thought of when the author wrote …show more content…
Not in Beowulf. The movie surprised everyone by opening with hall Heorot, a place built by Hrothgar to thank the soldiers for their bravery, expected to be giant and elegant, but was actually in a building that looked more like an old barn. The hall was supposed to contrast to the fen the same way light and dark do. But that didn’t happen. It didn’t in any way appear to differentiate with the fen the tremendous way it did in the book. The fen, a swamp with the lovely, depressing filter of evil casted in the sky in the book, was located more in the mountains than in front of hall Heorot. It came across as a pool of water from a fantasy novel where fairies assembled together to plan to overthrow an evil queen of some sort. It was also supposed to be across from hall Heorot, but was kilometers away from it, affecting how it contrasted with hall Heorot. It was clear the directors didn’t want to keep that small detail that affected the story as a
The plot is where the book and the movie totally differ, they have almost nothing in common. A big plot twist in the movie is when Beowulf goes to kill Grendel’s mother; first of all he did not end up killing her and lies about it. Also in the movie, it shows that Grendel’s mother is just angry about Beowulf killing her son, so she makes him stay and give her a new son by making love to her. Another big plot twist is when Hrothgar kills himself and Beowulf does not return back to his kingdom, and becomes King of Dane Land. But in the book Hrothgar lives and stays king of his land and Wiglaf takes the throne after Beowulf dies; “Take what I leave, Wiglaf, lead my people, help them; my time is
The plot of the story differs in the poem and film. The main plot has the same general idea, yet in a different sequence. In the book the main character, Beowulf sets sail to the Danes land to conquer a monster named Grendel. Also in the book Beowulf has three agons. In the movie, the character that represents Beowulf, is Buliwuf, and he goes out to conquer a race which is Wendols. In the text Beowolf defeats Grendel. Buliwyf actually defeats the Wendols on the second attack not the first, where they kill the ‘Mother.’ In both the film and poem the characters have a dragon that they must defeat which is also known as a ‘fire
In the beginning of the story the plot stays the same for the most part... other than Beowulf being motivated by other things than glory or pride. When Grendel is killed in the movie they introduce his mother, they don't show her face but they hint to her being very seductive by the way she talks. Grendel’s mom doesn't really seek revenge in the movie but Hrothgar asks Beowulf to kill her because of a prior incident (Grendel is actually Hrothgar's son) with Grendel’s mom. Beowulf obliges and goes to kill G’s mom but when he enter her den he is almost instantly taken away by her beauty, this causes Beowulf to have a lapse in judgement and impregnate G’s mom. This is very different from the book because in the book he kills G’s mom in a battle to the death then cuts the head off of Grendel’s dead body as illustrated “Armless, exactly as that fierce fighter had sent him out from Herot, then struck off His head with a single swift blow”(542). Also after Beowulf was seduced he goes back to Hrothgar and lies to him and the Danes saying that he has killed Grendel’s mother. This is the major plot difference in the movie and the book.
If we’re going to compare the book to the movie we have to make sure we’ve carefully read the book and watched the movie occasionally stopping your mind to evaluate the movie wondering what is different. I did just that, Beowulf the book compared to the movie has a variety of differences and some similarities. In my opinion the movie was better, let me tell you why.
The first example of the similarities and differences between the poem and the movie is the representation of religion. For example, both the movie and the poem of Beowulf included Christianity and Paganism. However, in the movie it was more about the Pagan religion, trying to make Christianity look bad. As an example, in one scenes of the movie, Beowulf says the Christianity killed the time of all heros. On the other hand, in the Beowulf poem, Beowulf is compared to the gods of Christianity. For example, in the passage The Battle With Grendel the scop describes “... Now he discovered- once the afflictor of
Beowulf has a good plot line so the compilation follows the actions of the characters. Beowulf has good and evil characters. There are Beowulf, Hrothgar, Wealhtheow, Scyld Scefing, the coast guard, and many more benevolent people. They all lived in the land of the Danes, except for Beowulf. Beowulf lived in the land of the Geats. The evil people are Grendel, She the monster, and Unferth. Most of the evil monsters live in the fen. “The fen was full of evil that feared the light. There were vampires and witches and ogres and worms that burned. Horses with no heads and with hands instead of hooves loomed out of the fog. … A few were bottomless, and went straight down to hell” (page 7). So the fen was full of beastly creatures. There are many battles between benevolent people and the despicable people. Most of the time good wins. Also in Beowulf: A New Telling the story takes place in two lands; one is the land of the Danes and the other is the land of the Geats. In the land of the Danes, Hrothgar, the king, built a hall which he saw in his dreams. The hall is
The tale of Beowulf follows one of history's oldest heroes as he ventures throughout Nordic Europe on a quest to kill the infamous monster Grendel, however in contrast with many of the regaled heroes of the past Beowulf remains constant in every aspect of his character. His goals, values, and actions never undergo even the slightest amount of alteration, even throughout his unusually long life, he remains static, Why? Some would argue that Beowulf’s unchanging personality could be contributed to poor penmanship by the author of the tale, or that it simply could have been lost throughout the ages of the story being retold orally, but despite all of that, it seems most likely that Beowulf was intentionally portrayed this way in order to set an example for those who would encounter his story, in all senses of the Nordic Culture that he came from, Beowulf is the Paragon of what a nord should aspire to be, his values encompassed everything their culture held dear in this world: gold, glory, the well-being of his people, and an aspiration to have his name ring out for the rest of eternity.
The lead and most important character Beowulf was told to be the hero that has no weakness or fear of anything, as told in the tale. In the poem, it states that, “Beowulf is greater and stronger than anyone else in the entire world.” In the movie, it is a very similar description too. He proves his strength after his defeat of the monster Grendel. He showed that he has no fear when he undressed himself to fight the beast, and he shows that he is so powerful when he tears off the beast’s arm to end the battle. Although there is a similar sense and feel for who Beowulf is in both the movie, and the poem, there is a major detail in the movie that is not told in the poem. In the movie, Beowulf has a very great lust for women. Not only is this
In the long story and legends of Beowulf he is shown as a heroic young man who fights with his internal desires as a person all while trying to rid people and places of monsters, because of of this people view him differently compared to others. Has it ever occured to you that people may judge or view you differently based on your actions or life conflicts? Well if that is the case then welcome to the life of Beowulf, Beowulf is an old swedish epic that depicts the life of a young prince from Geatland who travels to daneland to help rid the danes of their monster whose name is grendel. While studying the story of beowulf and the movies, book, and cantos that we all watched and read there was many differences between them all, some of the main differences that can be found are the characters and the problems that they face in each story line. Such as in the movies in one grendel is the one who cuts his arm off while in the animated version beowulf is the one who cuts his arm off in order to kill the dragon. Another difference between the movies is in the first one the only monster is grendel and his mother, while in the animated movie they show the sea monsters along with grendel his mother and the dragon all of which beowulf must
When Hollywood makes a movie that has been based off a book, there is going to be some obvious similarities but there will also be some differences that are often noticeable. Beowulf is an epic poem that had been orally told for many years up until an unknown author wrote it down around 1000 A.D. Robert Zemeckis directed the 3D epic fantasy film in 2007 that was a retelling of this epic poem. The writers take on the epic poem was interesting to watch but it did vary a lot from the poem instead of staying true to it. While there were several similarities with some of the main characters, it was evident that the writers strayed away from how the poem portrayed some characteristics that were given to them like their actions, personality, and
A major plot difference between the story and movie is Grendel's mother's curse in general. To elaborate, in the movie, Grendel is King Hrothgar's son as the effect of the curse Grendel's mother, a Water Demon, placed on Hrothgar. The basis of the curse is as follows: with the promise of becoming the greatest King, every time a warrior kills the Water Demon's son, they must deflower her and create a new son to replace the one they killed. In the movie, Beowulf ripped Grendel's arm off and later killing him. Grendel's mother retaliates by murdering Beowulf's men the next night while they are sleeping. Accordingly, Beowulf confronts her in her underwater cave. Hrothgar gives him the Dragon Cup, and Unferth gives him his sword, Hrunting. The sword is useless against the Water Demon's impenetrable skin. The Water Demon successfully seduces Beowulf into giving her the Dragon Cup, and promises to make him the greatest King. Hrothgar soon realizes what has happened, then committing suicide and leaving the crown with Beowulf. The curse is no longer a burden to Hrothgar; it was passed to Beowulf as he became king of the Danes. Conversely, in the text, Beowulf became the King of the Geats, while in the film, he was the King of Danes. This difference was most likely added to accumulate for the curse.
In the poem the dragon is a new foe that must face Beowulf to fulfill his desire to want to die a hero. Though in both the movie and poem, Beowulf does die fighting a dragon ( Dragon is like a symbol of his failure). The perspectives of the two stories were different. The poem had dealings with Christianity and the movie with Pagan type. The whole building of the Heorot was that they were wishing in a way, to give glory to God.
characters were portrayed a little differently. The film has things not explained in the book, for example, Grendel's mother is described as a monster in the poem, in the film she is looked upon as beauty that performs miracles. In the poem Grendel lives with his mother and they have an affair, in the film, Grendel's mother wants Beowulf to come back to her. In the film, Beowulf is the father of the dragon that burns down the village. Grendel’s mother is a siren, who tries to reel beowulf and Hrothgar in to keep the evil alive.
Also in the book, his corpse, after fighting the dragon, is cremated whereas in the animation he is buried in a mound of boulders. It was also noted that the animation covered significantly less details as compared to the book. In the animation Beowulf just seems to jump from one task right to another without given reason. The book however does in fact cover the small details so it makes much more sense as to why he does what he does.
Beowulf story is interpreted from two novels, Grendel by John Gardner and Eaters of the Dead by Michael Cricthon. Beowulf also came up with movie form in 2007 which is starting Angelina Jolie as Grendel’s mother. Beowulf has two main setting; Heorot, a Danish hall, Beowulf’s Kingdom. The plot begins when Beowulf heard that Heorot, the hall which is built by King Hrohtgar, attacked by a monster known as a Grendel. Beowulf and his warriors travel by sea to Heorot.