Beowulf, directed by Robert Zemeckis and published in 2007 is a computer animated film. It was written by Neil Gaiman and Roger Avary. The author in created Beowulf the epic to entertain and to teach as well. Heroism is the main purpose. In this epic they made this male character, Beowulf as a hero. The females were nothing compared to him. Society in this era believed only a male would live up to those standards. Why couldn’t this hero be a female?
Feminism: the theory of the political, economic, and social equality of the sexes (Merriam-Webster). According to the scholarly article by Benjamin Mangrum it states that people at war tend to feminism their enemies to make them feel bad about themselves. “Soldiers find pleasure in feminizing the enemy, sexualizing the images and actions of battle, and thus couching their entire enterprise as an attempt to find pleasure in violating the feminine.” In Beowulf that’s what had been going on they make them feel like they are not man enough to defeat their enemies. In the film the men belittle the women and make them seem powerless.
The main idea in the Beowulf film is that Beowulf is fighting Grendel, he tears his arms, Grendel dies and his mother is wanting to get revenge. She goes to look for the person responsible for her son’s death. She runs to hide in a cave and Beowulf and his men go look for her, when they encounter each other they fight and Beowulf tries to stab her with his sword, he fails, he lets go of the swords and fights her with his hands. In the epic poem Grendel’s mother dies and in the film she lived. The difference between the the poem and the film was also that the way they set Beowulf’s funeral. In the film Beowulf has more imperfections than in the epic poem.
In the movie they made the Beowulf more humble, with some flaws, not completely perfect as they made him seem in book. The men are easily noticeably other the women only come out of wife’s to these important men. In the book there’s the mother that was seeking revenge, and there was the type of women in the film who lures the men.
Grendel’s mother is a siren and she lures Beowulf. (01:00:07-01:02:10) In the book Beowulf was not easily for him to fall for a women, she was seeking revenge for her son that Beowulf killed by decapitating. Than in the movie Grendel’s mother
Dragon dies by Beowulf ripping his heart out, Dragon falls of the cliff, and washes away. (01:35:10-01:37:34)
Beowulf takes Grendel’s arm. (00:42:00-00:42:43)
Works Cited
- “Feminism.” Merriam-Webster.com Merriam-Webster, n. d. Web. 27 Nov. 2018.
