So there I was over at another carbon based being's home and there had been a recent trip to the video store. Never one to pass up an opportunity to watch a movie I ask what they are and when the watching is going to commence. Let's see what we have here...Michael Clayton, 30 Days of Night and Beowulf and the watching will commence...now!
I'd just seen Michael Clayton so they put in 30 Days first. They asked if I had seen it already (I had) and I asked if they'd ever seen the comic it's based on (they hadn't) then I made a point to say how the guy that drew it had left a comment on my blog recently (because when famous people leave comments on your blog, you fucking tell people) and we enjoyed the carnage and bloodshed and making fun of Josh Hartnett who looks like a Cro Magnon.
Next up came Beowulf. It's that motion capture animated one that was out last year. When asked if I'd seen this I said no, I avoided it because I didn't want to spend money on it. They asked why and I explained, again, my general hatred of adaptations combined with the fact that I could see that some pretty huge changes had been made to the source material just from the trailers and some shit you just shouldn't fuck with at all let alone in a big way and Beowulf is one of those things.
Now, I told you all of this to get to this bit, so pay close attention.
They then said, "What, is this a remake of some other movie or something?"
"Sorry, what?"
"This. Was it out before?"
"Uh...yeah, man. It's over a thousand years old and is one of the most famous poems in the world. It's, y'know, Beowulf."
"I never heard of it before."
"..."
"What?"
"Nothing. I...it...nothing."
So yeah, I had that conversation.
9 comments:
Wait...what???
Exactly.
Holy...crap. I even had to memorize some lines in old english for a teacher once. Not that I remember it, sadly, but still. Come on people!
Don't... know... Beowulf? Gah?
I mean, I know of plenty of people who haven't read it (okay, I haven't read it technically... I've read translations... but you get my point)... but not to have even heard of it?
What... what are you doing hanging out with these people? I'll bet you were waiting until they fell asleep so you could steal their kidneys. That's it, right? Right?
Wait.... What????
I saw the movie with my mother, which was odd, but we both liked it. Later, my mother stole my copy of Beowulf to read, so I didn't get to go back and reread it.
As is my way I have three translations of it and have it in the original language which I keep telling myself I will learn just so I can read it that way. If you haven't already, read the Seamus Heaney translation. It's beautiful. I just can't understand how someone, even someone that doesn't read much, has never even heard of it.
As for the movie, in and of itself it was OK I guess. As an adaptation it was pure ass.
Seamus Heaney's translated edition ROCKS. I've tried quoting the Saxon passages a few times just to watch people's reactions. Priceless.
"Wait, they translated this into Saxon? Why would they do that, Saxon is like Latin, a dead language... right?"
Me: "Um, yeah. Just like Le Mort D'Arthur was translated into Cornish."
"Huh? What's that?"
I take my translations how I take my game hens: Cornish.
Sorry.
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