page_title: Beowulf (2007 film)
section_title: Themes
hierarchical_section_title: Beowulf (2007 film) / Themes
caption_attribution_description: English: Photographic portrait of Sigmund Freud, signed by the sitter ("Prof. Sigmund Freud")
context_page_description: Beowulf is a 2007 3D computer-animated fantasy action film directed and co-produced by Robert Zemeckis, written by Neil Gaiman and Roger Avary and based on the Old English epic poem of the same name. Starring the voices of Ray Winstone, Anthony Hopkins, Robin Wright, Brendan Gleeson, John Malkovich, Crispin Glover, Alison Lohman and Angelina Jolie, the film features human characters animated using live action motion capture animation, which was previously used in The Polar Express and Monster House.
  Produced by Zemeckis' ImageMovers and Shangri-La Entertainment, the film premiered at Westwood, Los Angeles on November 5, 2007 and was released theatrically in the United States on November 16, 2007 by Paramount Pictures, with Warner Bros. Pictures handling international distribution. The film received moderately positive reviews from critics, who complimented the visual effects, motion capture and voice acting whilst criticising aspects of the interpretation of the poem. The film was a commercial disappointment, having earned only $196.4 million on a $150 million budget.
context_section_description: The film has been acknowledged to draw extensively from the philosophy of Freud, Kristeva, Lacan and Jung, as well as Žižek. In particular, the portrayal of Grendel and his kin appeals to multiple forms of sexual unease, among them the castration anxiety, the monstrous feminine and the challenging of traditional gender roles. According to Nickolas Haydock, the film reflects the "American obsession with sex as the root of all evils," to the extent to compare Beowulf's and Hrothgar's portrayals to Bill Clinton and the history of sexual misconduct that caused his political decline. Nadine Farghaly also argues the story makes the point that unbridled desire only causes ruin.
  Grendel's mother is represented in the film as a castrating, monstrous female who threatens masculinity. While Beowulf embodies phallic power through his physical strength, recurrent nudity and usage of a sword, all those prove useless against her, as she symbolically emasculates him by subsuming his phallus into the feminine power. This is metaphorized by Beowulf being seduced in her womb-like cave, where his sword strike magically fails at harming her body. After copulating with Grendel's mother, both Hrothgar and Beowulf find themselves unable to maintain fulfilling sexual relationships with Wealthow or other women, becoming aged, bitter and even feminized in their impotency. In turn, Grendel's mother remains immortal and young, and through her offspring she proves capable to wield herself the robbed phallus. Grendel and the dragon act as extensions of her will, "mindless embodiments of feminine aggressiveness" who represent their fathers' emasculation and loss of patriarchal power.
  Later Beowulf claims to have vanquished the mother, having supposedly rendered dead with his sword in her cave, but the falsity of this only translates as a wishful, pretended triumph of the male over the female. His defeat to her, as well as his bargain for prestige and glory, transmits that male power "not only comes from the feminine, but remains eternally subject to it." However, authors have noted that he ultimately breaks the Oedipian triangle caused by his destructive son, as he manages to kill the dragon and seemingly thwart the cycle at the cost of his life. This has been interpreted as a last exaltation of masculinity, electing to die in self-sacrifice rather than living in his impotent, feminized state. He refers to himself as already "dead long time ago" in a previous scene. The film still underline the irresistibility of female power, as even Wiglaf, who had been shown to be abstinent from lust in contrast to his partners, is hinted to be similarly seduced by Grendel's mother.
  The film contrasts those points to the original poem, using the "postmodern techniques of metatextuality and deconstruction". Whereas in the poem the heroic values of ancient warrior culture is reaffirmed, in the film it is shown to be in decline, even explicitly failing along with Beowulf. In the film, the character laments the old, heroic pagan religion is being replaced by Christianity, "leaving humankind with nothing but weeping martyrs, fear, and shame." In the poem Beowulf slays Grendel's mother and defeats her challenge on gender roles, but her film version is victorious over him, also using seduction instead of strength, which updates the ways in which the story views female power. The gold covering her skin and the Faustian bargain she offers embody similar modern views on the relationship between wealth and sex, particularly societal compulsions to enjoy them at the fullest, "not prohibited but demanded, which becomes a postmodern variation of Freud's death wish."
  However, the main difference from the poem is portraying Beowulf as a flawed hero destroyed by his own negative qualities, like lust for power and unchecked male desire, which raises questions about the morality underlying heroism. Despite the superficial characterization of the Water Demons as Others, the film blurs the line between heroes and monsters, as Grendel can talk, and the dragon's human form resembles Beowu
caption: Sigmund Freud.
exif: {"Image ImageWidth": "1647", "Image ImageLength": "2240", "Image BitsPerSample": "[8, 8, 8, 8]", "Image PhotometricInterpretation": "1", "Image Orientation": "Horizontal (normal)", "Image SamplesPerPixel": "4", "Image XResolution": "72", "Image YResolution": "72", "Image ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Image Software": "Adobe Photoshop CC 2017 (Windows)", "Image DateTime": "2021:06:20 22:15:25", "Image ExifOffset": "236", "Thumbnail Compression": "JPEG (old-style)", "Thumbnail XResolution": "72", "Thumbnail YResolution": "72", "Thumbnail ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormat": "386", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormatLength": "4275", "EXIF ExifVersion": "0221", "EXIF ColorSpace": "Uncalibrated", "EXIF ExifImageWidth": "1647", "EXIF ExifImageLength": "2240"}