I’m going to be completely honest with you. The first 40 minutes of this movie are some of the most brutal and violent moments I’ve seen on a movie screen this year. And that says a lot because this movie year has been filled with a lot of violent films. The violence in this film is not framed as like you might find in the low rent Tarantino knock off. It is endemic to the times and the character that we are seeing presented on the screen, it is not stylized or elegant, it is graceless and unpleasant to watch.

Robin Hood is a character that I have followed since I first saw the Errol Flynn movie back in the 1970s. There are several versions of the legend that have come about in the meantime and almost all of them have been faithful to the idea that Robin Hood is largely a heroic figure who sometimes acts in ways that are unconventional and maybe even not very praiseworthy. None of those other films however have come out and tried to reinvent Robin Hood as an amoral murderer who’s happy to Slit your throat over a few tuppence.

Hugh Jackman is a producer on this film and I’m sure he had a big part in getting it made and choosing to play the lead, I’m just not exactly sure why he would choose to do so. I sound pretty down on the film and in large part that’s accurate. In the long run there is some merit to the take that is being presented here. The era in which Robin Hood was supposed to have lived probably was a brutal one, principles are not always followed closely and people would make up their own rules as it was convenient for them. There’s an attempt to make this a Redemptive Arc but it doesn’t really go very far and I found the resolution less than satisfying. 

If you’re looking for a movie with a grim vision of the world, and a hero that you want to sympathize with but can’t then this is the movie for you. It’s competently put together, and very well made by a director that I have admired in the past, but I would warn you away from this, if you have any doubts about these kinds of reimagining, because this one was completely unnecessary and largely unpleasant.