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First Images of Beowulf...


BLUMENKOHL

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First Impressions: After a triple take, I went "What the hell? I thought this was going to be a cartoon."

Now if the animation holds up to say Davy Jones caliber (and not Zombie Monster House/The Polar Express)....this is gonna be a kick-ass movie, if nothing for the amazing visuals, since Zemeckis hasn't really made anything less than tolerable.

[Edit] Update The Trailer was just put up.

http://www.apple.com/trailers/paramount/beowulf/

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hmm... not sure what to think of it... so much of film is digital already... why not do the whole film that way? lol

But at the same time, the story seems to dark to be done in the style of ...Shrek... I'd really have to see how they do it first... becuase being computer generated like this...I can't think of any serious... or dark films that are like this...

Not sure if it works entirely in this medium... it's sorta like having a Saw III coloring book... lol

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I'm intrigued. Looks pretty interesting and it could also provide us with a great epic score from Silvestri, who has sort of vanished off the radar lately. The Angelina Jolie model was very close to the real thing, but with a glossy fantasy sheen to it - an attractive effect.

Count me in.

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I agree, I think it should have been either or. Amazing looking animation (mo-cap), or doing it for real. It seems pretty dumb to me to put in all the work into something that looks like the God of War games.

Still, I am looking forward to it. Fantastic cast. Scored by Silvestri. Co-written by Neil Gaiman. Doesn't sound like it could possibly be bad.

Morlock- who can't wait for Crispin Golver's glorious return to thw world of A list films!

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How have you all lost faith in Silvestri? He played his main theme from Beowulf at a concert recently and it was just superb. It went online a few days after the concert, if anyone has a link? Seriously, very whimsical, bombastic score we have to look forward to from this guy.

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Beowulf looks really ambitious and promising to me :) !

Making a seemingly "adult" animation based on a tale not so well-known is a daring move for a studio-financed movie.

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Don't get me wrong... I know Beowulf quite well personnally, having read a lot about it because of my passion for Tolkien.

I was just saying that it is a dificult and complex tale, and has hence acquired less fame than Grimm Brothers tales for example (unfortunately, might I add). [edited]

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Don't get me wrong... I know Beowulf quite well personnally, having read a lot about it because of my passion for Tolkien.

I was just saying that it is a dificult and complex tale, and has hence acquired less fame than other Grimm Brothers tales (unfortunately, might I add).

But Beowulf wasn´t written by the Brothers Grimm.

Unless that's not what you mean?

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the second pic looks next gen Videogame CGI cutscene...but the 1st one looks real enough. Great skin ilumination :)

But after seeing the trailer, yes its CGI. Seems great on stills, but in action its still cgi.

Well that angelina jolie is better than any cutscene in the Tomb Rasider videogames...

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Really... i dont see the point in having real actor playing CGI ones.

Filming them in bluescreen is easier and cheaper... and equally frustating for the actors anyway...

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Filming them in bluescreen is easier and cheaper...

I sincerely doubt it is.

It may not be easier or cheaper, but it is a hell of a lot more effective.

"300" kicked my ass from here to next Tuesday and they only had to render the backgrounds for that film. Plus I wasn't distracted the whole time with analyzing every little facial feature, or judging how realistic the motion capture performance was, as I usually am with Zemekis' use of CGI.

But...I do think this technology will get better in the future, though i'm still not sold on the performance-capturing aspect of it yet.

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Filming them in bluescreen is easier and cheaper...

I sincerely doubt it is.

Making CGI models and animating them is $$$

With bluescreen you can 'waste' that money making great landscapes (where this movie seems to fail)

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Looks good to me. I'm not sure how those visuals will hold up for a full movie, though.

I hope it's at least somewhat dark and not Shrek. We've had enough of those fantasy parodies.

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The comments about the animation and motion capture procedure that people made in this thread really only shows their lack of knowledge on the subject. As soon as an ambitious cgi production goes underway for something that is not a kiddie movie for a change, everyone suddenly becomes an expert in cgi animation or effects work.

What was done here with Beowulf actually hasn't been done in feature film animation before. The only thing that comes close are short movies from independent 3-D artists or students. We have a great, serious and dramatic piece of historical literature turned into a movie with the help of technology.

People talk about CGI images as if it was easy to achieve a convincing look for them over the course of a whole movie when you have to beat reality as reference in every frame. From a professional point of view, there is so much in these few trailer scenes that makes them look great and will raise the bar for annyone trying to achieve a good cgi picture. Everything regarding physics and interactions like the water, the fire or the characters movement looks damn convincing. Just look at that moment when beowulf goes through the water and how his beard and hair is wet. It does not just look like some mapping that was made to look reflective and wet, it actually looks like there is water on the hair and that look alone must have been a real challenge.

People ask why doing motion capture animation of these things when you can do them real. Apart from the obvious advantages that this technology brings (if you were to shoot this movie in real, you would likely end up with a budget twice or even trice as high especially with such a prestigious cast) I don't really see the point of that question. Why did Walt Disney create feature length animation? Why did Harryhausen invent stop motion? Why making movies in the first place?

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That's a rubbish statement. Harryhausen had his main characters played by real actors, show white looked like snow white, not the actress who did her voice.

I'n this trailer I see CGI Antony Hopkins looking just like Anthony Hopkins, but less real, the same with Jolie.

What's the point?

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That's like comparing apples with credit cards.

Which you need to buy an apple.

sorry, couldn't resist.

I saw the trailer. While I did not like Polar Express (couldn't even finish the whole movie), I feel as though I'll kinda enjoy this one.

Hated the book though.

But that could just be from my distaste of my English teacher who made us read it in HS.... twice

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That's a rubbish statement. Harryhausen had his main characters played by real actors, show white looked like snow white, not the actress who did her voice.

I'n this trailer I see CGI Antony Hopkins looking just like Anthony Hopkins, but less real, the same with Jolie.

What's the point?

The point is that all of these people used technology to push filmmaking many steps forward. With Mo-cap it is exactly the same.

You have great actors doing the pure essence of the performance in a minimalistic environment. It's cost effective because you don't have to go through a lengthy process of animation for any of the characters and you dont have to cope with location shooting or having cost intensive film rolls or all that stuff that drives the budget these days. Every movement is already there, done by world class actors and it just needs to be put in context with the environment. It's much more direct than having an animator (a person who often does not know much about acting, which is why most performances in these kiddie films feel like planned routines by now) hand animating a performance.

At the same time, you are 100% free in what you are doing. No restrictions whatsoever. There are no public laws that will forbid you to shoot that helicopter shot. You just create your environment and have the angles however you want them to be. The possibilities are unlimited, yet the budget will always be the same!

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The comments about the animation and motion capture procedure that people made in this thread really only shows their lack of knowledge on the subject. As soon as an ambitious cgi production goes underway for something that is not a kiddie movie for a change, everyone suddenly becomes an expert in cgi animation or effects work.

What was done here with Beowulf actually hasn't been done in feature film animation before. The only thing that comes close are short movies from independent 3-D artists or students. We have a great, serious and dramatic piece of historical literature turned into a movie with the help of technology.

People talk about CGI images as if it was easy to achieve a convincing look for them over the course of a whole movie when you have to beat reality as reference in every frame. From a professional point of view, there is so much in these few trailer scenes that makes them look great and will raise the bar for annyone trying to achieve a good cgi picture. Everything regarding physics and interactions like the water, the fire or the characters movement looks damn convincing. Just look at that moment when beowulf goes through the water and how his beard and hair is wet. It does not just look like some mapping that was made to look reflective and wet, it actually looks like there is water on the hair and that look alone must have been a real challenge.

People ask why doing motion capture animation of these things when you can do them real. Apart from the obvious advantages that this technology brings (if you were to shoot this movie in real, you would likely end up with a budget twice or even trice as high especially with such a prestigious cast) I don't really see the point of that question. Why did Walt Disney create feature length animation? Why did Harryhausen invent stop motion? Why making movies in the first place?

I gotta agree with BigMac here... and I too don't know why so many here start nit picking on something like this when it's made.

To me personally I think the animation looks fine and to me looks convincing.

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Don't get me wrong... I know Beowulf quite well personnally, having read a lot about it because of my passion for Tolkien.

I was just saying that it is a dificult and complex tale, and has hence acquired less fame than other Grimm Brothers tales (unfortunately, might I add).

But Beowulf wasn´t written by the Brothers Grimm.

Unless that's not what you mean?

Lol sorry, I didn't express myself correctly. I meant that Beowulf has acquired less fame than many Grimm Brothers tales. Which is a pity.

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300 was one baaaad movie.

On the contrary, 300 was a superb movie, just not a very accurate.

It's entertainment, even art. Though history is "right out".

It was a bad movie, aside from it's inaccuracies. It might have been entertaining if made better, and to call it art is either a veeeeery wide definition of art, or an insult to art.

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I thought 300 was awesome...

I agree. It was never supposed to be a historical reconstitution, simply a fun and stylized war movie... Aesthetically, it surpasses anything ever done in its category (Sky Captain, Sin City...)

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I don't think it begins to scratch the heels of Sin City aesthetically, but that's not what is so bad about it. It is a badly directed movie, and that permeates every single aspect of the film. The film has one terrific performance, by Gerard Butler. It has some good shots, to be sure. But I found it insulting that someone expected me to like such a terribly made film, and a rather deplorable one at that.

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I didn't care for 300 at all, but Beowulf looks pretty intruiging. It has Zemeckis and Silvestri, so I'll definitely check it out. It's supposed to be released as a 3D IMAX movie, isn't it?

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It will be released in imax 3d and regular cinemas. There is still some uncertainty about the rating as reported in comingsoon.net's beowulf comic-con sumary:

What's odd is that when we got to the screening, someone from Paramount was saying that the movie was going to be a hard R and the blood and partial nudity we saw seemed to confirm that, but Avary and Gaiman seemed to think they would be going for a PG-13, and that what we were shown might not be the final cut if they have any problems with the MPAA.

The internet trailer implies something along the lines of pg-13 though. I hated that rock music at the end. Where is that great score I heard during the silvestri concert? They are aiming the marketing of this thing at teenagers which i think is a bad move from the executives because that film was never made for that target audience in the first place. It will just shy away potential older audience.

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I pretty much agree with Steef on this one. What's the point of doing CGI characters that look exactly like the actors, only faker-loking?

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Well, if that's how you look at it, then it is pretty stupid. I concider the mo-cap thing more as animated movies. Everything, including the characters, costumes, set, ect, is animated. It's just that the performances are real performances, more than just voice acting.

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It's too distracting in my book. In POTC, Davy Jones has some of Nighy's features, but it sill is totally independent character lookwise. In this case, the CGI adds nothing to the original performance.

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