Last evening the other DrC and I watched the Ridley Scott film Robin Hood starring Russell Crowe and Cate Blanchett. This film is a prequel, it explains how and why King John came to declare Robin an outlaw and how Robin and the Sheriff of Nottingham became mortal enemies. We enjoyed it.
The story of Robin begins with him as an archer in King Richard Lionheart's crusader army, and no royal favorite either. Fighting their way home across France, Richard is killed and Robin decides to adopt the identity of a knight killed in an ambush while taking the news of Richard's death home to England.
Like most Ridley Scott work this long film really emphasizes set decoration. To create a suitably grubby pre-gunpowder England with mud, filth, and animal droppings everywhere is no easy task but Scott's elves got it done. Except on state occasions costumes were far from glamorous or even clean.
Crowe seems to have as much fun with the Robin part as he had with being a disgraced Roman general in Ridley Scott's Gladiator, another 2.5 hour film in costume. Blanchett is no beauty, an asset in this film where the only semi-beauty is the king's mistress, As Ridley portrays 1100s England, there were dang few pretty people about.
