Customer Reviews

Robin and Marian

5 star:		(13)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

I only wish I had bought it sooner!

Seeing as I didn't know much about Robin Hood, regrettably, I was a little afraid that this movie would confuse me. I was really impressed that it didn't, the directing style was amazing, and the acting was just superb for everyone involved, especially Audrey Hepburn and Sean Connery.

This movie was just great! It was interesting, and the love scenes with Audrey and Sean were so sweet. Not to mention the musical score!

This movie just goes to show that even if you aren't familiar with Robin Hood, you can still enjoy this movie!

This movie is an undiscovered gem. It is not only a beautiful love story, but it is also attempts to present a realistic picture of the age of the Crusades.

The acting is wonderful. The scenery is gorgeous. The audience is treated with respect. The writing is wonderful. You can stop reading now, as this should be enough to make you buy the movie.

Two additional points: the movie contains the best once sentence describtion of the middle age mind set: "he was my king" and watch this movie and you will get Eddie Izzard's joke in his HBO stand up routine.

This movie isn't so much a sequel to The Adventures of Robin Hood as it is to The Lion in Winter. James Goldman wrote the scripts for both and he seems to have a fetish for the Plantagenets. This movie opens with Robin and Little John in the service of a very mad Richard the Lionhearted (wonderfully played by the late Richard Harris). They make their way back to Sherwood to find that Maid Marian has become a nun. (A little tip: if, in a British legend, your girlfriend becomes a nun, you just know it is going to end badly.) The only person who seems truly happy to see Robin again after twenty years is the Sheriff of Nottingham (Robert Shaw). Watching him fight Sean Connery again, I felt as if this might also be a sequel to From Russia With Love!

The movie is a very good bittersweet romance between famous lovers in their later years. It is not on the same level as The Lion in Winter, but then, how few things are. Watching it, I was reminded how wonderful it is to see Connery act in a real role - instead of mouthing the inanities they give him now ("Welcome to the Rock!").

It is a very good period piece, made the way the used to make them. For any Sean Connery fan, it is a must.

In this version of the Robin Hood myth, an aged Robin and Little John played wonderfully by Nicol Williamson return to Sherwood and Nottingham after the death of Richard Lion Heart whom they followed on the Crusades. Upon their arrival, they encounter Tuck and Scarlett, forcibly recruit Marion who's now the Abbotess of a nunnery, and in doing so, re-initiate hostilities with the Sheriff of Nottingham. I can't blame anyone for being disappointed in this film; you hear the name Robin Hood and you automatically expect feats of Zen archery and balletic sword duels between Robin and The Sherriff of N. But while not as dynamic as other Robin Hood films, Robin and Marion is not as facile as those films either. This film is about people; it's not supposed to serve as a visual roller coaster. If you prefer comic books to literature, by all means stick with the Errol Flynn version, because Robin and Marion, while it may not be a great work, is still a good piece of literature. It's about being human and being alive, to which, in this film, the fighting is secondary. And while the fight between Robert Shaw and Sean Connery did look arthritic and clumsy, it was also a lot closer to a real fight than Flynn's bladed flashdance with Basil Rathbone (sp?) ever was.

Very raw. Not your typical Hollywood production. These two are no longer spring chickens either. More of the reality of an old love than the frills. Audrey Hepburn only gets better with age, and the butt shot of Sean Connery was an unexpected, funny bonus. This isn't a film I would purchase and watch over and over, but I enjoyed it. I give it 3 1/2 stars.

This gorgeous film features an outstanding score, perfect casting, an unbeatable story, and as a bonus it has the most authentic "feel." I am a longtime scholar of all things Robin Hood and while the storyline strays a bit from tradition, the essence of the original has never been more beautifully or poignantly portrayed. This is a film for anyone who has ever been charmed or moved by the old legend... and for anyone who has ever dreamed.

When we surf over to the hundreds of reviews for the Matrix and Lord of the Rings, here lurks a more beautiful and heroic story. Connery was never better then in the mid 1970's, always robust but distilled with a dogged patina by life being lived. And Mrs Hepburn adds such gracefull depth. I feel better whenever I think about this film, and though Connery is the biggest reason to see it, the feel of the story is so welcome when one is tired of special effects and gratuitous sex. Its very British, in a gallant, piquant, wisely variegated way.

I liked this movie when it was first released, which answers my sons' challenge that I like Robin Hood as a middle-aged guy because I AM a middle-aged guy. It is everything that a good movie should be. It is well written, well cast and acted, and it holds up as a good story and a good film many years after its theatrical release.I have always thought that Sean Connery was a cocky kid and a not-so-good actor in the James Bond movies, but became profoundly good later in life in "The Rock" and "The Untouchables", and that same developed talent comes through here. He IS the middle aged Robin, a perfectly realized role, as is Audrey Hepburn as Marian. The plot follows Robin's return to England after the death of King Richard in the Crusades. King John (Boo!) is in power and the Sheriff of Nottingham (Robert Shaw)is up to his old larcenous tricks. But now they are "old guys" and their efforts to fuss with each other as in days of yore are sometimes funny and sometimes sad. But the movie is an excellent addition to any DVD library. Technically, the picture has been remastered to modern standards, and if the sound is not DTS, it is acceptable. Good job, but where is the outastanding "Adventures of Robin Hood" with Errol Flynn?? It's long overdue in DVD format.

Okay, first a bit of DVD speak. The special features advertised on the box include sound in English (and only English). I didn't know that sound in movies had been a special feature at any point since the 1930s. Oh well.. as with most scaled down DVDs, it advertises the standard menus, scene access and trailers as being special features. No matter. The film is a very nice transfer, and the movie itself is pretty special.

The script is by James Goldman, who also wrote the medieval character piece The Lion in Winter. And if anything, the writing here is even sharper than his early film.

Many people have noticed the 1970s Vietnam era feel. And it's true that Robin as a returning crusader certainly taped into the mood of the decade the film was made. But it's more than that. Most Robin Hood films end with Robin being pardoned by the king. And this happens in one of the earliest ballads too.

But the part of the ballad that is cut out of most movies is that Robin Hood eventually left the king's service and returned to his outlaw ways. And then he died at Kirklees Priory. And these final years of Robin also appear in many of the children's novels. This movie -- like very few other filmed versions of the legend -- shows the end of Robin's life.

After the death of King Richard, Robin returns to Sherwood. He has a lot of regrets -- leaving England, leaving Marian, participating in senseless slaughters like Acre. So, a much older Robin seeks a second chance. In his twilight years, Robin tries to recapture the best days of his life. There's something very sad and tragic about it -- but it's also wonderfully human.

The acting in the film is first rate -- Sean Connery makes a very believable Robin. Nicol Williamson is an interesting older Little John. Screen legend Audrey Hepburn plays a very changed Marian. And finally Robert Shaw is the best sheriff of Nottingham in all the Robin Hood movies. An older, more patient, likeable man. The sheriff hasn't been promoted because "I can read and write. It makes you suspect. Not a duke in twenty can read a word. Correct, my lord?" "Books are for clerks."

As he waits for Robin to invade Nottingham, he explains "He's a little in love with death. He flirts. He teases. I can wait."

I think those quotations should give you some idea of how good the writing is and also something of the film's mood.

It is a rich and interesting character piece of people who are very human, but who also formed the basis of legend. ("They've turned us into heroes, Johnny.") It's not an action film, not swashbuckling adventure. There is some romance, but it both a mature and immature romance of older people trying to recapture lost glories.

A smart, sombre -- but also witty -- film. As others have said, it is very much underrated. When I bought this DVD, the store owner was impressed. "Now that's a cool choice," he said.

And so it was.

I have always loved this movie, and for many of the reasons already listed by other reviewers. It has a truly inspired cast, a tremendously moving ending, the chemistry between the two leads is extraordinary, and the movie presents a new and interesting take on some of the classic characters of English folklore.

What really stands out for me though is the late Robert Shaw's brilliant performance as the Sheriff of Nottingham. This is the only time I have ever seen the character portrayed on screen as anything other than a throughly contemptible villain. The Sheriff has been seen as everything from the greedy, rapacious robber baron of the old British "Robin of Sherwood" TV series, to the over-the-top, caricature of evil portrayed by Alan Rickman in "Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves". In this movie, Shaw shows us a very believable, and very human Sheriff.

He's obviously cleverer than Robin, and it's also obvious that he truly respects his old adversary. A really touching scene is when the Sheriff warns Robin not to interfere and try to rescue Marian from the fate she has chosen for herself. It's clear he doesn't at all want to be Robin's enemy again. In another scene, he actually laments the death of one of his soldiers - something no other actor's Sheriff would have done in a million years. This Sheriff is actually a rather likeable figure in his way, and if he's a bad guy, it's only because he is a creature of duty and is determined to carry out the orders of his king, even when the king is an unworthy master.

It's fascinating to see such a human portrayal of the Sheriff, to match the realistic human portrayals all the other actors bring to their characters. This is really one of the most underrated pictures out there. I highly recommend it.