The Death of Robin Hood Review

The Death of Robin Hood Kills the Myth to Find the Man

By: Marc Kozak

The Death of Robin Hood

The Death of Robin Hood Kills the Myth to Find the Man

By: Marc Kozak

Michael Sarnoski’s The Death of Robin Hood was always going to struggle to pique the interest of the general moviegoing populace, mostly due to the sheer amount of Robin Hood stories and movies that already exist. There isn’t a soul alive that hasn’t seen at least one of the 50+ film or television adaptations, each one playing a similar riff on the story of a heroic outlaw who robs from the rich to feed the poor. We’ve all got our favorite version – whether it be serious, comedic, or full of animated animals. And it’s not like there haven’t been any recent big-screen adaptations – it hasn’t even been that long since 2018’s Robin Hood with Taren Egerton, or even Ridley Scott’s 2010 version starring Russell Crowe. Most people are just plain Robin Hood-ed out.

Not content with this already high level of difficulty, Sarnoski almost seems to go out of his way to make his latest version a crowd repellent. This Robin Hood is grim, filthy, and bereft of charm. There is action at first, but very little of it, followed by somewhere around 90 straight minutes of somber reflection, a kind of glacially paced meditation on the many sins of a main character who is as far as one can get from being a hero. If you’re looking for a swash-buckling adventure, you’re going to be severely disappointed. If, however, you’re open to a thoughtful interrogation of the heroic myth – one that brutally inverts everything you thought you knew about the more-familiar versions of Robin Hood – you might find yourself appreciating and even downright enjoying what Sarnoski has done here. Sarnoski’s previous movies, Pig and A Quiet Place: Day One, were also relatively quiet character studies that dealt with the burdens of guilt, grief, and violent pasts, making The Death of Robin Hood a poignant conclusion of sorts to his unofficial trilogy.

The opening scenes are a shock to the system, dispelling any expectations the viewer may have had about witnessing another classical Robin Hood tale. The landscape is shrouded in darkness and fog, and the people we meet are hungry and desperate, covered in the omnipresent muck of the harsh medieval terrain. Robin Hood himself, portrayed by an ultra-grizzled Hugh Jackman, is a tired old man, out alone in the countryside with no merry men in sight. He encounters a child who knows of the legend of Robin Hood, even as Robin quickly tells the child that those legends are almost entirely bullshit. It’s not long before he’s stabbing the child through the head, kicking off one of the most spectacularly violent sequences you’ll ever see in a studio movie, with enough blood, viscera, and historically accurate costuming to make Robert Eggers proud.

" It's a sobering deconstruction of the hero myth, one that reminds viewers that the stories you hear about legends and mythic figures are usually written by the survivors. "

You can see the weariness all over Robin’s face as he gets dragged into yet another situation in which the only possible outcome is more death. This Robin Hood has been here countless times before, killing without hesitation for reasons that aren’t exactly honorable. Once he started killing all those years ago, even if it was initially for good reasons, he is now caught in an endless cycle of violence, forced to defend himself against the brothers and sons of all the men he’s killed, which in turn creates even more brothers and sons that perpetually seek him out in order to attempt their revenge. Even though we hear snippets of the kind of legend that exists around him – one that he hardly seems to be perpetuating with intention – we aren’t really sure what his motivations are anymore, or if he’s simply running on survival autopilot, almost cursed with the kind of superior fighting skills that make it incredibly unlikely that anyone could ever successfully put him out of his misery.

After a particularly brutal fight in which he tries to liberate the kidnapped wife of his old friend Little John (Bill Skarsgård), the injured Robin finds himself in the care of Sister Brigid (Jodie Comer), the leader of a small community of orphans, lepers, and other downtrodden folk who aren’t made for the cruel world outside their island sanctuary. It seems like the perfect kind of place for someone like Robin to finally find some peace, a haven in which to spend his final days amongst happy children and beautiful gardens. So of course, Robin tries to leave almost immediately, either because he’s worried that his presence will bring evil to this place, or because he doesn’t believe he deserves the comfort. Sister Brigid tends to his wounds without questioning who he used to be, which starts to stir up the kind of feelings in Robin that he thought were gone forever.

These scenes go on for some time with relatively little new intrigue, something that will surely grate on the nerves of those unaccustomed to or unprepared for slower-moving cinema. Pat Scola’s gorgeous cinematography really carries these scenes, including sumptuous, naturally lit sequences set inside of old castle walls, matched in beauty by the frequent sweeping wide shots of the rich Irish countryside. Robin’s reluctance to stick around is slowly eaten away, helped by the presence of a friendly leper (Murray Bartlett) who encourages Robin to stick around, if only to make sure there’s always someone around to take care of the fruit trees. The more time that passes and the more glances he exchanges with Sister Brigid, the less Robin thinks about making his escape. Once Little John’s young daughter Margaret (Faith Delaney) washes up on the shores of the sanctuary, it starts to feel like the beginning of a new family unit, and potentially a new beginning for Robin.

But Robin’s old life just won’t leave him alone. The arrival of a one-eyed boy named Arthur (Noah Jupe) sets off alarm bells in Robin’s mind, as he’s pretty sure that he’s the one who caused the boy’s wounds and is even more sure that the boy is here to kill him. It seems that there is nowhere he can run where he won’t be found by his past, and despite his recent happiness, he’s rapidly losing the will to keep fighting.

The story of an older man looking back on a life full of violence isn’t exactly new territory (Jackman portrayed a character going through pretty much the same thing in Logan), but Sarnoski’s contemplative, almost serene approach is oddly mesmerizing. Maybe it works well here because Jackman’s Robin Hood doesn’t really express all that much guilt for what he’s done – he’s just getting tired of being trapped in the cycle. This is also a key point for those who say that the movie is pro-rich (a point I don’t agree with at all) – this is a Robin Hood who specifically tells young Margaret that the people he stole from were not good people. He feels way more guilt about being a danger to those around him than the fact that he offed a bunch of rich guys.

Still, this is a sobering deconstruction of the hero myth, one that reminds viewers that the stories you hear about legends and mythic figures are usually written by the survivors, and don’t always convey what actually happened. Sarnoski’s patient style may irk some, and there are certainly questions to be asked about why he chose to tell another Robin Hood story instead of that of another mythic hero, but I found myself utterly captivated by the visual and musical style, Jackman’s dependable performance, and Sarnoski’s existential musings.