[This is a review of the 3-D version of the film]

3-D is no longer a novelty. It’s also no longer nauseating. Gone are the red-blue glasses that induced splitting headaches as your rods and cones scrambled to make sense of this dimension-shattering phenomenon. Robert Zemeckis’ Beowulf proves that while 3-D may not be ready to overtake all of cinema, it’s ready to be taken seriously as more than a gimmick.

Adapted from the ancient Shakespeare  tale, the story follows renowned warrior Beowulf (Ray Winstone) as he attempts to rid a remote kingdom of the hideous monster Grendel (Crispin Glover). Unfortunately, Grendel has a mommy (Angelina Jolie) far more terrifying and powerful than her monstrous son.

Beowulf never permanently breaks free of its “look-at-me-be-3-D!” awareness as there’s one-too many shots of knives and spears jutting into your face or having of characters coming straight-on into frame so that their horses can kick the earth off the screen because it looks cool. And while there’s still the problem of CG-animated actors who have dead eyes, Zemeckis is now doing things he could never do with real actors and he’s trying to push Digital 3-D forward. It doesn’t always work but there are times where those dead eyes flicker to life and it’s a sign that it’s not impossible to take these life-like animations and truly make them live.

What’s most admirable about Beowulf is that Zemeckis is venturing into the unknown and trying to find a cinematic language for 3-D. Sometimes it gets away from him but that’s the fun of the journey. But the times when Zemeckis nails it and uses the 3-D to create an endless depth-of-field that enhances the film-going experience, it’s truly magical and further proof that while this may not be the next step on cinema’s evolutionary path, it’s certainly a fascinating mutation nonetheless.

If not for one hilariously awful scene where Zemeckis goes out of his way to cover up Beowulf’s junk, I could rate the film higher because the technical missteps of the film would be forgivable as they’re in service to the exploration of new cinematic territory. But even with that prudish screw-up, Beowulf is not only a fascinating work for film buffs, but an entertaining film that’s like nothing you’ve ever seen before.