Oh no, not a feminised Robin Hood! What are you doing Russell Crowe?

Richard Wilkins interviewed Russell Crowe on the Today Show yesterday about the film he is presently completing with director Ridley Scott and fellow Oscar winner Cate Blanchett. I was looking forward to the interview, keen to hear about the filming of one of my favourite boyhood legends, Robin Hood, played by one of my favourite actors.

Errol Flynn's 'Robin Hood' is indisputably a classic adventure/action film and mostly satisfies the high demands I would make about a film adaptation of the famous legend. Errol Flynn's swashbuckling good looks, his outfoxing devil-may-care attitude, and his athletic prowess (especially his sword fights) in defeating evil are hard to beat. And Olivia de Havilland's Maid Marian with all the necessary feminine nobility and frailty was just right. She was a heroine to be saved by a fearless swashbuckling hero, a heroine to whom every man would pay homage. But no kisses.

Russell Crowe is an actor with the compelling screen presence of the great heroes of the Golden Years of Hollywood, like Clarke Gable and Gary Cooper. Even in a mediocre film like 'Proof of Life' with Meg Ryan his performance was engaging and convincing. He was totally convincing in one of his recent films, 'A Body of Lies', where he plays a fat cynical CIA supervisor. So with Crowe's name attached to the project I thought it promising.

Wilkin's interview was interspersed with some film clips. The first couple of clips gave a good impression. Russell looking manly and imposing was charging around on a white steed engaging the enemy with great cutting flourishes of his sword. (Pity there was no bow and arrow scenes, a great feature of Flynn's 'Robin Hood'.) Then came a close-up of a helmeted figure riding a horse and wielding a sword. Ah, good, a sword fight on a bucking and rearing horse, I thought. But then the helmet was raised to reveal Cate Blanchett who then proceeded to cut down soldiers who were twice her size.

No, no, no, Russell, not good. Maid Marian does not carry a sword, let alone pretend to wield one. What are you thinking? Don't put yourself in the same category as iconoclastic Monty Python who gets a cheap sluttish laugh for befouling some of the most endearing features of Western Civilisation. Monty Python is the joy of furious feminists, leftist wankers and the spitting and farting ockers in the local boozing halls. That's not your audience, surely.

In a Sky News report Russell is quoted thus:

'It's a huge part of English-speaking peoples' history, Robin Hood ... possibly the oldest-living story in the English language', said Crowe, 'So, it is a big job to try and reshape that in peoples' minds'.

Well, don't do it. No reshaping is necessary. No, more than that: it is forbidden. You do not fool around with the integrity of boyhood legends. It is a sacrilege. Must everything pertaining to the male be poisoned by feminist fantasy? Cate Blanchett waving a balsa wood sword and great big beefy men collapsing for no obvious reason is laughable. What's got into you? I thought you were above the theoretical fantasies that have the dominant political class in their thrall.

Boyhood legends and tales have essential features. And they are not to be mucked around with - unless you want to destroy them, make them into something they are not. Superman, Batman and Robin, the Phantom and others have already suffered desecration at the hands of fat Hollywood film moguls whose brain-pulping preoccupation with matters below the belt determine all they do.

Boyhood legends and tales have a hero who would die rather than betray his principles, principles that are best summed up in the Code of Chivalry. Boyhood legends have a beautiful heroine who embodies all that is good in the feminine, and whose heart the hero conquers through selfless bravery, and to whom all other men of principle pay disinterested homage. Above all, boyhood legends have a six-year-old boy's consciousness of physical passion.

In the Flynn version, Robin, after a gripping sword fight with Lord Gisborne, Sheriff of Nottingham, rushes to free Maid Marian from her dungeon prison, after which they hold each other in a tender embrace. No kissing. Later when Gisborne and his forces has been defeated, Robin stands before King Richard and says, 'My sword is yours, Sire, now and for always.' The King then grants Robin a wish. Robin asks for the hand of Maid Marian, which Robin's liege lord gives with pleasure. Arm in arm Robin and his maid depart. No kissing.

There are few things as sacred in a culture as a true boyhood legend.

Comment: gerard@gerardcharleswilson.com