Robin Hood character gets tougher

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Anchor Marco Werman has some thoughts on how the character of Robin Hood is getting tougher… at least the movie version is.

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MARCO WERMAN:  I’m Marco Werman and this is The World.  Coming up, the unofficial anthem of Israel, but first we’ve got this anthem.  This is the power ballad from the 1991 movie, Robin Hood, Price of Thieves.  Well today, a new Robin Hood got its world premier at the Cannes Film Festival.  It’s a new take on the man in tights.  Turns out this time there are no tights.  Lead actor Russell Crowe does wear clothes, but in this movie he’s more like the Gladiator version of Robin Hood.

RUSSELL CROWE:  You’ve got to ask yourself the practicality of romping through the English forest wearing a pair of green tights and I just wanted to give the guy some dignity.

WERMAN: That’s Russell Crowe commenting on his tougher looking Robin Hood.  This release is the latest in a long line of film and TV adaptations of the classic English legend.  The first was a silent movie from 1908.  The swashbuckling hero has been played by such legends as Douglas Fairbanks, Sr., Errol Flynn, and who could forget Kevin Costner.  In fact there have been more than 100 versions of the Robin Hood story on screen.  David Thompson wrote the Biographical Dictionary of Film.  He says Robin Hood is getting tougher.

DAVID THOMPSON:  Generally speaking, you’d have to say that the whole Robin Hood legend is growing darker and darker.  And one doesn’t know quite what to expect next.

WERMAN: Thompson says it’s because we are living in tougher times and he offers his own scenario for a  future Robin Hood on the screen.

THOMPSON:  One day, I suspect Robin may be a wicked terrorist in the trees and the Sheriff is the person who is trying to search for weapons of mass destruction.

WERMAN: Welcome to Sherwood.

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