Robin Hood

Ridley Scott’s 2010 film tells how the legend began: Robin is an archer home from a crusade, and the outlaw in the forest is only set up at the close. The project began as a different film. In Nottingham, by Ethan Reiff and Cyrus Voris, the Sheriff was sympathetic and Robin less virtuous, and Crowe was once considered for both. Brian Helgeland was hired in 2008 to turn the story back to Robin. The trace survives: a shooting script dated 1 May 2009 is headed Untitled Robin Hood Adventure aka Nottingham, crediting Reiff and Voris with Helgeland’s revisions. That is why the Sheriff counts for so little. Filming used Bourne Wood in Surrey, Dovedale in Derbyshire and Freshwater West in Pembrokeshire, Wales. Cate Blanchett, Max von Sydow, William Hurt, Mark Strong as Godfrey and Oscar Isaac as John fill the cast. It opened the 63rd Cannes Film Festival out of competition on 12 May 2010. The historian Alex von Tunzelmann noted that Richard the Lionheart had returned from the Holy Land seven years earlier, so showing him fight in France on the way home in 1199 is wrong. A good fit if you will take taxes, the throne and coastal defence over outlawry in Sherwood. Not for you if you expect the Sheriff to be the real opponent.