Grendel And Beowulf Differences

A look into Cultural differences based on Beowulf
Many cultural differences between the epic poem Beowulf (Gunnarson) and the movie Beowulf and Grendel (Heaney) were demonstrated, including character behavior. In the epic poem, characters that portray this difference from epic to movie are Beowulf and Grendel. Beowulf in the epic poem is mostly known as a God among men, he kills all the evil in his sight, has no flaws, and doesn’t care about much, other than being honorable. Being that this was written in the eighth to eleventh century people that wrote this were simplistic to the idea of everything God made is either good or evil. This explains why back in this time Beowulf was explained as having no flaws since good can't have any, in order to be known as good. As for the movie, made many centuries later, Beowulf is more human and in a way shows he has real emotions when it comes to compassion and guilt. The reason for the more human representation over the centuries, the viewers believe having simplistic dualityvhas become boring, and our culture craved a human character to be able to relate to. If we saw a movie that had a man that would just kill …show more content…
He seems to change throughout the movie from someone that is sent on a mission to kill Grendel that was terrorizing a mead hall in a small village, to realizing something beyond a creature killing to just kill. Beowulf does not really boast in the movie like he does in the epic poem, the geat seems not that into himself as I expected because that's how he was in the epic. Because of our culture now, people need a hero that we can relate to and have certain flaws that we have in common. Viewers would not enjoy a hero that does not go through the same struggle emotionally as a normal person. Also, in today's culture, boasting about oneself can come off as annoying to a viewer so that is another reason Beowulf seems more human in the