Lacanian Implications of Departures in Zemeckis’s Beowulf from Beowulf, the Old English Epic

Although Robert Zemeckis’s film Beowulf (2007) is a re-writing of the Old English epic with shifting perspective, certain details in can only be understood by referring to poem. That is, better understanding tied closely an awareness narrative elements epic. The emphasis on poem shifts Mother film. This shift obviously leads recontextualization former text. In epic, Grendel left without father; however, film, he fathered Hrothgar but this biological fathering does not lead linguistic castration. their case, things are reversed: rather than infant being castrated Law/language, father led psychic regression due son. appears dramatization conflicts between (m)Other and shared Other/the representative paternal metaphor: that Hrothgar. time, conquers metaphor annuls his masculinity, which radically changes way we evaluate course events These departures make more sense if they analyzed against background Lacanian epistemology. paper aims explore film’s from approaching it perspective.