Un’ibrida progenie semi-mostruoso-eroica. La non-rigenerazione e la metamorfosi del male nel "Beowulf" di Robert Zemeckis

Among the rewritings of the Old English epic of Beowulf, Ze-meckis’ homonymous film departs from the poem in its rein-terpretation of the themes of otherness and parenthood. The director and screenwriters come up with the lethal hybridi-sation between two incompatible lineages: monsters are the result of the carnal union between Grendel’s mother and a hero. From the adulterous encounter with Hrothgar was born Grendel and from that with Beowulf the dragon was con-ceived. In returning the Old English epos to a contemporary audience, the film presents a dystopian reality in which lust-ful parents lost their heroism by succumbing to the seduction of evil conveyed by Grendel’s Mother. From that fatal union shape-shifting creatures are born and raised in a thirst for re-venge against their parent who disowned them. For Zemeck-is, it is an inevitable catastrophic cycle that will ever endure in non-regeneration.