New ROBIN HOOD Trailer Says More in Opening 5 Seconds Than We Needed to Hear

The new (and, seemingly, final) trailer for the latest Ridley Scott/Russell Crowe collaboration, ROBIN HOOD, has been released courtesy of Yahoo! Movies, and that opening shot might be a little too telling.  No, I’m not talking about the guys on horseback charging across a sandy beach towards a grounded ship.  I’m talking about the actual green band that accompanies the trailer.  It divulges that the film has been granted a PG-13 rating.

Suddenly, the thought that this would be GLADIATOR with arrows has slipped away.  That idea, actually, sounded pretty cool.  When I first glanced at Brian Helgeland’s first draft of the film, I noticed how savage it was, how authentic and brutal the violence felt on the page.  Alas, that was a few years ago, and the film has gone through some major rewrites.  Evidently, the savagery has been completely excised.  Now, I fear, we are left with just another Hollywood rendition of the classic tale of Robin and his merry men.

I could be wrong.  I hope I’m wrong.  This new trailer certainly doesn’t do much to tell me I’m wrong, though.  It does, however, give us our first good looks at Kevin Durand as Little John and Mark Strong, who, I fear, is getting to be typecast in these villainous roles, as Sir Godfrey.  It’s also nice to see Maid Marion, played by Cate Blanchett, taking bow and arrow in hand and doing some damage of her own in this one.

See for yourself:

ROBIN HOOD hits theaters on May 14th.