The Medieval Hero on Screen: Representations from Beowulf to Buffy edited by Martha W. Driver and Sid Ray (review)

REVIEWS67 Martha w. driver and SiD ray, eds., The Medieval Hero on Screen: Representations from Beowulfto Buffy. North Carolina: McFarland and Company, 2004. Pp. 268. isbn: 0-7864-1926-1. $35. In the Medieval Hero on Screen, Martha Driver and Sid Ray have assembled a collection that persuasively 'present(s) medieval film as both a complement to the study of the medieval period and as a field worth studying on its own.' Drawing from sources that range from 'serious' medieval cinema to unabashedly popular offerings, this collection discusses the appropriation ofthe medieval past as a vehicle for modern ideologies, an appropriation that fabricates a Middle Ages that has, for many viewers, displaced the mote historical and philological one of the academy. Part I examines how this displacement takes place. William Woods asserts that medieval films convince us of their 'authenticity' by first conforming to out preconceptions about the medieval past and then telling tales, focused on a suffering hero, that confirm their audiences' sense of 'universal human experience.' While the 'historical' medieval films that Woods discusses seem 'real' because they patticipate in a larger fantasy about the Middle Ages, the fantasy of Middle Earth, as David Salo argues, 'borrows' authenticity from 'our world' through Tolkien's use of real languages and histories. Part II moves from film's creation ofthe medieval past to the translation ofmedieval narratives into the present, examining how 'the Arthur legends were used, and continue to be used, as models for specific types of "chivalric" or heroic behaviors for children to emulate.' Kevin FIarty convincingly argues that the introduction of Lanier's A Boy's Arthur into the Shirley Temple version of Damon Runyon's short story, 'Little Miss Matker,' is central to the film's conversion narratives. Lanier also provides the subtext to Tom Henthorne's discussion of 'boys to men' in Star Wars and E. T, which ttaces the conversions ofLuke and Elliot from unhappy youth into chivalfic knights—from Carter liberals to Reaganite heroes. Part III focuses on female heroes; Anke Bernau discusses the problem of representing heroic virginity (Joan of Arc) on the screen in the context of an examination of contemporary culture's renewed obsession with virginity. Diana Slampyak moves from problematic virgins to equally problematic warriors as she analyzes Jen's unhappy end in Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, arguing that Jen's fate is sealed the moment she steps outside of the confines of both her society and her dual genres (Chinese wuxia and medieval romance). Susan Sanaito concludes this section with Buffy the Vampire Slayer, a female hero who manages to escape culture and genre to become an example ofa new kind of 'medieval hero.' Part IV turns from modern medieval heroes to the narrative and political commodification ofmedieval themes and motifs. Carl Grindley ttaces the topos of the Hero's Weapon from the Iliadto Dirty Harry and TheArmy ofDarkness. Michael Torregosa provides a survey of the iconography and function of Merlin on film. Caroline Jewcrs focuses on the ideological appropriation of the medieval hero in First Knight, A Knight's Tale, and Black Knight, three films that 'create a trio of unlikely laboratories who become bellatores in spite of themselves and, through the code of the past, articulate the culture of the present.' 68ARTHURIANA Jewers's essay, with its focus on medieval films produced for Generations X and Y, serves as a fitting ttansition into the collection's final pedagogical section, particularly John Ganim's musings on his student's reception and reading ofmedieval film, which should serve to both encourage and caution anyone considering a similar course. The other essay in this section, Edward Benson's examination ofJoan ofArc films, provides a critique ofthe modern ideologies that hamper cinema's ability to capture Joan's story accurately, reminding us, as Driver and Ray assert in their Preface, that medieval film 'demonstrates the tendency to bend history to fit a political agenda (and). . .more often than not supports white male heterosexual hegemony.' Even if readers may sometimes find themselves wishing the authot had had mote space to develop historical context or to expand analyses ofthe films, TheMedievalHero on Screen is an impressive collection—thought-provoking and insightful. It...