'Beowulf' (PG-13)(out of four)

An epic poem gets the Hollywood treatment in "Beowulf" -- but it isn't your high-school English teacher's version of the more than 3,000 lined Old English verse. In this saga, the computer-generated characters bear an uncanny likeness to Hollywood stars, the story has been sexed up a bit and it many times resembles more of a Playstation 3 game than an action movie.

Director Robert Zemeckis has taken the performance-capture technology he used in "The Polar Express" to create the same Max Headroom type visuals employed in that film. Human movement is morphed with high-tech artwork. The way it's done is that the real actors dress in tight fitting suits that have electrodes attached to them. Then electrodes are tracked by cameras and the movements are transferred to digitally animated characters.

With the addition of the film's 3-D technology, the film somehow becomes an odd sensory overload of sight and sound. No one can argue that moviegoers will feel like their right in the middle of the action as the sound of horses galloping by also puts you up close and personal with the animal's hooves and the gravel. And just as this "Beowulf" isn't the vintage saga most everyone grew up with, the 55-year-old 3-D technology isn't the stuff from monster movie drive-ins. In one scene, a man on horseback dodges tree limbs and in 3-D, the limbs appear as if they are jutting out of the screen and into the middle of the movie theater.

The film's story follows Viking hero Beowulf who brings his tales of slaying sea monsters and battling creatures to a town terrorized by the hideous monster Grendel (an unrecognizable Crispin Glover). After a night of merry making in the hall of King Hrothgar (the unmistakable likeness of Anthony Hopkins), the grotesque creature practically wipes out the village, biting off limbs and flinging men and women into the air.

The following day, Hrothgar orders the hall shuttered and the dead to be burned. Beowulf arrives only a short time later and promises to kill the monster. While the King believes Beowulf is his saving grace, many doubt him. Beowulf demands more merry making to beckon the beast. He says he'll fight the beast naked literally without a sword or armor or any clothes for that matter. An ongoing joke in the movie is that objects are strategically placed in questionable areas.

While Beowulf and Grendel's hand to hand combat is the stuff action movies are made of, the computer technology gives the scene the appearance of a video game (not surprisingly, there is a "Beowulf" video game on the market. You'll almost be looking for the joystick on the seat's armrest. And with the incredible feats that the hero performs showing off his six-pack abs, it is suddenly very apparent that no matter how real the figures appear (although they are still not entirely convincing and have an odd wax museum look to them), they still aren't human.

Beowulf" isn't kid's stuff and rightfully deserves its PG-13 rating. There's violence aplenty (think the movie "300"), sexual suggestion and nudity (mostly of Beowulf's behind).

Angelina Jolie as Grendel's mother is probably the most interesting animation in the movie. Covered by iridescent gold, the computer starlet revisits Jolie's Lara Croft character. Many in the audience will find themselves attracted to a character that's a virtual actress. Strange, don't you think?

"Beowulf" is a tightly wound action movie, but there's so much else going with its 3-D visuals, weirdly drawn characters with movements like human actors, and the feeling that you've been tossed on a ride at an Orlando theme park, it's difficult to appreciate the story. But you read the poem already anyway in high school English, didn't you?