If you think reading the epic poem "Beowulf'' in high school or college was a misery, try sitting through Robert Zemeckis' digitally animated version on an IMAX screen in 3-D. It's a full-fledged cinematic assault, as if a black velvet painting of Norse gods had sprung to life and begun heaving spears, arrows and geysers of blood directly at your forehead.

The setting is Denmark, circa A.D. 507, in the kingdom of Hrothgar, a computer concoction who bears a resemblance to Anthony Hopkins and is in terrible straits at the time of our introduction.

First, he's drunk and baring his flabby old chest, which is embarrassing. His contemptuous young wife, Wealthow (Robin Wright Penn), actually spits on him. And he's got major security concerns; a skinless monster named Grendel (Crispin Glover) regularly storms the local mead hall, picking through his subjects as if they were an assortment of See's nuts and chews.

Along comes the wandering hero Beowulf, who aims to slay Grendel, a civic duty he believes is best conducted in the nude. Beowulf has the arms, pecs and trunklike thighs of Brad Pitt in peak "Troy'' form, but facially he vaguely resembles the English character actor Ray Winstone, who provides Beowulf's voice. This will be a disconcerting combination for anyone who remembers Winstone from "Sexy Beast," in which he most definitely was not the title character.

The whole naked-Beowulf-in-battle sequence, which involves strategic placements of pitchers of mead, spears

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and shoulders to spare us the perhaps paralyzing power of his manhood, is a cinematic feat, seamlessly blending homoeroticism, slapstick and utter foolishness.

Having reached these heights, Zemeckis tops himself by bringing Beowulf into the lair of Grendel's overprotective mother (Angelina Jolie). Monster Mom also prefers to wage battle naked. She's buxom and so carefully buffed that her privates look like Barbie's. (Wouldn't you expect someone as politically correct as Jolie to have told Zemeckis, "If you want my boobies, the rest of me better be anatomically correct"?)

Not that Jolie had much to do with "Beowulf,'' other than picking up the paycheck. She has said that she was only on set for two days. Zemeckis employs the same high-tech digital animation of "The Polar Express,'' mapping the faces and bodies of his actors. So to say that Jolie "plays'' the demon or Hopkins "acts'' Hrothgar may be an overstatement.

Why Zemeckis even bothers with actors is mysterious, since his human results are so bland and unsatisfying (to be fair, his efforts with landscapes do impress). In the role of a sulky courtier, a computer-generated Cro-Magnon-jawed John Malkovich doppelganger parodies every past Malkovich performance. Yet it is so devoid of life that by the end, the preview audience cracked up whenever he, or it, opened his mouth.

Amid this soul-deadening, show-offy demonstration of high-tech, how perfect is it that the biggest audience reaction is to a malfunctioning Malkovich?

Reach Mary F. Pols at mpols@bayareanewsgroup.com or 925-945-4741. Read her blog at http://cctextra.com/blogs/shortcuts.

'beowulf'

D

Starring: Ray Winstone, Anthony Hopkins, Angelina Jolie, Robin Wright Penn, John Malkovich

Director: Robert Zemeckis

Rated: PG-13 for intense sequences of violence including some disturbing images, sexual material and nudity

Opens today: Bay Area theaters

Running time: 1 hour, 56 minutes