WELL, they wanted "different". A Robin for the new millennium. And Ridley Scott's Robin Hood is certainly different. The Merry Men and the Sheriff are reduced to fleeting bit-parts.

Russell Crowe, as Robin, has an Irish-crossed-with-Welsh by-way-of-Jamaican accent.

And it takes 40 minutes for Robin to get out of France. Yes, France.

What's he doing there? The answer is, coming back from the Crusades. And boy, does he take his time about it. At times, you long for Kevin Costner's ability to leap small countries in a single bound.

King Richard (Danny Huston, with obligatory Lion King locks) is busy plundering French castles. So we start in battle.

Meanwhile, across the country, the evil Sir Godfrey (Mark Strong wearing serious eyeliner), trusted friend of the English crown, is busy conspiring with the oyster-quaffing French king to help him conquer England.

To help him achieve his ends, Sir Godfrey (basically Guy of Gisborne by another name) plots to ambush King Richard but, as it turns out, this is a waste of time. Richard has already died in battle.

Instead he ambushes and kills another man entirely: one Robin of Loxley.

Now don't worry – this is not OUR Robin (that would be a plot twist). Our Robin is named Robin Longstride and is a common archer on the run from King Richard's army.

After ambushing the ambush with his Merrie Men (although singing a few songs is the extent of their merrie-ness), the two Robins finally meet. Loxley-Robin's lengthy last wish is that Longstride-Robin take his sword and return it to his father – in Nottingham.

"Do you know it?" he asks.

"I've heard of it," replies Russell.

As well as taking the sword back to England, he has to deliver the bad news King Richard has died. He decides the best way to achieve this is to assume the identity of the dead Robin.

This turns out to be a lot easier than you'd think. When he finally gets back to Nottingham and tells Loxley's wife Marion (Cate Blanchett) and ageing father Sir Walter (Max Von Sydow) that their beloved Robin is no more, it takes them about a minute to get over the shock.

Then Sir Walter suggests this new Robin should make his identity fraud permanent so Marion can hang on to her house.

The first hour-and-a-half of Robin Hood is frustratingly episodic. We're in Fontainebleu. No we're not, we're at the Tower of London. Hang on – back to France. No, wait – we're in Nottingham.

You can feel the creak of writers treading carefully around all previous tellings of the tale, trying not to step on anyone else's toes.

This means that some characters barely get a look-in. Matthew Macfadyen as the Sheriff has a brief snarl at Marion, then disappears – presumably the film didn't want to try out-Rickmaning Alan Rickman.

However, it also ensures the spotlight is thrown on other, less-celebrated characters – most notably the women.

This is probably the most history-savvy of all the Robin Hood films and Eileen Atkins shines as the previously unhailed Eleanor of Aquitaine, the king's mother, delivering some of the best lines in the film with her usual Oscar-worthy eclat.

She despairs of her weak, dilettante son, King John, who scorns running a kingdom in favour of rolling in bed with, as she puts it, "a piece of French pastry".

The other outstanding performance is Cate Blanchett who has turned Marion into a rampaging young Mrs Thatcher (albeit with a Lancastrian twang).

Hair loose and flowing, surrounded by a pack of dogs, kicking peasants and ploughing fields, this Marion is fearless and formidable. She even turns up in full body armour, at one stage, ready for battle – although she does have to be helped out in the fight by Robin.

A truly revisionist Robin Hood might have left the men out of it and focused on these two females.

And what of the main man?

Russell Crowe's performance is Gladiator revisited. This Robin is haunted by something terrible that happened in his childhood. Russell conveys this by looking a bit puzzled throughout. He's certainly a muscular, unstoppable presence onscreen – albeit a bit humourless.

Once he's back from France, the film's too-lengthy mid-section focuses on landowners' rights, which is as fun as it sounds.

This Robin Hood is specifically located in times of economic belt-tightening, when the crown has overspent on a misguided foreign war and the peasants have no money to pay.

In addition, Sir Godfrey, whose horses seem conveniently able to cover six hundred miles a day, has set about burning down Darlington, Lincoln and York to make the Northern barons rise in rebellion.

For some unfathomable reason, Nottingham is last on his barbecue list – even though he has every reason to suspect his deadly enemy Robin Hood might be hiding there.

This gives Robin plenty of time to indulge in a bit of Nick Clegg speechifying before he arrives, suggesting the Magna Carta might be a really good idea.

"What do you suggest? That I give every man a castle?" asks a baffled King John.

"An Englishman's home IS his castle!" roars Russell, in a line for which Oscar-winning screenwriter Brian Helgeland should have his keyboard confiscated.

What Ridley Scott has attempted is an English Braveheart. Alas, it never really gets going.

Godfrey is too distant a villain and John and the Sheriff are spineless incompetents. Robin never really feels under threat and it's not clear why he inspired such loyalty and hatred.

The final spectacular battle with the French is meticulously filmed. And Nottingham itself has been depicted with a bit of a nudge and a wink.

The village drinking holes are heaving with bosomy wenches who wink "All right, me duck?" at the Merrie Men.

But overall, the film feels rather research-heavy, too bogged down in details.

In the last two minutes of the film, King John finally makes Robin an outlaw and he and Marion take off to the woods.

You can't help feeling, this is where the story really starts...