888. BRAVEHEART (1995)

Running Time: 177 minutes
Directed By: Mel Gibson
Written By: Randall Wallace
Main Cast: Mel Gibson, Sophie Marceau, Patrick McGoohan, Angus Macfadyen, Catherine McCormack
Click here to view the trailer

Note: Added some new things to the sidebar, including a link to the IMDB list of my (to be) 1,000 list, as well as a link to the same list on Listal, complete with stills from all 290 films. Be sure to upvote or like or comment or whatever it is you do on those sites, if you will. I also added a picture from my time in Philadelphia last month. The picture was taken by me at the top of the steps at the Philadelphia Museum of Art - the very steps that Rocky scaled while training to fight Apollo Creed. Just a bit of decoration on the blog, which also happens to be a movie reference. Now then...

"YOU WILL NEVER TAKE OUR FREEDOM"...HOWEVER, WE WILL FORMALLY DECLINE IT IF GIVEN THE CHOICE

So over the next few weeks I'll be trying to tackle the three hours and over movies from THE BOOK, so that I'm not left with a big pile of really long movies when I get down to the end. It is my goal to watch the remaining movies in order of their length, so that when I get down to only having ten or fifteen left, they're all ninety minutes or so. I'm sure I won't go in the exact order of length, but I plan to stick as close to it as possible. So expect reviews for The Deer Hunter, Lawrence of Arabia, Doctor Zhivago, Ben-Hur, The Sorrow and the Pity, Seven Samurai and Scarface coming soon.

The story (yes, STORY - it's CLEARLY historically inaccurate) begins by bringing us up to speed on King Edward I a.k.a. Edward Longshanks (McGoohan) who was the heartless ruler of England (and Scotland, among other countries) in the 1200s. We can skip ahead to the part where Edward rules that all new brides will spend their first night as a wife with an English lord, as opposed to their new husband. This, of course, enrages the Scots and forces William Wallace (Gibson) to marry in secret to his love Murron (McCormack). However, during a skirmish, Murron is killed by an Englishman, which enrages Wallace to the point that a small battle erupts, where he ends up killing a local English garrison. This pretty much puts into motion the whole movie, which sees Wallace lead an army of Scottish and Irish against the English, in a few battle scenes, which are epic and good, solid movie action. I think enough of us are familiar with Braveheart that I can pretty much stop there as far as plot summary goes and get right into my thoughts. Shall we?

Okay, so of course I wasn't SURE that the film was historically inaccurate, since you're dealing with a history buffoon, but it was pretty obvious, wasn't it? And then I get on Wikipedia today to nab the poster for the blog post and I notice that there's paragraph after paragraph about all the history goofs in the movie. In fact, the only thing that historians agree with the movie on is that William Wallace existed, he DID kill someone when they killed his wife and that there was a war with the English that he was involved in. The rest is complete rubbish, as far as everyone who should know is concerned, but even as a work of fiction, Braveheart pretty much works for me! I dig it, for the most part, even though now that I KNOW that 90% of the movie is a load of horse crap, it's almost going to be laughable to watch now. Although and even though I like it, I'd say that I've probably had my last viewing of Braveheart for a lifetime. I said the same thing about The Usual Suspects when I reviewed it for the blog - that even though I think both movies are fine examples of successful filmmaking, I feel like I've seen them enough times now that anymore viewing would be unnecessary. I've formed my opinions staunchly and that's that.

Does anyone else cringe at Gibson's attempt at humor here? Man, I sure did. Gibson has a way about him that is really, sort of annoying if you ask me. There were moments, mainly in the beginning, where I just wanted to punch him in the face and tell him to stop trying to be cute and funny. It was even enough to make me drop my rating, but only a bit. Overall I'm fine with Braveheart as a whole. Even if the history is rubbish, it IS a historical film and one that gives us information (no matter how inaccurate) and makes sure we know what's going on and why. The battle scenes rank up there with some of the best and if you consider this a war movie (which I do, in part), then I'd have to consider it among the better war films. The three hour running time seems excessive and actually, I feel like this could've been scaled back to right around two hours and everything would have been more succinct and nicely packaged. It seems to me that everything from about the two hour mark to about the 2:45, at times just feels like extending the time for the sake of making an epic. If I'm being honest, there were times in that span where my attention did wane and I just wanted everything to get wrapped up. Otherwise, a fine time at the movies and speaking of Gibson, are there any other directors in THE BOOK who have their entire directorial career included as a "must see"? Charles Laughton comes to mind, but then he only directed the one movie. I guess by default I'd have to consider Gibson among my favorite directors, since I gave favorable reviews to all three. For those keeping track, I'd call Braveheart his worst and Apocalypto his best. It's enough to make me wish he'd decided against the acting career so many years ago and just decided to be a director.

RATING: 7.5/10  Okay, I just checked and apparently Gibson also directed The Man Without a Face, which isn't in THE BOOK, so all of his films aren't in there. I guess I should scoot that one to the top of my watchlist though, considering.

MOVIES WATCHED: 927
MOVIES LEFT TO WATCH: 74

June 23, 2015  11:38am

988. Apocalypto (2006)

Running Time: 138 minutes
Directed By: Mel Gibson
Written By: Mel Gibson, Farhad Safinia
Main Cast: Rudy Youngblood, Dalia Hernandez, Jonathan Brewer, Mayra Serbulo, Morris Birdyellowhead
Click here to view the trailer

THE GREAT GIBSON?

I was hesitant to watch "Apocalypto", because...well I don't really have an acceptable "because" - I was just skeptical, that's all. One thing that may have led to my skepticism is the lack of faith I have in Gibson as a director. Despite turning in a near masterpiece with "The Passion of the Christ", I felt as though that work was ready made to succeed and didn't really chalk the success up to Gibson's direction. With "Apocalypto", I now have no choice but to give Gibson the credit he's due.

As far as I could tell, the film is segmented, quite nicely, into four distinct pieces. We start out with the introductions and establishing the characters. In this case, the characters are members of the Mayan civilization and more specifically, in this case, a small Mayan village, where the residents know one another, respect their boundaries and are grateful for what they have. This particular Mayan community is a civilized lot, where families live and flourish and ancestry is respected. One morning, however, all of this is disrupted when the village is attacked by a band of outsiders. The outsiders kill some, capture and hogtie the rest and burn the village to the ground. With their captives, the raiders tie them together and lead them through the forests, bound to a bamboo pole. The captives have no idea where they're going and most are tied and beaten. Having just seen members of their family killed, most are also emotionally drained, not knowing where they're going or who's taking them there. It is eventually revealed that the captives are being taken to be ritually sacrificed to the God of the sun, Kukulkan. After killing two of the captives in brutal fashion, the crowd that has gathered and everyone else witness a solar eclipse and therefore, the men doing the sacrificing declare that Kukulkan is satisfied and to "dispose" of the rest of the captives. The final part deals with the escape of Jaguar Paw (Youngblood), one of the captives, as he tries to escape the band of original captors and get back to his pregnant wife and son, whom he hid in a pit before being captured.

It took a little bit before my skepticism was quenched. When the film started, several feeble attempts at comedy were made and they were those kinds of feeble attempts at comedy that, kind of, make you roll your eyes - the very unfunny kind. However, Gibson didn't waste any time and quickly put the kibosh on the comedy and started rolling the ball on an absolutely FANTASTIC movie. For me, the skeptical one, it was a film that built and built and built until I couldn't help but embrace the film that was being laid out before me. At first, as I mentioned, I wasn't crazy about it. Then, the village is attacked and I start to get a little more into it, but not too much. The mini war scene when the village is attacked was some pretty great stuff, but I still wasn't sold. Then we started walking and I began to wonder when we'd stop walking. Was the entire film going to be the leading of the captives to their destination or were we going to get there in time to see what happens and then some? That question was quickly answered though, when we did arrive at our destination and the cinematography started to pick up a notch. Immaculate sets,  thousands of extras, camera angles that squeezed every drop of beauty out of the surroundings and the blues of the painted bodies, the sacrificial lambs being led to their slaughter. But it was too soon for all of our main characters to die and if the sacrificing wasn't enough to get you "oohing" & "aahing" and gasping & groaning, you still had the whole final act to go - the escape of Jaguar Paw and to see whether or not he'd survive a band of worthy hunters. By the end, I was exhausted. Going from a skeptical viewer to a 100% hooked one is hard work, ya know?

So with all this glowing praise, I'm forced to ask myself the question: Is Mel Gibson a great director? Well, I'd have to say he is. Now, I'm as surprised as any of you to hear myself say that, because up until about an hour ago, I wouldn't give have dared to lump the terms "Mel Gibson" and "great director" into the same sentence. But, if you look at his directing career (with the exception being "The Man Without a Face"), you see some very passionately done stories. Gibson is one who gets an idea in his head and either goes whole hog with it or doesn't do it at all. I mean, Gibson (once an A-list Hollywood actor), with his last two pictures, has broken the cardinal rule of a Hollywood filmmaker and that is: never make a film with subtitles. Gibson could've just as easily had his actors speaking English, in this and "The Passion", but he went whole hog, used Hebrew and Mayan dialects and did it right, lest he didn't do it at all. I applaud that. All I know is this, if it was announced tomorrow that Gibson had announced his next big directing gig, I'd be excited to hear the details, see the trailer and eventually see the movie. He has officially crossed that threshold of directors, where I'm literally looking forward to his next project and speaking of his projects, as you can tell, they're few and far between. I'd call that another credit to his abilities, as he doesn't simply grasp at anything that's thrown at him, but rather waits for something that he wants to do, that he feels passionate enough about to direct. Gibson is one who obviously directs just as much with his heart, as he does with his mind.

RATING: 10/10  Screw it, I'm going all the way. This was a great, great movie. Great action, beautiful cinematography, great direction, perfectly acceptable acting and a fantastic story...this is what going to the movies is all about.

MOVIES WATCHED: 670
MOVIES LEFT TO WATCH: 331

April 28, 2013  9:45pm

978. The Passion of the Christ (2004)

Running Time: 126 minutes
Directed By: Mel Gibson
Written By: Mel Gibson, Benedict Fitzgerald
Main Cast: Jim Caviezel, Maia Morgenstern, Monica Bellucci, Rosalinda Celentano, Francesco DeVito
Click here to view the trailer

FAITH

With Good Friday falling today and Easter this Sunday, I figured there was really no better time to get to "The Passion of the Christ" - a Mel Gibson directed film and the highest grossing independent film of all-time.

I think we all know the story of Jesus by now, but for the folks who have been living under rocks, I'll do a quick synopsis. The film traces the final twelve hours of Jesus' life, beginning in the Garden of Gethsemane. There, Jesus prays to God, asking him "if at all possible, let this cup pass me by. If this cup cannot pass me by, your will be done." From there, Jesus is arrested and brought before Pontius Pilate. Pilate, not wanting to condemn him, sends him to be judged by Herod. However, not finding any crimes that Jesus has committed, Herod sends Jesus away. From there, Christ is taken back to Pilate, who, after much pressure from Caiaphas (Jewish High Priest) and the crowd, condemns Jesus. First, Christ is only scourged - beaten with whips, chains and mocked with a crown of thorns. Later, after much more pleading from the crowd and Caiaphas, Jesus is condemned to be crucified. He is forced to carry his own cross to the mountain of Golgotha, but can barely do so, having just been nearly beaten to death.

Look, I don't want this to turn into a sermon or anything and I certainly don't want to start any religious debates. Yes, I believe in God and Jesus Christ and that Jesus died for our us, but I'm also aware that many do not and I have no problem with that. In fact, if I may share, I really can't stand people ("bible bangers" some call them) who feel that it is their duty to convert non-believers. It is my belief that each man must answer for his own actions. If you don't believe, that's your business, you will have to pay the piper someday, but it is certainly not my duty to try and change your mind, just as I wouldn't appreciate non-believers trying to talk me out of my beliefs.

To the non-believers, however, I ask (as I did in my "Gospel According to St. Matthew" review) can you at least take "The Passion of the Christ" as a good story. Obviously, to you it's only a story, but I ask, is it at least a good one? Even though you're non-believers, is there any part of you that says "Well I guess this is POSSIBLE"? For example, if someone runs from outside and tells me that giant sequoia's are falling from the sky, I wouldn't believe them, but my mind (maybe for a second or two) would imagine the prospect of this actually happening. If your mind can at least flirt with the idea of this being possible, would you feel sympathy for an innocent man being treated like this? If in that same instant of flirting with the idea of this being real, would you be grateful to a man who went through all of this for you? I'm just curious.

Okay, I've certainly said enough about religion and I said I wasn't going to. Let's talk about "The Passion of the Christ" - the movie. Cinematically", I had few problems with this one. If I was forced to nitpick, I'd say that there were far too many slow motion takes and a few scenes that really should've been left on the cutting room floor. For example, (and THE BOOK even notes this one) the scene where Jesus is depicted practicing his carpentry, making a table for a rich man. It wasn't needed in the slightest. This film should have been 100% uncomfortable, sad and heart wrenching, but it was the inclusion of unnecessary scenes like that, that only made it 98% heart wrenching. Everything else I'd say was fine. The music was just perfect and the acting was fine. In other news, what on Earth happened to Jim Caviezel? He sort of fell of the face of the Earth after this movie. Actually, now that I think of it, I think he's on some TV show...but I'm not sure what and don't really care enough to go looking it up.

RATING: 8.5/10  Great stuff here and another strong candidate for the TOP 20 list. I hope all who celebrate have a Happy and safe Easter.

MOVIES WATCHED: 648
MOVIES LEFT TO WATCH: 353

March 29, 2013  2:00am