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dwndrgn · 7th May 2005, 09:46 AM

Saw this one today. All in all I'd give it a 5 out of 10. Not bad, not great, just ok.

It's a good story, the attempt to keep Jerusalem independent of the rest of the Arabic world. Unfortunately it seemed as if the editors had a field day. There was so much stuff left out and so much seemed to happen so fast that I felt that the whole thing happened within a week. There was no sense of time. A couple of things jarred as well - (spoiler alert)

- one of the main characters dies within the first 10 minutes. A little startling. Especially when the audience really has no background to work from, we've now lost the character who could fill that in for us.

Orlando Bloom's entire dialogue would fit in one paragraph if put together. Since we've no background on him nor his father, we really have nothing to go on. The secondary characters also weren't fleshed out well. I felt that the acting was done well and the casting seemed to be strong but they weren't given enough to work with.

I just didn't get the symbolism of the Princess cutting her hair superimposed by an image of the dead king's disease-ravaged face. Seemed a bit odd.

It was visually stunning though. They used a new technique (ok, new to me at least) for filming the gore of the battlefield. It was recognizeable but worked just the same.

I left feeling that it could have been a great movie if they had left all the missing pieces in and perhaps cut it into two movies.

7th May 2005, 09:46 AM	#1 (permalink)
dwndrgn Fierce Vowelless One Join Date: Apr 2003 Location: Florida Posts: 3,663	Kingdom of Heaven Saw this one today. All in all I'd give it a 5 out of 10. Not bad, not great, just ok. It's a good story, the attempt to keep Jerusalem independent of the rest of the Arabic world. Unfortunately it seemed as if the editors had a field day. There was so much stuff left out and so much seemed to happen so fast that I felt that the whole thing happened within a week. There was no sense of time. A couple of things jarred as well - (spoiler alert) - one of the main characters dies within the first 10 minutes. A little startling. Especially when the audience really has no background to work from, we've now lost the character who could fill that in for us. Orlando Bloom's entire dialogue would fit in one paragraph if put together. Since we've no background on him nor his father, we really have nothing to go on. The secondary characters also weren't fleshed out well. I felt that the acting was done well and the casting seemed to be strong but they weren't given enough to work with. I just didn't get the symbolism of the Princess cutting her hair superimposed by an image of the dead king's disease-ravaged face. Seemed a bit odd. It was visually stunning though. They used a new technique (ok, new to me at least) for filming the gore of the battlefield. It was recognizeable but worked just the same. I left feeling that it could have been a great movie if they had left all the missing pieces in and perhaps cut it into two movies.