I believe you should watch the 2 movies then. While i felt Passions atleast made the effort to show a distinction between Jews of a certain time being bad as apposed to the religion itself, KoH portrays Christianity itself to be quite terrible and never makes a distinction between people and the religion that they follow.

Frankly, I think POTC's jewish racism was make a huge deal of when it wasn't in the movie. The movie clearly showed the decisions to be made by fanatics, a decision which people would atleast understand .. (who the hell wants someone coming and proclaiming a new religions). It also makes the effort of showing the commoners (jews) feel against the persecution, with a few jews even running in to save Christ, one even risking herself to offer water. The only 2 Christians portrayed in any good light in KoH were the same ones who from the beginning denounced either Christianity and were never shown to accept it back and very openly dismissed Christian doctrines. PoTC's racism towards Jews was no where close to that of Passions and almost everyone I saw it with .. actually everyone I saw it with agreed. Everyone I saw it with were also Muslims looking at this from a very nuetral platform.

Well like dolce said, I think that there were actually people to blame for the Crusades. There were people that murdered civilians just for thoughtless "glory". The Passion was not as bad as I feared it'd be, that's more of the fact that Mel Gibson's father is about as close to a neo nazi as one can get (and the anti-Semetic comments people said to me in real life, but that's a whole 'nother story). It still was a pretty bland and boring film (albeit sorta pretty to look at), but it was more the rumors about the anti-Semetism and the fact that the Jews being blamed through "passion plays' throughout history is one of the reasons that they were constantly slaughtered in tragedies like the Holocaust.

And honestly, how did they really show the Christians as that terrible? Balian, Godfrey, Tiberias, Baldwin, and Hospitalier were all definitely "good guys", and they all wanted to keep the shaky peace. If they hadn't shown how bloodthirty and malicious some of the Crusaders were, it would have been more inaccurate and worrisome, not less. The Crusades and the mass murders caused by them are historical fact and there are people to blame (I don't blame Christianity, I blame the people who used it and "God's will" for there own evil purposes).

Balian: Till the very end stated God is no longer with him.

Gofrey: Just pushes past a dead girl's funeral (compare that to Saladin picking up the cross and respoectfully placing it back)

Tiberias: According to me, the only one who acted good. Then again, he never once even portrayed himself to belong to anyone.

There was one other good guy. The priest that was forced to go to war. Even he said he doesn't believe much in Christian doctrines.

Now compare it to how many bad guys there were as the main character, you only got Guy and Reynald as the main evil doers. Not to mention that Reynald was portrayed more like a fanatic

All 4 good guys .. I've discounted them as symbols of Christianity.

Lets look at the main Christian figures then.

Guy - You mentioned

Reynalds - You mentioned

Priest 1: Priest yet stole from the girl.

Priest 2: Condemed everyone and justified is as the word of God.

Soldiers during scene when Messenger's head cut off: Rejoicing

Soldiers during scene where Tiberius makes his case and is mocked by Guy in front of the emperor: Rejoicing

I liked the film's distinction between followers of the pope and followers of Jesus...

As to the whole movie - meh - it was okay - I always enjoy the historical stuff, but the story itself was just okay. (...and Orlando Bloom wasn't as bad as usual!)

3 out of 5.

Well yeah baba, we can draw straws, but I've already agreed that they make the Christians in KOH look worse then the Jews in Passion, but I also listed how theres a reason they made them look bad, versus no reason in Passion and that was pre-viewing.

thats fine moviedude .. was just answering Roid back : )

Hope I didn't come off as aggresive or whatever, definitely don't want to start a bad argument about that.

not at all ... to each his own opinion .. remember i'm not jew ... the repurcussions and feelings it envokes in people who are jewish or know much about the history and culture is pretty lost on me : )

I gotta make this really brief.

-Good visuals
-Broken Story
-Bad Character development
-Good Orlando Bloom performance
-Good costumes
-Nothing new; unoriginal

B-

Alot of the atrocities did happen in the Crusader period. In RL, Guy was actually spared by Saladin and released 2 years later after his release after Guy has promised not to invade Muslim land again. Of Course Guy broke his promise few years later when he along with Richard the Lionheart. There were alot worse atrocities by the Crusaders like the cannibalism period where the soldiers actually ate the flesh of the muslim warriors because they were considered infidels.If the complaint was about Christians being treated harshly in the movie, I dont see the complaints about how Saladin wasnt treated more of a saint than he really was. If you read his biography he was indeed a man with alot of honor and he even payed for the ransom of the christian prisoners of war to be set free too. When he died he wasnt even able to pay for his own tomb

Roid, I can't complain about it because as I mentioned right in the beginning, I can't comment on the historical accuracy. Again, it wasn't the treatment of Christians I had an issue with, it was the treatment of Christianity.

Inaccuracies

Before the Crusades, the Christians DID NOT worship freely in Jerusalem (as mentioned in the dialogue) for the simple fact that in the year 1009 the Fatimid ruler of Egypt, "Al-Hakim" burnt the Church of the Holy Sepulcher to the ground. It was rebuilt few years later after intervention of the Byzantine Emperor.

Sibylla was in love with Guy de Lusignan and she married him because she loved him and in defiance of the whole kingdom including her Brother Baldwin IV. Guy was devilishly handsome and not the troll shown in the movie. He did not take part in the raid against the pilgrims' caravan. It was Reginald de Chatillon's crime and he alone bears the blame. Saladin attacked the fort of Kerak but it was so invincible that he had to withdraw, not because the king asked him. The king actuklly never went to Kerak and he never met Saladin. Reginald was never imprisoned by the King of Jerusalem, if anything he was imprisoned by the Arabs before becoming lord of Kerak.

After Baldwin IV (the leper) died, Sybilla's infant son, whom she bore to her first husband William de Montferrat became king as Baldwin V. He died after a year and then she was crowned queen. The patriarch would not crown Guy and to absolve himself he asked Sibylla to chose a king, which she did as shown in the movie.

Lastly and most important of all, Saladin DID NOT let the inhabitants of the city go free. He demanded a ransom for each inhabitant. A knight paid more than an ordinary man whose ransom in turn was double that of a woman's or a child's. Any inhabitant who could not pay the ransom was sold as a slave and this is a fact of history, which the director chose to ignore

I think it's on par with Troy more or less. KOH has an involving story, and the last battle scene alone was amazing. There were a few pacing problems, but I enjoyed the movie and it's easily recommended. And I really thought Orlando Bloom was absolutely terrific in the movie.

A-

Sort of inaccurate here

On 2 October 1187 Saladin and his army entered Jerusalem as conquerors and for the next 800 years Jerusalem would remain a Muslim city... Saladin kept his word, and conquered the city according to the highest Islamic ideals. He did not take revenge for the 1099 massacre, as the Koran advised (16:127), and now that hostilities had ceased he ended the killing (2:193-194). Not a single Christian was killed and there was no plunder. The ransoms were deliberately very low...

Saladin was moved to tears by the plight of families who were rent asunder and he released many of them freely, as the Koran urged, though to the despair of his long-suffering treasurers. His brother al-Adil was so distressed by the plight of the prisoners that he asked Saladin for a thousand of them for his own use and then released them on the spot...

http://www.islamdenouncesterrorism.com/ ... eeast.html

I saw an very good movie about Crusade. Very nice visuals as well. And some good message to. If you want go and see an entertaining movie like LOTR your wrong. Its also not an action movie (but the finale battle was very well done and looks amazing photorealistic).Unfortunately there are some rough cuts. Hopefully the Directors Cut will fix it.

I give a 8/10.

I was highly disappointed. Ridley Scott has made some amazing films, but he completely missed the boat on this one. Completely.

Memo to Ridley and the rest of Hollywood. DON'T SKIMP ON THE SCRIPT.

Orlando Bloom's character goes from a simple blacksmith in France to an accomplished leader, civil engineer, swordsman, military tactician, statesman, and King Solomon wannabe in the span of a month? Give me a freakin' break. I understand it was a movie and certain liberties have to be taken, but his character bordered on ridiculous. Normally I hate Orlando Bloom, but I thought he did his best with a terribly written part.

He shows up in his village/city/new desert neighborhood and "fixes" things in a couple of days that the locals have never figured out? Okay. Hopefully he planned to later head to Ethiopia to plant some corn and beans.

I also loved how Mr. Bloom kept running into the same Muslim throughout the film. How very convenient.

How did he know so much about the tactics the Muslims would use when he was from the middle of France? The local Crusaders seemed clueless.

The bad guys were so over the top ridiculously bad that it seemed cartoonish. Let's go kill, rape, and pillage and not worry at all about the consequences. Who cares if we're outnumbered and start an unwinnable war?

Now compare that with Troy and Alexander. I liked both films better. They were certainly far from perfect, but did a much better job of conveying that flawed men will make flawed decisions. We saw the men making their fatal choices, but we could see what would lead them to such illogical actions. The characters in KOH just seemed like Wile E. Coyote with swords. I hate films that have one-dimensional characters. KOH was full of them.

Bloom's speeches to the city of Jerusalem also bordered on ridiculous. What the hell? Ever since Gibson's damn talk in Braveheart, directors have their star warriors giving pep talks. It would have been much more compelling for Bloom to pull aside 10-20 men and talk to them and then send them out to talk to men in their area or unit.

Surrendering the city was smart on his part, but I don't see the people accepting the act so happily. They'd be happy to be alive, but would have been humiliated to surrender to the Muslims.

The battle scenes were fine, but nothing original. We get it. Thousands of guys with swords and horses and spears would lead to a chaotic, grisly, long lasting battle. Compared to Spartacus, the scenes were brilliant. But Spartacus was done in 1960. Compared to Braveheart, only ten years old, the scenes didn't stand out at all.

I just happened to watch Lawrence of Arabia the other day. That was a great film. That was a true epic. Kingdom of Heaven was a highly flawed movie that had a couple of good moments, but spent the better part of 2 1/2 hours bouncing from ridiculous to mediocre.

Another case of a movie where every character is more interesting then the protagnist, and I must say I found his goth like princess love intrest a total bore.

Come for the battles, stay for Edward Norton.

Bloom manged to not look like a handsome 15 year old women in this movie, he actually looked his age and attractive.

C+, for the good battle scenes, and intersting side characters, but they kille doff the most intersting people in the first battle.

I should have gone to see this instead of Crash orginally.

Just saw it.

Big dissapointment. Good battle scenes (though they cut the best one!), okay performances (Bloom sucked before, and guess what? no change...), but overall, the movie was a complete bore. It wasn't bad, but c'mon now, let's make it interesting? Please? C-

This movie really sucks. Except for the battles KOH is boring as hell. Never expected it to be that bad.

D+

B+, almost A-

Better than it should've been. Like bABA, I didn't care much for how accurate or how historical it was, but it was pretty enjoyable and engaging. Some parts I didn't quite understand, but it worked itself out. The movie is verryyyy well-produced and well-made, with good visuals, acting in Bloom who was surprisingly good, and direction. The fight scenes were pretty hardcore too, from Bloom and Neeson at the beginning to the full-out warfare at the end. And metal-faced leper king was hardcore I must say, great performance by him too.

I think Troy was easier to follow, had better characters, and was a lot more entertaining, but this was a lot slicker and more professional work, thanks to Ridley Scott. I think Troy was a little bit better, but not by much. This is close.

#7 of the year so far.

B-


To bring it to the point right away: I was disappointed big time. At first I actually didn't have any high expectations for it, especially because of the fact that the untalented Mr. Bloom took on the main part in the movie. However, slowly, but gradually, my expectations rose with well-amde teasers/trailers, as well as the early positive reviews. Additionally, I must admit that I like Ridley Scott as a director a lot and Gladiator, as well as Hannibal and Alien belong to my favorite movies. So I hoped that even if the movie isn't quite as good as Gladiator that it would at least become one of the better epics of recent time and to be on-par with Troy (which I didn't love, but liked a lot). The disappointment was bitter.


Certainly, the movie is not an absolute wrack. It would not be fair towards the efforts put into this movie to call it that. However, it is hard for me to speak of the positive aspects of the movie when there are so many negative ones that I don't even know where to begin.


For one, there is no denying the fact that Bloom really has not much of a talent as an actor. I have given the benefit of doubt to him often enough, but since LOTR he hasn't shown any significant improvement as far as his acting skills go. There is no doubt: Orlando Bloom ain't no Russell Crowe. It's pretty tragic if the actor who plays the main hero in an epic can't even act well and carries the same face expression throughout the entire movie. But not only we are punished with a not-so-well-acted hero, but also with a fabulously lame villain. By that I mean Marton Csokas' Guy de Lusignan whose portayal of a villain in Kingdom of Heaven has about the same quality and less complexity than his villain in xXx. If your villain has less depth than xXx' villain then you know that something has gone deeply wrong...and that is not a compliment to xXx... That's pretty sad as in Gladiator we were not only given a great hero, well-acted by Crowe, but also a villain with a complex personality, splendidly acted by Joaquin Phoenix. Gladiator thanks a lot of its greatness to the dynamics between the two. Kingdom of Heaven can surely not benefit from that.


Since I have mentioned Gladiator, I must say that Ridley Scott stole a lot from his own flick. Just think of the "fields in the wind" and the tragic circumstances the hero is in at the beginning of the movie, as well as the position of the villain (Emperor in Gladiator/King in KOH) in contrast to the hero (gladiator in Gladiator/ blacksmith in KOH). There are many more, but I don't want to spoil some parts of the movie. Scott even copied some of the camera angles he has used (Balian's arrival in Jerusalem vs. Maximus' arrival in Rome and others). Many similarites can't be overlooked.


For another, the pacing of the movie is flawed. The beginning, at which Balian (played by Bloom) meets his father, played by the great Liam Neeson and gets to Jerusalem is simply too short. After a five minutes long lesson in swordfighting by his father, Balian turns from a blacksmith into a perfect swordfighter (:-k). Also the hoped-for development of th relationship between father and son is practiacally non-existant. Too bad since Liam Neeson is great in his rather short appearance. The first quarter of the movie should have been developed much more. The movie loses its sense of time. On the whole, there is little to none character development in the entire movie. Both villains, played by Brendan Gleeson and Marton Csokas are as one-dimensional and simple as you get 'em. Ghassan Massoud has a very respectable appearance as Saladin, but he has little screentime. Jeremy Irons is simply wasted. That's a pity as he is one of the movie's most interesting characters. The relationship between Bloom's Balian and Eva Green's Sibylla barely develops and is being dropped in the middle of the movie. All the other characters get little chance to develop themselves. There's simply not much time and with 144 minutes running time the film seems too short, considering the epic undertaking. However, even another half an hour would hardly be enough to get rid of all the flaws and it still wouldn't make Bloom a better actor... It also must be noted that the "invisible" voice performance by the King of Jerusalem, sick with lepra (I won't spoil the actor, even though probably everyone knows already) was amazing. One of the best characters in the entire movie. Finally, Eva Green deserves some acknowledgement. She hasn't been given much to do, but for what she did and for her rather small-ish screentime, she was really good, on-par with Gladiator's Connie Nielsen (and certainly better than Troy's Diane Kruger).


However, you need to applaud the movie where it deserves it. All the techical aspects of the movie range from very good to excellent. The cinematography is admirable, the visual effects are pretty good and the art direction as well as the costumes are great. The final battle is great and very intense even if it somewhat doesn't live up to the hype surrounding it. It's still not as good as ROTK's Pelennor Fields battle, however, it easily tops Troy's biggest battle. Ridley Scott is not afraid of showing the brutality of war. There is enough blood flowing and enough stabbing and hacking can be seen. It's not an "airbrushed" battle, made to look good on screen. The battle looks very raw, brutal and, well, natural, especially at the very end. You'll see what I mean. Some of those mass battle scenes, once its simply people vs. people are quite breathtaking. Unfortunately, there is only one such big battle scene in the entire movie. However, there are enough smaller action bits throughout the entire movie to keep the viewer entertained. I still stick with my unpopular opinion that Alexander's battle at Gaugamela is the best battle scene since ROTK, but this comes very close. As I said, good effects and very intense/raw once it really gets down to life/death. Moreover, as mentioned above, there are many interesting supporting players in the movie. Eva Green, Ghassan Massoud and David Thewlis stick out. Unfortunately, they don't get enough screentime.


Overall, I must say that this one was one of the weakest historical epics in recent memory, in my opinion. I am a sucker for such movies, therefore, even if my rating seems a bit high in comparison to how I have described the movie, you must keep in mind that if I wasn't a big fan of those, it might have been even a bit worse. There are certain well-made things about this movie, such as the great technical aspects, good entertainment value and the fact that the movie actually carries a good message. Unfortunately, the movie fails almost everywhere where Gladiator succeeded and that undermines the message of the movie somewhat.


This is not another masterpiece by Ridley Scott.

Kingdom of Heaven is the most frustrating movie of the year, not because it was so thoroughly bad, but worse: it had enough nuggets of greatness that you could get a good sense of the much better film that could have been made and I was left feeling truly sorry for the many talented people who worked on this misguided movie, some of whom put in some great work and whose efforts were wasted.

The first 20 or more minutes are so recycled that I practically expected a Greenpeace stamp of approval to show up in the corner of the screen. We have the long lost father, the losing of loved ones (apparently real fun only begins in Hollywood after your wife or parents die), the mentor/student relationship, complete with the obligatory mentor death. The character of Balian, played by Orlando Bloom, is taken through a series of preposterous events at a rapid speed, as if the movie is saying "There was this blacksmith Balian, yadda yadda, he's a Knight now."

In the space of a few minutes, Balian buries his wife, learns and accepts without blinking that this stranger who claims to be the Baron of Ibelin is his father, commits murder, gets trained as an expert fighter, fights a group of soldiers, travels on a ship that gets wrecked in a storm, meets a stranger who he duels and gets led to Jerusalem. It's easy to fault Bloom as an actor, it's certainly clear now that he isn't a great one, but after seeing the even more bland Christian Bale in Batman Begins I can't fault just Bloom here. An actor can work for an audience if he at least looks the part and is directed well and has interesting lines to say. Part of the problem in Kingdom was that Bloom was simply miscast. Bloom's Balian looks unlikely to even lift a Crusader era sword, he might have a hard time lifting the scabbard and while his acting is monotonous, I saw enough duplications of Crowe's Gladiator expressions to convince me that he was doing what Ridley Scott told him to do.

But then something unexpected happens, just when I am about to give up on the movie. Three supporting characters appear that are acted and written so well it's astonishing, it is as if they walked in from another, much better film and were attempting to stage a coup and take over this mess of movie. Edward Norton plays the King, a leper, a visually striking and original character, full of intelligence and determination. All of his scenes were magnetic even though he was behind a mask and more than probably recording his lines in a studio later. His confrontation with Saladin in person, and the following confrontation with an errant Knight, beating him and forcing him to kiss his ring was a memorable high point of Kingdom that delivered finally what we expect, something original and grand. Also good was Eva Green as Sybilla, who has a real charisma and regal bearing, convincing in her role and showing a maturity older than her years. It is hard to believe she is only 25, this actress has the talent and charm of a more experienced actress. Green is going to go places if Hollywood gives her a chance.

Then there is Ghassan Massoud who would have ended up stealing Kingdom of Heaven if he was given any more screentime. As Saladin, Massoud is that good, thoroughly inhabiting the well-written role from his looks of concern for the health of the King to his picking up a toppled cross near the end, there were many small flourishes that made his character memorable, he came across as a tower of experience and strength, an opponent you'd fear all the more because you respect him. If Kingdom of Heaven had focused on the Leper King, Sybilla and Saladin instead of Balian it would have been a much more interesting film, possibly even a great one. Those were three well acted well written and somewhat unique characters, but they are put in service of a hackneyed, pointless and weakly acted character of Balian.

So yes, it all ends up feeling like a lot of great talent and effort wasted use in search of a misguided goal, not unlike the Crusades themselves.

I can't end this review without commenting on the ending, so don't read this part if you haven't seen the film. Balian is given a choice near the end. Norton's King asks Balian to agree to having the main villain Crusader arrested and executed, with Balian marrying his wife Sybilla who is also the sister of the king. This would bring peace with Saladin and save lives. But Balian says no, he's too moral for that and won't do it. Instead he opts for a path that results in the slaughter of thousands of low ranking soldiers, many of whom were likely peasants pressed into service against their will. It's such an immoral decision by Balian that I found it hard to have any sympathy for him, he destroyed the chance at peace and condemned many people to death. He should have listened to the more experienced and wiser King, who came across as a far more moral and intelligent figure than Balian.

B

After that review you might have expected a lower grade, but this movie was like many later Kubrick movies to me in that while it didn't work as it should have, it had some memorable moments that I'll remember a long time and that is one of the main reasons I go to movies.

edit: Bah, found a couple typos.

For a second there, I thought you copied my review and added some little comment under it, hehe.

Needless to say that I agree completely. My review sounds like a worse grade as well, but it's not that the movie is bad, it's that it is so frustratingly disappointing.