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Rating: 2 out of 5
During World History in high school, one of the areas we stopped upon was the Crusades. It always fascinated me because of how long they lasted. So, the question to ask is, what were the Crusades? Well, here I am to drop some education on you. The Crusades were a series of religious wars between Christians and Muslims. The primary thing that started to whole holy war was to control holy sites considered sacred by both groups. Eight major Crusade expeditions occurred between 1096 and 1291—almost 200 years of war. If you watched ANY Robin Hood movie, the main timeline was during the Crusades, and King Richard is always off, fighting in the war. One video game stands out to me about this period. It was Dante’s Inferno, which was a crazy game in itself. The main character, Dante, was a Templar knight from the Crusade who committed numerous atrocities during the Third Crusade. It’s a good game, but once again, it is quite crazy.
Ridley Scott has come along and dropped a historical film about the Crusades. A film that is large and tries to show what was going on and how s**t officially hit the fan with things. A movie where Scott went from Gladiator and tries to recreate his magic with the war between Christianity and Muslims.
As the Crusades rage on, in 1184, French village blacksmith Balian (Bloom) has just buried his wife, who died after committing suicide. Lord Godfrey (Neeson), Baron of Ibelin, visits Balian, reveals himself as his father, and offers him a crusader life. Balian at first refuses but quickly changes his mind after killing the priest (Sheen) for stealing his wife’s cross and being provoked. While fleeing the French bishop’s bloody justice and seeking divine forgiveness, Balian decides to join the Crusades and go to Jerusalem. Balian is trained in the skills of war and fighting. After a brief battle with the bishop’s men, Lord Godfrey is mortally wounded. On his deathbed, Balian is dubbed a knight in Messina by his father. While making the journey, dude gets into a shipwreck and ends up on the Levantine coast. Balian quickly proves himself a superior knight as a fighter and noble idealist in the loyal service of leper King Baldwin. Even though he gains trust from King Baldwin, the king’s right hand and heir to his throne, Guy de Lusignan thinks he is nothing but a peasant and wants total war. As war is upon them, Balian is tasked with defending Jerusalem from the impending force.
This film has me perplexed. I am really having a hard time thinking if it is a good movie or a bad movie. When I have to think on this, I might as well land in the middle. The film isn’t terrible, but from Ridley Scott, I think I was expecting more. Maybe not on the level of Gladiator but something close to it. The major flaw was with main actor Orlando Bloom, but we will get to him in a second.
Not that I am aware of it, but most movies don’t revolve around the Crusades, so it was nice to see a film about it and learn a little bit about it even though most of this film’s actual characters had different storylines. For the most part, like I said before, my extent with the Crusades is Robin Hood and the whole war that was over 100 years, which included five crusades in total, but that is neither here or there. You can take the time to read about them later, this is about the film.
This film really took its sweet time to get going. It is a three-hour film, and it took every little bit of me to pay attention and keep watching it. Honestly, this film could’ve been two hours and 15 minutes, and it would’ve been okay. The pacing of this whole film was off. I guess it’s because we had to do a full hour to know why the main character was off to fight. The second hour dealt with all the political BS and why one side wanted to fight, and the other didn’t. Then finally, we get to a battle scene. It just took its sweet time, and it wasn’t the fault movie but maybe the director.
This brings me to Ridley Scott. I know you did a great job with Gladiator, and you tried to do the same thing with this film, but it didn’t quite work as well. Actually, now that I think about it, this movie was the exact same thing as Gladiator but just a different timeline. The feel and look were all like Gladiator, but it fell flat. Now, I know Scott knows how to direct, and he spent a lot of time researching the topic and what he wanted to do. He did pick a great battle to show, which was the best part of the movie.
I guess where this movie strives is all the political BS that went on behind people’s back and who didn’t like who. First, Guy of Lusignan was an absolute punk a**-b***h! You want to talk about someone with a stick up their ass, this dude had one shoved so far up, it is crazy. I couldn’t stand him, and all he wanted was power. What did he do when he got it? F****d it all up and lost badly. Then he let his homeboy, Raynald of Châtillon, run wild. What was it all for? To declare a war against someone that was superior to them in every way possible. Then there was Saladin, who was a conquering person but knew who to exploit people’s weaknesses. The dude was a military beast.
Now for the action, it comes in the latter half of the film. Actually, with the action and fighting scenes, they are more like Hansel and Gretel. Small bread crumbs are placed throughout the film to keep your attention and somewhat engaged in the movie. The first bread crumb is when Balian of Ibelin throws the priest in the fire because he took his dead wife’s necklace. Maybe that is going a little too far, but I’m okay with it. With that act, it led to Balian taking up the offer of his deadbeat dad, Barisan of Ibelin. This is when things get exciting because there is a nice little fight scene with some gruesome deaths. Another bread crumb comes when Balian lands and has to ride through the desert and meets up with a person who wants his horse. Fighting and dying over a horse, bad way to go. Well, all this leads up to the Siege of Jerusalem. I will say that it was a nice cherry on top because the whole battle and defense were great to see. Want to talk about holding a position at all cost. This one showed it.
This movie seemed to have every actor from across the ocean in it. If you thought of a person, it probably had it. It had Scar himself, Jeremy Irons. It had Zeus and Batman’s mentor, Liam Neeson. It had freakin Edward Norton. It had so many people that you will spend half the movie trying to figure out who they are and what picture you saw them in. It also had my crush and future ex-wife, EVA GREEN! Eva Green was such a babyface in this movie and yet as beautiful as ever. The woman was FINE! I love me some Eva Green.
Now for the acting of main star Orlando Bloom. Orlando, Orlando, Orlando. I don’t know what type of acting you were doing in this film, but damn, was it bad. You had absolutely no emotion in this role. You had the same monotone speech throughout the whole movie. Whether you were giving a speech to talking to Green’s character, you had the same speech tone throughout the entire film. Did you think to change your voice because you made it an absolute bore to watch you act. It was straight torture.
Kingdom of Heaven is one of those movies that is in the middle or Meh. If you want to get a taste of what the Crusades were about. The pacing is a little too slow for my blood, and some of the acting (cough, cough Orlando Bloom) was pretty meh. The cast is excellent as it has many people in it. Nice try Ridley Scott but try again next time with this topic.
