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In Reply to: Ridley Scott, Kingdom of Heaven posted by townsend on December 31, 2004 at 16:11:51:
Ridley Scott does have a good track record with these big, bold visual films, but for each successful historical (ahem) epic like Gladiator, he has a 1492. It's hard to peg down what makes some of his films very good and others less so. I can't say that it's due to style over substance or sotry in the weaker films. Blackhawk Down was just as good as Thelma and Louise, though it was non-stop action. I will have to think about why this is ...
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Today, with all the hard competition in the music business, it's almost impossible to come up with anything totally original. So we haven't. However, this disc was made with the accent on heavy music.
Follow Ups:
TA: I too liked Blackhawk Down, and thought Scott did a terrific job with it. While working at an acute care clinic (I'm a PA-C) in Addison, TX, I met one of the soldiers (Ranger, as I recall) who was not only there in Mogadishu, but he was actually portrayed in the movie!I can't recall which one--it has been several years ago, but I felt like I was in the presence of a hero--someone who walked the walk, and talked the talk. Very nice unassuming guy.
At any rate, he was pleased with Scott's handling of the material, and is actually featured in one of the interviews on the multi-disk set (I only own the superbit one-disc version--supposedly worth it only for the superb DTS soundtrack).
1492 was okay at best. I agree, not among Scott's best work by any stretch of the imagination, but worth watching a few times.
I have to say that the "non-Scott" directed track record for those historic epic movies is pathetic. While I enjoyed Troy (perhaps a guilty pleasure, but " . . . is there no one else? . . ."), Alexander was crappy, and Arthur was too "Hollywoody" (I attribute that to Bruckheimer, who also ruined Pearl Harbor).
When Hollywood makes these loser historic epic movies, we can't really expect more to be made. As I read several years ago, they probably got made riding on the wake of the wave created by Peter Jackson's LoTR (ok, fantasy rather than a historic epic, but similar grand scale), which demonstrated to Hollywood that if these grand scale movies are done right, movie goers will pay to see them.
all the best, townsend
I will admit too that I enjoyed Troy! Beautiful people fighting epic battles ... what could be wrong? Critics have criticized the film missteps for making Achilles too human, more like a 20th century character instead of a mythological one, and I would agree that that choice detracts from the mood you hope to get out of an epic. Gladiator was faster paced and had more thrilling fight scenes, and Russell Crowe said some crazy dumb lines like it was gospel. You just have to go all the way when you do something like that. it was better entertainment overall.I did not see Alexander, but I imagine it's more of an "Oliver Stone film" than a historical epic. Stone's films in general I'm mixed about.
Arthur was dull. It started out like a wet, rainy day (and looked like it was shot on a wet, rainy day) and never dried up to let any sun shine through. Also too campy for my tastes. It did introduce American audiences to Clive Owen, who is a fantastic actor.
There's always films like Ben Hur to revisit. The chariot race still thrills me every time - it's exciting on its own *and* the story builds up a lot of drama in the outcome so the viewer bites his fingernails every step of the way.
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Today, with all the hard competition in the music business, it's almost impossible to come up with anything totally original. So we haven't. However, this disc was made with the accent on heavy music.
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