Kingdom Of Heaven (Director's Cut) [Blu-ray]

The best action packed film have seen for ages

Excellent film Taken from history would recommend.

Kingdom of Heaven has taken a fair bit of criticism from many historians who are upset at its lack of historical accuracy. While they are correct in pointing out that it does take a fair bit of licence with historical fact, they miss out on the point that director Ridley Scott is not an historian. He is a movie maker charged with the responsibility of making an entertaining and profitable film. This he does on both counts. The film may not have been as successful in America as the studio would have liked but it has done well in Europe and combined with DVD sales it will turn over a nice little profit in the end. As far as beind a straight forward film is concerned, Kingdom of Heaven is pretty damn good. It loses one star for two reasons.1. Orlando Bloom, while not bad, doesn't seem strong enough to play the defender of Jerusalem.2. It's at least 30 minutes too short.Bloom is a good young actor. He is handsome and appears to have a bit more depth to him than many leading men at the moment do. However, the role of Balian calls for someone who you believe battle hardened Knights would be prepared to follow during a siege on their city. Surrounded by men like Jeremy Irons, Brendan Gleeson and Liam Neeson, young Orlando doesn't give you the impression of being the kind of brave, strong, tough, cruel and generous leader that would have been necessary to motivate his men. Bloom may eventually grow into that kind of actor, but he isn't there just yet and it detracts from the film.Also, there is too much left unexplained in the movie. Like where does Balian, who starts out as a humble blacksmith, gain such a mastery of weaponry and tactics to be able to fight to a standstill an experienced general like Saladin, and how does he manage to hold onto his Father's estates. It is obvious that his Father is a man of some wealth and influence, surely somebody would have been looking to take these for themselves rather than allow them to pass into the hands of an illegitiamte son who knew his Father only a matter of weeks before his death. Young Balian is excepted far too easily and too much is left unexpalined during the course of the film. However, these critiscims aside, Kingdom of Heaven is a pretty good movie. It is engrossing, zips along at a good pace, has some excellent acting performances most notably from Irons, Gleeson (is this man able to turn in a bad performance. He is consistently excellent no matter what he is in), Neeson and most impressively of all from Edward Norton who plays the King of Jerusalem afflicted by leperosy. In his eerie and almost etheral performance, you get an idea of what a real medieval king would have been like. It is an understated yet tremendously effective show. Also some of the lesser supporting actors put in good performances most notably that of Saladin and also of the Templar Knight who succeeds to the throne on the leper King's death. KOH, also has more of an epic feel to it than Gladiator which was really about one man's quest for revenge, but it lacks that films emotional drive, mainly due to the lead performance. True, it isn't historical fact, but it is based on real events and characters and it is a lot closer to fact than Braveheart. The fall of Jerusalem and the Third Crusade lasted over seven years, and was an intricate mish mash of truces, plots and alliances. Scott isn't going to be able to cover it in a two and a half hour film, and keep people entertained at the same time.

Quality good, fast delivery

"There can be no victory except through God"Kingdom of Heaven is directed by Ridley Scott and written by William Monahan. It stars Orlando Bloom, Eva Green, Marton Csokas, Jeremy Irons, Liam Neeson, Alexander Siddig, David Thewlis, Ghassan Massoud and Edward Norton. Cinematography is by John Mathieson and music scored by Harry Gregson-Williams.Director's Cut, two words that has these days come to mean a marketing ploy to get the home movie fan to part with more cash. Except maybe when they call it something else, such as Unrated Edition or Extended Edition, the Director's Cut has rarely been more than the original theatrical version with some added bits sewed back in. Case in point Ridley Scott's own Gladiator. But Scott is a big advocate of the home formats available to us, and what he says in his introduction on these releases are always telling. Kingdom of Heaven: Director's Cut is one of the rare cases that deserves the label, it is the cut Scott wanted and with 45 minutes extra in the film, it's now a fully formed epic and without doubt a better film than the one the theatrical cut suggested.Nutshell plotting finds the story set during the Crusades of the 12th century. Balian (Bloom) is a French village blacksmith who after finally meeting his father Godfrey (Neeson), sets him on a course to aid the city of Jerusalem in its defence against the Muslim leader Saladin (Massoud). Saladin is battling to reclaim the city from the Christians. It's a fictionalised account of Balian de Ibelin the man, but with the Crusades featuring so rarely in movies it's good to see one with attention to detail in relation to the events and time period.Now this version exists there is no reason to visit the theatrical cut, for although this has one or two missteps in the narrative, big holes have been plugged and characters importantly expanded. Benefiting the most are Eva Green as Sibylla, and Bloom himself as Balian. The former now gets substance on why she transforms from a measured princess to a borderline head-case, and the latter gets a back story which helps us understand why he does what he does. Both actors performances are seen in better light as their characters become more defined. Neeson and Norton, too, also get more screen time, and that can never be a bad thing.In this day and age the topicality of the film as regards Muslims and Christians is obviously hard to ignore, but Scott and Monahan are not in the market for political posturing. Scott had long wanted to do a film about The Crusades, to make it an historical epic adventure reflecting the period, and he has achieved that without head banging messages. In fact the culmination of the films major battle comes by way of tolerance, compassion and mutual respect, not by over the top histrionics or side picking. It's a crucial point to note that the makers have not demonized the Arab leaders, both Saladin and Nasir (Siddig) are portrayed as intelligent and cultured men of standing. Their drive and determination coming off as respectful as Balian's defence of Jerusalem is. They also provide the film with two of its best acting performances. Impressive considering the film is full of very good acting turns.It will come as no surprise to fans of Scott's work to find that Kingdom of Heaven is tremendous on production value. Filled out with astonishing visuals and no overuse of CGI, it's arguably Scott's best production: it's certainly his most ambitious. Filmed in Spain and Morocco, the makers easily whisk us back centuries to the France and Jerusalem of the time, the ability to plant us firmly in the time frame is not to be understated. Mathieson (Gladiator) is a big part of that, his colour lensing for France (metallic cold blues) and Jerusalem (dusky yellow and brown hues) is a visual treat and integral to the feel of the story. While Gregson-Williams' score rarely gets a mention, but it's very at one with Scott's vision, a delightful mix of ethnic strains, mystical flair and medieval emphasis. Scott also ups the ante for visceral battles, the horrors of war never more vivid as they are here. Supremely constructed, the siege of Jersualem is one of the finest in cinema, the first sight of fireballs igniting the night sky bringing the hairs on the back of the neck standing to attention. It's just one of many great moments that form part of Scott's breath taking epic.Badly treated on cinema release by the studio, who even marketed that cut badly, Kingdom of Heaven: Director's Cut is these days worthy of a revisit and deeper inspection. For rich rewards await the genre faithful. 9.5/10

Eclampsia film

Entertaining

History and Action