Kingdom of Heaven

[sumire]

I want to agree with you, but that round chest shadow makes it look like he has a weird boob.

[Deleted]

Saw this yesterday. The burning questions:

1. Can Orlando carry a movie? Well, he's a bit weak at the beginning, overpowered by Liam Neeson's strong presence. But as the movie continues and his character grows, Orlando gets stronger until he's more than up to the task. So the answer's yes, with help from an excellent supporting cast.

2. Is it better than Troy/Alexander et al. Yes. Easily. Which is why the lukewarm Rotten Tomatoes score is fairly baffling to me. The characters don't have quite the depth they do in Gladiator but I'm not quite sure which I enjoyed more out of those two. No one does battle scenes quite like Ridley Scott and they were some of the best bits, along with building a complete beleivable world around the characters. Jerusalem, unlike Troy, looks like a real city, lived in and already battered by time and war. Every so often there's a scene that will remind people of Troy or of Lord of the Rings but I think that's the shared visual language of the epic genre.

Loved seeing David Thewliss there (he gets some of the best lines), Jeremy Irons was good, not enough Alexander Siddig, and Eva Green as the love interest is far more interesting than the bland blonde chick from Troy.

[angel17987]

Moldy said:

The movie finished first at the box office...thus sparing us from Paris Hilton staring in the #1 movie. Although, with an opening weekend of $20 million, it looks like it's going to be an expensive flop.

While I'm happy Paris isn't in the #1 movie, according to IMDB, Kingdom of Heaven cost $130 million to make. So yeah, a $20 million opening weekend isn't so good.
Maybe now the Orlando craziness will die down somewhat, and the epics will go on hiatus and the viewing audience can read a history book.
Who am I kidding? That's never going to happen.

[cari]

It made $56 million in Europe, though. So, that taken into account, it's a flop, just not expensively.

[heavenwithagun]

It's an incredible snoozer unfortunately. Orlando was fairly good but he could have been better. He just looked too work-a-day. Maybe the supporting actors scared him. He looked like he was thinking "why did I sign on to this" through the whole thing.

It was good during the Edward Norton scenes (I'm not really a fan of his and only saw his name when I checked at imdb to see who the actor for that role was).

[londonaster]

I saw it today and thought it was really good. And so was Orlando. I didn't giggle at his line delivery once. During PotC I couldn't stop, well the dialogue was stupid but that's beside the point. He was just bad in PotC and Troy.

The final battle nearly had me in tears with that speech(would say more but I have no idea how to spoiler tag sentences).

I definitely don't remember the Crusades being this interesting in European History.

This movie really didn't do well. But for Orlando's first leading movie it's a starting point. Next week it might do decent, maybe get a word of mouth boost, but when Star Wars comes out it's done. Shame because Ridley Scott made an amazing movie, should've released it in November.

I nearly forgot to mention, Orlando looked like a man! Instead of his usual man-boy look. I think the gray in the facial hair might have helped.

ETA: Edward Norton was King Baldwin?! What the hell?

[Deleted]

I loved this movie (not just because I am an avid Orlando-gusher) because I actually thought about it after I left the theater and there hasn't been a movie that has made me do that in a while! In fact, I spent so much time talking about this movie over the weekend that I am sure my family/friends wanted to put a muzzle on me.

I loved all of the scenes between Balian and Baldwin. The battle scenes were awesome, though the final one did make me think ROTK/Pelennor Fields. The bloodier the battle sequences, the better as far I am concerned.

Favorite performances(besides Orlando): Eva Green, Edward Norton and Ghassan Massoud.

I didn't feel that there were any good guys or bad guys. There were definitely power-hungry ones, but not necessarily bad. Each side was struggling to make good decisions and each leader was being lead not only by his religious beliefs but also by political pressure. The ways that this was portrayed was so awesome! Okay, I'll stop now. Will definitely be going to see it again!

[Deleted]

I'm with you bisonchiefnole. I loved the movie.

While the movie isn't a blockbuster by any means, I wouldn't consider it a flop. And it certainly isn't Orlando's fault.

A lot was cut from the movie and in parts, it was pretty choppy. I can't wait for the extended edition DVD!

I thought everyone was excellent in the movie - not a bad performance.

[lurker]

Quick Question: At the beginning of the movie, why did they have to cut off his wife's head? I know she was a suicide, but wasn't burying her in unconsecreated ground enough?

[egplantda]

That is historical and probably just gratuitously thrown in to underscore the movie's point that people have done all kinds of horrible things throughout history in the name of religion, including passing judgement on people. (as in final judgement, not that light, snarky bs we do when we say that a celebrity is a skank)

I enjoyed it and I usually can't stomach that kind of action/violence. The acting was solid (even Orlando's), the story was choppy (will def. rent director's cut), but that it was good overall.

And it made me very reflective (at 1:00am no less!) about the present mid-east conflict, modern day terrorism, etc. So I think Ridley's mission was accomplished.