Rollicking historical action movie that fires up the blood

Rating: 8/10 (8 September 2008)

I remember coming out of the cinema after first seeing this film back in 1995 and being so fired up and just enthralled by it. It may in part have been because of the Irish references and the Irish connections and to note that the Scots weren't all that dissimilar to us Irish in celebrating getting one or two over on the ole English oppressors.
Yesterday I visited the Wallace Monument on Craig Abbey in Stirling overlooking the battle site of Stirling Bridge and just had to re watch it when I got home.
Of course Randall Wallace, as well as being responsible for some subsequent awful clangers, most notably Pearl Harbour, took some considerable poetic licence in stretching the fiction of Wallace's life to its very limit and even beyond, but considering that little it actually known about very much of Wallace's life beyond what has been based on Blind Robbie's poem, he succeeded in weaving a powerful and inspiring and both uplifting and harrowing story of the man, who probably more than any other, still lives within the hearts of Scots more than 800 years on.
Possible Spoilers:
Of what we do know of Wallace's life, well of that presented in the museum in the Wallace Memorial in any case, is that he was the son of a very minor Scottish noble, he was educated in Latin and French probably by one or two of his uncles who were priests. He had a disagreement with some English soldier/occupiers while he was apparently fishing and had to go on the run and, the English, in trying to get at him did burn down his house with his wife inside and he did revenge her murder. He did achieve a great tactical victory over a superior English force at Stirling Bridge which was achieved more by the nature of the swampy terrain and the narrow bridge than by what is depicted in the film as a battle on an open plain with a cavalry charge defeated by pointed sticks. The English were supposedly shocked by the savagery of the Scots who systematically slaughtered all the injured English on the battlefield and it is alleged that Wallace himself had a sword belt made from the skin of the English commander of the battle. He was betrayed by the rest of the Scottish nobles at Falkirk, who refused to lend him their support. Robert the Bruce's father did have leprosy which Robert himself ultimately also succumbed to. Wallace never did meet the Princess of Wales since he was dead three years before her arrival in England and Edward de Longchamps outlived Wallace for some three years also and whilst Edward Prince of Wales may have been exaggeratedly or misleadingly portrayed as an exteremely camp weak prince, there is considerable evidence to indicate that he was a homosexual, this in spite of producing a number of offspring with his French wife including Edward III, who ultimately overthrew him with the assistance of his mother.
However, if all these hard facts had been adhered to too rigidly would it have made for near as good of a movie? I don't think so.
There are a number of excellent scenes within the movie, most notably Wallace's visit to the English military camp to revenge his wife's murder, The Freedom speech before the battle of Stirling is probably one of the best in movie history, all the battle scenes are magnificently if gorily realised and the final execution scene is both graphic, harrowing and inspiring and overall the graphic gore developed within this movie was ultimately to become Gibson's trademark and that which was to invite so much criticism in The Passion.
This is a truly inspiring film, perhaps not entirely nor anywhere near historically accurate, but in terms of large scale entertainment and the realisation of a vision in cinema it is a great achievement, right up there with Spartacus and Ben Hur, and well worthy of the recognition it received.