It's gritty, dirty but also beautiful

Rating: 10/10 (11 August 2008)

A tight script with very few holes, a wonderfully full-bodied score, great panoramas and characters we can immediately sympathise with; Braveheart tells the story of a true protagonist resisting a cruel, tyrannic and insurmountable enemy.
When we witness the very brutal murder of William Wallace's wife in an up-close and personal way, we cannot but feel emotionally invested and so we share in Wallace's blood lust, not just for revenge, but for justice also. What a great evil villain Patrick McGoohan portrays as Long Shanks, the King of England! His sudden, swift deliverance of rage or the foreboding tremor is his voice, makes him truly terrifying. How we can so easily loath everything about his tyrannic kingship. This character has no redeeming features other than you LOVE to hate him. He is a wretch who's only motivation is to maintain absolute and total power and he has no qualms about the suffering of others to maintain it.
Oh really, who cares if the movie itself is grossly and historically inaccurate! Perhaps it embodies the original spirit of the man become myth... or perhaps it elaborates too much for some... I guess normally I would detest such liberties on historical accuracy and shy away from the forced elements of the blockbuster, but in this case I allow it licence simply because it has managed to seamlessly forge all the elements of good storytelling together. It is the perfect movie for the escapist; acting near like opera, Braveheart plays off deep inherent feelings, plucking at our heart strings to feast upon our most basic and primordial emotions. It is a gritty movie -especially the battle scenes- yet also sweet and sentimental. The movie will take you... and you yourself will fall willingly into it. Let it sweep you away...