Mixed Feelings

Rating: 7/10 (3 April 2011)

I have mixed feelings about this movie. It's a slow movie, choosing to showcase characters and dialogue over the battle scenes. Which is fine as the characters and dialogue are both exceptionally good, and the acting is, for the most part, fine. But there are so many characters, with so many conversations and so many back-stories, by the end I had trouble keeping track of any of them. The battle scenes, however, are fantastic. Long and brutal, they really are great to watch, though a PG rating prevents them from being appropriately brutal and therefore realistic. I also didn't like how one-sided the battles were. Though the movie is quite balanced and has main characters on both sides of the conflict, the battles are only shown one side at a time. The first big battle on Little Big Top is shown entirely from the Union's point of view, and the ending battle is shown entirely from the Confederates point of view, which kind of hurt the movie and it's character development. For instance, Colonel Chamberlain, is shown anticipating the final battle, but is never actually shown in the battle, nor is he shown afterwards until the final scene, so we have no idea how he held up or what he was doing throughout the entire battle. All in all, though, this was a pretty good movie, and a great experience, though it would have been better if it wasn't four hours long.