Best ACW film there is

Rating: Null/10 (18 June 2001)

What was the Englishman living Down under smoking? He's critiquing a movie about the largest land battle fought in United States and calling it American nationalism!? The movie is about Americans fighting Americans at a crucial point in the Civil War. I would guess that what that gentleman knows about the American Civil War wouldn't fill a Dixie cup.
Was the movie 100% accurate? No but, it was true to Michael Shaara's book. As I recall, Historian/Re-enactor Brian Pohanka recommended pages upon pages of changes and by his own estimation, Mr. Maxwell incorporated some 85% of them. That is good enough for me. I thought that the interpretations of their characters by the leading actors were great. I especially liked Tom Berenger as James Longstreet, Jeff Daniels as Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain, Martin Sheen as R. E. Lee and Sam Elliott as John Buford.
Was there speechifying. You bet! But a world 138 years removed from the battle may deserve a little reminder of what made these people fight.
When the movie got down to the fighting, it did a terrific if not quite bloody enough portrayal of it. The scenes of the 20th Maine fighting the 15th and 47th Alabama Regiments on Little Round Top were gems. They did an excellent (if incomplete) job of showing what's going through a man's mind, fighting his first action in charge of his regiment. Historically speaking, the only flaw there was was not showing Chamberlain detaching Company B and then wondering what happened to them throughout the fight (something that occurred in the book).
Was the movie complete? No, I don't think the intention was to show the whole battle. It was trying to show what Mr. Shaara put in his book. I'd like to see a movie about the whole battle (somewhere out there, I'm told are 6 hour cuts of the movie - I'd kill to see one of those.)
Finally, to our English buddy: the book "The Killer Angels" was written at a time in our Nation's history (1974, I believe)when it was down on itself about anything that smacked of the American Military. Mr. Shaara intended to show American Military characters who were proud, smart, and pugnacious and, beneath it all were generally good people. All wore white hats in his portrayal of the events of these three days. The tension was in the battle itself and, we didn't get gypped there either.