Great entertainment, less history

Rating: Null/10 (3 October 2004)

I finally got the DVD and found it to be great entertainment. The actors give an outstanding performance and bring a sense of the "human" side to the heroes that everyone in Texas believes to be larger than life. Unfortunately, even the movie in its attempt to be "accurate" left a few things to be entertainment only and not history based. For example, just where was the actual church location in regards to the rest of the mission? Not that close to the main courtyard. How many people were captured at the end of the battle? Most reports say seven, even this movie's director claimed to use that report, but why was there only one shown? Entertainment. Several other things will stand out to "Alamo Buffs" as odd, but the fact is this is just one person's view of the battle. There are very few reports that can be considered true and accurate. The people inside the fort were scared to death, the survivors saw or knew their husbands were dead. They were likely in shock. The men taking the Alamo had seen their friends killed as they fought side-by-side. The attack itself took place in the dark so who knows what happened on either side? The entire case for the Alamo plays out like a courtroom drama. Any given lawyer could argue for or against just about any aspect of the Alamo. It was recently actually mentioned that the Alamo defenders may have stayed to protect gold and silver that Bowie brought in to help fund the Texas rebellion. Again, historians will become lawyers and argue that for sometime too. My final vote is The Alamo is good. It is as good as Wayne's Alamo was for 1960 (and at least attempting to be more accurate). I've added to my collection and found that in no way did any of the Alamo defenders ever appear to be cowards. They were ordinary men who were asked to face the impossible. Some of them were just built up larger than life even during their lifetimes.