A few words to describe many

Rating: 7/10 (17 April 2004)

Apart from colorful and dramatic sequences that play lavishly over the screen, imparting a generally correct and truthful sense of place as well as history, this is a movie of words. Too many in some places and too few in others.
This is not the cartoonish Alamo of Fess Parker or John Wayne. Thankfully so. But neither is it a summary of all that was actually good or bad about the seminal event that created "Texas" as a concept bigger than life and arguably still representative of the changing frontier in North America.
To put it briefly, I liked what was here but came away dismayed by what was not here. Any movie that presumes to portray an actual and well-documented historical event must do more than touch on this or that fragment of fact. The production staff is obliged to accept what is presented to them by the writers, the actors, and the director -- leaving on the cutting room floor only irrelevant scraps. I have the feeling that procedure was not followed here. Too many threads holding the story together are missing.
For example, the single most important motive lying at the heart of the Texas rebellion is inadequately explained. Was it merely greed and personal ambition on both sides that created the conflict? Or racial and ethnic disputes? Or Manifest Destiny? There is absolutely no clear picture to be gained from this movie that sets in perspective what the fuss was all about. Yet we have glorious and stirring speeches (or at least aphorisms) emanating from all parties, delineating character rather well but existing only in an isolated truth here or a compelling argument there.
Somewhere on that cutting room floor, I suspect, are scenes that focus less on individual character and more on the fact that "Texians" were a unique combination of English-speaking and Spanish-speaking citizens of the newly-created nation of Mexico, a remote outpost or colony of the central government that grew too large for that government to handle. In that sense, it was just like any other historical event reflecting a desire on the part of a distinct group of persons living at the edge of an empire to achieve self-government.
When seen thus, the merging of cultural differences that characterize Texas even today presents a unified entity of mutual interest. What holds this story together, as very ably shown in bits and pieces of the film, is how important it is to recognize what humanity holds in common in spite of apparent differences.
Little wonder that Billy Bob Thornton as Davy Crockett steals the show. (Unlike Dennis Quaid as a one-dimensional caricature of my collateral ancestor Sam Houston.) This movie could have been another thirty minutes longer and mutually subtitled to get at the heart of its message. No Oscars for the current cut.