What a waste of a good idea

Rating: 3/10 (1 February 2006)

This movie had the makings of being great, beautiful locations, authentic sets, great actors, score, script, everything... So what happened. I don't know, there were so many things wrong that I lost count and wanted to leave after about 15 minutes knowing that it was hopeless. Was there a script to this movie? - I don't know because hardly anyone had any face to face dialog. The editing was dismal, I don't think a piece of film was left on the cutting floor. The whole movie felt chopped up with no story-line and character development. I like this genre, authentic historical pieces, so that's why I went, but take away the sets, costumes and scenery and you are left with an empty shell that moves slower than the over-long scenes of rivers flowing to eternity.James Horners music was so annoying, I wanted to cover my ears and the hand held camera was so bad in a couple of scenes I was dizzy and had to look away. At the end I couldn't help but feel that a lot of wonderful work went into this movie, the sets, the costumes, the ships, the locations and it was all a waste.