A trio of wonderful performance

Rating: Null/10 (3 April 2006)

This movie is based on true historical events surrounding Pocahontas, the Powhatans Indian princess who married to England in the 17th century, became a celebrity, but was lost to an unfortunately early death from illness (smallpox, tuberculosis or pneumonia, depending on which account you read). Pocahontas's story was first told on the screen in a Disney animation.
Although there are historical references, on both sides of the Atlantic, The New World is in heart a love story, nay, two love stories. When I describe it as spiritual, it is not so much in a religious sense as in the sense of the wonder and mystery of nature. Against the enrapturing visuals of the wild and mystic scores in the background, we see Pocahontas (Q'Orianka Kilcher) and adventurous Captain John Smith (Colin Farrell) not so much as two people from different cultural background as two children of nature. The apparent obstacle (lack of a common heritage or language) ironically becomes a bridge for their communication as they interact through signs, sounds, as well as movements that are at once playful and graceful.
We also hear voice over of the characters, in a languid, minimal tone, almost like whispering their feelings. Some critics have a problem with this extensive use of voice over in this movie. But while voice over can become a clutch to lazy or incompetent directors, it becomes this particularly movie, blending seamlessly with its surreal feeling, as if we are hearing directly from the depth of the souls of these characters.
While the love between Pocahontas and Smith starts in the purest form, it was eventually marred by another layer of Smith's being, an ambitious adventurer who has not given this relationship such absolute priority as Pocahontas has (she risks her life to save him AND his people from starvation). He is however not heartless, and when he eventually leaves her, he would have her believe that he had died so that she can be free to seek a happier future.
In John Rolfe (Christian Bale) Pocahontas finds, instead of "pure" instinctive love, a blending of more mature emotions  care, comfort, trust. In Rofle she finds a man that she knows will never leave her, and a man who trusts her enough to bring to her an old lover that she thought is dead. Towards the end of the movie, Pocahontas sees Smith one more time, in an almost stoic mood. Then, it's almost as if the albatross has been dropped, she is back at Rolfe's side and the audience is bathed in serene joy.
Ferrell hits just the right balance to make the character Smith work. Bale is marvellous, and whoever found Kilcher deserves an award in casting.