Rousing, vigorous, with the strength and conviction of Mel Gibson's performance and the realism of the battle sequences. ***1/2 (out of four)

Rating: 9/10 (25 August 2000)

THE PATRIOT / (2000) ***1/2 (out of four)
"The Patriot" is a rousing, vigorous Revolutionary War epic from the view point of a family full of vengeance and strong wills. Mel Gibson reprises his "Braveheart" characteristics for a production that shares many common factors, such as frequent and graphic battle sequences that are persuasive, personal, and tragic. He stars as a widower named Benjamin Martin, who contains fond memories of his late wife and is raising several children on a South Carolina estate in 1776. Of course, he is haunted by deep secrets in his past and is an expert on the French and Indian war. King George's taxation without representation is the subject of conflict here, and although Martin believes the policy to be unjust, he wants nothing to do with supporting war with the British.
Benjamin's oldest son, Gabriel (Heath Ledger in an overzealous performance), goes against his father's strong intentions and joins the rebellion by enlisting as a soldier in the war. Soon a wounded Gabriel returns to his father's plantation as a battle occurs in the front of their livelihood, and the diabolically cruel Col. William Tavington (Jason Isaacs) orders the novice solider to be hanged. In fury one of Benjamin's other children (Gregory Smith from "Small Soldiers") is killed for interrupting the process, compliments of Tavington.
Naturally this action triggers an impulse within Benjamin whose rage causes him to switch to battle mode and, with the help of his two younger sons, ambushes the party in charge of Gabriel's hanging. Benjamin then takes up arms against the British and is given the command of a militia. With the help of French warrior Jean Villeneuve (Tcheky Karyo), he marks a full-throated revenge against the man who killed his son, and who changed his previous life.
The film is fond of bridging on emotions such as love, patriotism and betrayal. These emotions are true to the story, and relate well with the audience. There is also some mild comic relief, revolving around simple-minded misunderstandings and character traits. Mel Gibson's "Braveheart" similarly portrayed such humor to ease the tension. But in a movie with as much human depth and tragic occurrences as "The Patriot," why would the filmmakers want to induce chuckles. They only decrease the seriousness of the subject matter-although the production is careful not to tread over its head in laughs and foolishness.
I did see a few excessively familiar clichés within the material of "The Patriot"; how many times do we really need to see a father raising his children on his own because his spouse passed away a few years earlier. In lesser films I can see where their dim-minded writers would purchase this concept from the marketplace of customary clichés, but when I witness this particular mechanical abstraction in a movie with as much power as this, it is really shameful and sticks out like a sore thumb.
What really propels "The Patriot" from being a good movie to being a great movie is the strength and conviction of Mel Gibson's performance and the realism of the battle sequences. Especially in war epics, Gibson is capable of portraying characters of flamboyance and passion, while at the same time can drive the film's many action scenes into excitement and thrills; not many actors can do that, but Mel Gibson can.