A fine film and not as historically inaccurate as some think.

Rating: Null/10 (4 April 2001)

THE PATRIOT is a flag-waver to be sure, but that's not such a bad thing these days when a lot of Americans have forgotten their own history. The film has compressed historical figures such as Francis Marion and Elijah Clark (both American partisans) and particular battles (most notably the Battle of Cowpens and The Battle of Guilford Courthouse) for dramatic license. The War for Independence was a bloody affair and the film does a magnificent job in recreating the era and dramatizing its incidents. Those who sneer at the anti-British portrayal have either never learned their history or choose to ignore it for their own agendas (take that Canadians and Brits!). The character of the British Dragoon Col. Taviston was based on the true and infamous Col. Banastre Tarleton, whose massacre of unarmed American P.O.W.'s and wounded at Waxhaws, South Carolina earned him a reputation as a ruthless butcher. Similar sorts of incidents occurred throughout the war, with Loyalists and Patriots alike enacting horrendous savagery upon each other. But that is the nature of a war fought between neighbors. Seen from the amoral perspective of today's apathetic, feel-good political correctness, I'm sure its hard for many Americans to understand how the passion for liberty and freedom, imperfect as it may have been, could fire men's souls to put their families, fortunes and lives on the line for what they believed. Watch THE PATRIOT and learn something. I say, bravo Mel!