As a Movie..................

Rating: 10/10 (16 August 2006)

This is an utterly superb film. The costumes are visually splendid, the scenery is to die for and the story line in a traditional good ol' 'Loving American guy gets wronged by an evil British guy and then during his hunt for revenge teams up with a comic Frenchman and in the end they win'. Exactly the right story line for a Hollywood movie.
The cast could not have been bettered, Jason Issacs, Tom Wilkinson, Mel 'Controversial' Gibson, Joely Richardson and Edward Woodward's son Peter. A really impressive gathering of talent, no doubt about it. The CGI FX are the best of their kind I reckon, who wouldn't want to see a man getting decapitated by a 24 pounder roundshot? All in all, As a Movie.........I'll rate this full marks. It is a quality watch and worth the Dollars/Pounds/Euros or Yen you want to spend renting or buying the DVD. As it is a movie, not a documentary, I will rate it here as such.
HOWEVER!!!!! When the accompanying feature claims that the film makers have 'tried their best to be as authentic and credible as possible', it is then I start to laugh very, VERY loud.
Let me take you through several historical errors I myself have noted.
The British Infantry seem, throughout the film, to be entirely devoid of Light Infantry. A prominent unit in the American War and would have proved a nice little counter to the 'Patriot' militia.
There is only ever one British Infantry Regiment seen in the entire film, despite three major battles being covered. This same Regiment carries the Colours of several other Regiments into action. A bizarre aspect indeed.
Smooth bore pistols and muskets take people out at several hundred yards, a range to make even the most skilled sniper amongst the ruins of Stalingrad gasp.
Gibson's character has 'freed' slaves work his land. That is a serious whitewashing of something that plagues the USA until this day.
In a similar vein, there is only one racist in the whole Southern Rebel army. Even he has 'seen the light' by the end credits. Despite it being a further 100 years until slavery was abolished and even that took a Civil War.
The British soldiers march into Battle like the SS Leibstandarte Adolf Hitler parading through Berlin.
Why the hell do most of the characters throw away their ramrods like javelins? This is just plain weird. I mean, for a Colonial Rebel with little experience, you might just think it plausible but when a British Colonel does so.............usually the ramrods are back in their hands seconds later. That is a real puzzler.
There is little or no mention of Native Americans, whom, you will understand, are the 'true' Americans and fought on both sides during the war. I think you spot a couple loitering about in one camp scene.
The 'atrocity' performed by Wilkins, under direction of Tavington is fiction, despite equally nasty scenarios being fact. Rebel atrocities on 'Loyalists' were far more cruel. At Concord bridge in 1775, the rebels scalped a British soldier and removed his brain.
The French Naval Officers at Yorktown are dressed in Napoleonic Uniforms complete with tricolour cockades. I think these fellows would be more at home at Trafalgar or the Nile.
The whole film is too 'squeaky clean'. There was no regular bathing then, even the King of France bathed but once a year. Cleaning one's teeth was far from an oft performed duty. The lack of top dentists would also hamper the eye shielding shine of the teeth in this film.
A man and his two young sons take out a section of infantry belonging to the best army in the world? Don't make me laugh. 'Aim small miss large' methinks.
I could go on but I've lost the will to live!