Yea, Yeah, Yeah

Rating: Null/10 (4 July 2003)

Gibson was, as usual, stellar. Isaacs was a vicious, haughty, overbearing, slimy monster. But that's where I fell out of sync with the film. I couldn't accept the hyperbole of his evil, and it soured the rest of the story for me. Cornwallis was an officer and a gentleman. In real life, he would have had the Isaacs character [Tavington?] shot at dawn. I began to wonder if that character was a pastiche of Banastre Tarleton, who had a bad reputation on that score.
Too much unrelieved evil on the part of the British, and too much saintliness on the part of the Americans. The political correctness with the black men being freed and accepted as equals by the South Carolinians tore the tissue, and the rest went down the toilet.
Nonetheless, I enjoyed the movie. I just wish it hadn't been billed as American history. It wasn't. I found it inspiring and exciting, and -- bottom line: Braveheart 1776.
Sandman