Select the correct sentiment of the following review: Once upon a time in the mid 1990s I used to write for DOCTOR WHO fanzines and the whole of fandom was holding its breathe about the new American produced DOCTOR WHO TVM . As soon as it was announced that the Doctor's arch enemy the Master was going to be played by Eric Roberts everyone scratched their heads and exclaimed " Who is Eric Roberts ? " . I should point out this was before the IMDB came online when all you had to do was type in a name into this website to their resume , but one helpful soul wrote into a publication I wrote for to explain that Eric Roberts was best known for a role where he starred opposite F Murray Abraham , the film was called BY THE SWORD and was about a fencing school . Actually looking back now Roberts is best known for THE POPE OF GREENWICH VILLAGE and RUNAWAY TRAIN but that didn't stop the person putting the boot into both Roberts and BY THE SWORD and his mind was made up that this American Master with his southern drawl was going to a debacle . Strangely most fans were furious about Roberts playing the Master but after they saw the DOCTOR WHO TVM a great many fans ( Myself among them ) thought Roberts performance was the best thing about the disappointing American production

Yeah I'm digressing but BY THE SWORD was a film that I wanted to see simply because it was the first time I'd heard the name of Eric Roberts but I didn't get the chance to see it untill this weekend and I was fairly disappointed with it . I know nothing about fencing ( Everyone else on this page seems duty bound to mention if they fence or not . I don't fence ) so I don't know how accurate it all is , but as mentioned the film feels somewhat anachronistic even if you saw it on its release in 1991 , the hairstyles seem a few years out of date along with its mixed teenage cast doing a little dance routine that makes you wonder if it wouldn't have worked a lot better if it'd had been produced by Jerry Bruckheimer in the mid 1980s . You could argue this would have meant the relationship between Max Suba and Alexander Villard being off centre for most of the film but I wasn't convinced about their love/hate relationship and Abraham and Roberts have given much better performances before and since BY THE SWORD
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--negative;
--positive;
negative