07/06/10 - Kingdom of Heaven

Kingdom of Heaven (2005, 192 min)
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0320661/

This is one of those epics I'd been wanting to check out for quite some time. I'd heard the standard theatrical cut of this film was average but that the director's cut was phenomenal. So, even though it clocked in at over three hours, I selected to give it a watch.

The film is huge in every aspect and has about fifteen prominent characters. Because of that I'll just summarize it in the following way: the film follows Balian de Ibelin (Orlando Bloom) as he goes on a crusade to Jerusalem and then leads the protection of the town from the Muslim leader Saladin (Ghassan Massoud).

First off, the length of this movie is both good and bad. It's good because it does serve to develop characters and give some side plots, thus making the film not only about Balian's defense of Jerusalem (having a three hour movie on one plot point would be terrible) but also about the problems of these other people. On the other hand, the film seems disjointed and never really runs incredibly smoothly so it bogs down a few times and just gets boring. Frequently I found myself zoning out of the film and not paying attention. This is never a good sign.

One of the worst parts of the movie is the beginning. I feel that since this is mainly a character movie on Balian that we really need to develop his back-story first. This includes his family, his life in France (where he's from), and his reason for going to Jerusalem in the first place. This should take around thirty minutes I'd say where all these points are established. I feel that Kingdom of Heaven attempts to do this with the character but just fails. There's too many characters introduced in the first hour of the film, many of which just don't turn out to be important for the later half or even for understanding Balian's character. This is wasted time in my opinion. The longest movie I'd seen this year before this was The Deer Hunter which logged just around three hours. There, the first hour was devoted to one long wedding scene. Characters were established and relationships developed and they set the scene for the remainder of the film. It was superbly done with expert character development. I'd say that this film falls almost on the other end of that spectrum as it does a pretty poor job in this department. Though I will say the film succeeds on the Saladin character. His noted chivalry comes through in the film, particularly when he picks up a Christian cross that has fallen over and stands it back up.

As I alluded to above, one thing I like about Kingdom of Heaven is that it does a good job at interweaving multiple minor plots into the major story. This makes everything seem pretty realistic as it doesn't just go all out on this one thing but instead shows how the various lesser characters all have their own personal problems. I think for the most point these other side plots are handled well so this is a big plus.

Another positive for the film is how supposedly realistic it is. From reading around a bit it seems that the writers really tried to make the film a great blend of historical fact (from primary sources) while also making it an enjoyable film. This must've taken a lot of work and I think that the end product shows the effort taken in this regard. From looking at what the film got wrong, most of these things seem to be pretty minor while the broad storyline is extremely accurate.

Finally, the big ending battle of Kingdom of Heaven deserves its own mention. I mean, everything in the film does build towards this one moment. I feel it, like the rest of the movie, has strong pros and cons. As a positive, the whole thing is well choreographed and quite the visual spectacle. Just like in Gladiator, director Ridley Scott shows that he knows how to direct a large scale battle and make it interesting from every angle. Next, we've been going with Balian long enough that we care for the guy but we also like Saladin (or at least I did) because he comes off as a cool guy. It makes it hard to really root for one side or the other since I liked both leaders. However, as a negative, I felt like the film frequently cut away from the big battle to explore those side plots I talked about previously. While I did say I liked them, I feel like these last twenty minutes should be reserved for the battle and its conclusion. Maybe after the battle go back and wrap up the final strands of the side plots but for now let's focus on this main battle. Jumping back and forth just doesn't work for me. And last but not least, the battle ends on a pretty weak note. I felt like the conversation between Balian and Saladin could have been more momentous and stuff as it concluded what was such an important battle historically. Instead, they almost whisper a truce and then the movie wraps up with the Christians leaving.

Overall, I gave this film a 6/10. It's hard to say Kingdom of Heaven isn't well directed and it also has plenty of moments of cool battles (at least in the director's cut). However, on the whole, the film suffers from some character problems as well as some pacing issues.