I can start by admitting that i'm a fan of "Gladiator". And why do i mention this? Because there are more similarities between "Gladiator" and this movie besides having the same director.
What struck me first about this movie was the visual style. Ridley Scott is just one of the best directors right now when it comes to this. Every shot feels thought-through, every color balanced. Most of the time though he still manages to avoid the clinical style of many other directors focused on visuals. "Gladiator" felt somewhat artificial to me when i watched it the first time around, and even more so when watching it on DVD. Many of the special effects-shots are simply not that well-made. "Kingdom of Heaven" though takes full opportunity of the advancements made in technology. The movie looks awesome to say the least.
The script is no revolution of coherence or cohesion, yet it works rather well for this type of movie. Because this is more pure entertainment than anything else. In the press material Ridley Scott stated himself that this should be seen more as entertainment than historical facts. Which is absolutely fine by me i might add, at least as long as he states this beforehand. Perhaps the most disturbing things is for instance the way that Orlando Bloom goes from clueless blacksmith to full-fledged sword-wielding knight in 15 minutes movie-time.
And the actors? Orlando Bloom is in my opinion one of the most over-rated actors around today. Here though he's better than i've seen him before. I think the main thing is that he manages to act and look more like an adult this time, while in most previous movies he has felt almost childish. The rest of the cast consist mostly of quite well-known names and they all do a fine job, making this movie quite well-acted although it's not exactly Shakespeare...
All things said and done i found this movie to be very entertaining. It's visually stunning, reasonably well acted with a decent script and some nice characters. What it lacks in coherence and story it makes up for with a strong and quick pace (for the genre) and some truly impressive action scenes. Wolfgang Petersson and Oliver Stone should watch this before they even think of making another historic epic. Because Ridley Scott has learned the important lesson so well put in "Gladiator": the people want to be entertained! I rate this 7/10.
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