"I once fought two days with an arrow through my testicle"
Ridley Scott directs an all star cast in a story about the
Crusades and in particular the 12th Century battles in which Muslims
attempted to recapture the city of Jerusalem
from the Christians. Balian (Orlando Bloom) is a blacksmith in rural France . A Knight
(Liam Neeson) visits him and informs him that he is his father. After Balian
kills a Priest who mocks his dead wife, Balian is given the chance to join the
Crusades in the Middle East . While there he
learns the ins and out of the Politics and Religion of the region and ends up
in a prominent position in the defence of the Holy city of Jerusalem against a Muslim invasion.
This was the second Ridley Scott film I watched today having
watched Alien for the first time this
morning. Kingdom of Heaven is not
anywhere near as good as that. The first thing I’ll say is that the sets looked
sumptuous and were well dressed. The costume also looked good and the special
effects were on the whole excellent, despite the odd dodgy shot. The acting was
also generally quite good. Charisma vacuum Orlando Bloom was actually alright
but still far from the screen presence that a role like this requires. He is joined
by a fantastic cast which includes Eva Green, Jeremy Irons, David Thewlis, Brendan
Gleeson, Michael Sheen, Ghassan Massoud and an almost unrecognisable Edward
Norton. Had I not looked at the cast beforehand I honestly wouldn’t have known
he was in the film. Marton Csokas was a bit of a let down on the acting front.