Movie Review/DVD Preview: Kingdom of Heaven
Directed by: Ridley Scott
Starring: Orlando Bloom, Liam Neeson

Following the recent traditions of gigantic epic films, I present to you Kingdom of Heaven, an over-blown, elephantine behemoth of a movie that collapse under the weight of its own gravitas.

The premise: Son (Bloom) is seperated from his father (Neeson) at youth, and sets up shop as a blacksmith where his father, now a knight on his way to the Crusades comes to convince him to return with him to battle and become a knight. Son agrees, and the two venture to the middle east, while father is killed en route. Son makes it to Jerusalem and wrests control of Jerusalem from the hands of the Turks with the help of the leper king, only to have the Turks return with an immense army and kick the ever-living daylights out of them. Sounds uplifting, no?

The only reason I write this now is because I see that it is coming out on DVD, and despite the rather ravishing previews for the DVD and the starpower of Orlando Bloom, I warn all to stay away from this film.
This movie begins every sort of worn-out idiom you could imagine for this sort of film. The jilted son that does not love his father, only to run to him after his wife is murdered, blah blah blah. The heroic yet tragically conflicted father returns to seek his son's forgiveness and give him a sword that he might smight down his enemies, only to discover that his son lives at peace with the quaint villagers in the armpit of France.

Once we arrive in Jerusalem, what to we find, except that the evil invading European christian knights are horrible stewards, are corrupt and treat the locals poorly. Contrast this with the righteous muslim Turks who have rightful claim to the lands where the invading knights are living. Such a cock-eyed view of the motives and truths behind the crusades is taken in this film, it is hard to imagine why they ever took place.
Enter: our hero. Orlando Bloom enters into this arrid desert with pure motives, and prospers. Inevitably, however, he is called upon to go to war for his king (whom is the most intriguing character of the film,) and goes on to conquer victorioiusly.
Eventually the final showdown between the surrounded crusaders and the turkish hordes come, and Orlando Bloom negotiates for the safe passage of all within the city in exchange for the city itself. So, in essence, Orlando Bloom looses the war, and yet is viewed as a hero because he saved the lives of his men. Say wha...? I'm not quite sure of the moral of this story. Except that there's nothing worth dying for, apparently. At least when you're as beautiful as Orlando Bloom there isn't.

The performances in this film are adequte. Liam Neeson's role in this film is surprisingly small, seeing as how he dies less than halfway through this film. Is it only me, or have we been seeing Mr. Neeson play the same role in films for the past year or so? (Think Batman Begins.) Orlando Bloom is relatively chill in this film, and seems rather distant.

Over all, I'd rather this film two out of five

T.