My Two Cents

I am not a movie person. I do not remember the names of actors or actresses, I do not rush out to see every blockbuster, and in many cases, I do not stay awake to see the ends of many sagas. As a general rule, I am very very bad at the “Kevin Bacon” game. This is nothing new, and I am generally ok with it. However, there are several movies I have not seen which earn comments from amazed friends and acquaintances. These usually go something like this: “What? You haven’t seen that? Are you sure you’re American?” Rest assured, I am, indeed, American. But, I have not seen:

-The Karate Kid

-Rambo

-any of the Godfather movies

-Gone with the Wind

-Maverick

-the list goes on and on...

All of these were immensely popular for their time, but I just never got around to watching them. So, I recently added “Braveheart” to my Netflix queue in order to rectify at least one of my deficiencies. I cannot say I was all that impressed. First of all, this movie is three hours long and it was extremely hard for me to block out a chunk of time sufficient for the full viewing. (In fact, I did put this movie in the VCR back in 1999 but never got past the half hour marker…) Now that I have watched the film, I can say with confidence that there is entirely too much slow motion. It sometimes took nearly 5 minutes for men on horses to ride 50 yards. Is this supposed to be dramatic effect? I found it annoying. And speaking of horses…

…There are many scenes involving the killing or serious injury to horses. Poor horsies. They are just innocents in the conflict. There is even one scene where a horse jumps out of a 4 story building into a body of water. Who cares if Mel Gibson survived, what about the horse? And speaking of Mel Gibson…

…Is he aware of how old he is? OK, so his love interest in the movie is shown in a flashback scene in which Mel is played by a 12 or 13 year old kid, and she is played by a 7 or 8 year old kid. The difference in age is like 5 years, right? So then, we flash forward and Mel is nearly twice the age of this 20-something girl. And while we’re on that topic…

…How is it that she is still not married when Mel returns from his travels after 10 years? This is supposed to take place in 1345. Didn’t people get married at age 14 back then? (Of course, then the age difference makes more sense.) It just seems pretty convenient to me. And one other thing…

…Of course she is the most beautiful girl in the village. She is the only one who cleans/combs her hair. I think the writers went to extremes to show the differences in class of people by their dress/hygiene. But only with the men. Apparently, the women of all classes still managed to make it to the beauty parlor on a daily basis.

OK, now I got that out. Despite the above ranting, I did not hate the movie. I just don't see what all the hype was about. I did appreciate that it did not have the sappy Hollywood ending in which everyone who was going through a ton of turmoil is suddenly ok, saved by some amazing coincidence. I appreciated also that the bad guys did not hang over their victim saying "I'm gonna kill ya!" for ten minutes, allowing the hero sufficient time to swoop in for a "dramatic" rescue. I also enjoyed Mel Gibson's ability to convey emotion without speaking. His portrayal of hurt when he is betrayed by a noble of his own clan is great - no words need to be spoken (though, of course, this part is in slow motion...) He also has awesome expressions of passion and love in his eyes throughout the movie.

But that is just my two cents. I am not sure I want to see The Godfather. Next on my queue: Monty Python skits. Now how did that get to the top?