Hey, everyone. "Moriarty" here with some Rumblings From The Lab.
I spent many, many years living in Chattanooga. I’ve camped on Chickamauga Battlefield. I have enormous respect for the hardships anyone in the Civil War faced. But I don’t understand the ongoing fascination with recreating it and reproducing it and reliving it, and the idea of Ted Turner in a Confederate uniform frankly scares the shit out of me.
Let’s see what our first scooper thought of it:
Harry, it pains me to say this, but the movie was a mess. How the creators of this film could have taken the some of the most incredible events in American history and removed all drama from them is beyond me - in stark contrast to the book, which is quite good.
There were a few highlights: the Union charge at Fredericksburg and the Confederate sneak attack at Chancellorsville were well done, as was the shooting of Stonewall, and Robert Duvall was great as Lee; I would have loved to have seen more of him.
But the movie, which was too long (3 hours and 50 minutes), tried to touch on everything about the conflict and ended up doing nothing well. The film involved too many issues: the reasons for war, Lee's decision to support Virginia, Stonewall's personal life and devout Christianity, the role of blacks, civilian suffering, and the Emancipation Proclamation, together with the military strategies and the battles. The film thus suffered from a choppy narrative that deprived the plot of any drama. Narratively, this movie was simply a string of dramatizations, often perfectly acceptable and occasionally brilliant in and of themselves, but when strung together for nearly four hours the whole became smaller than its parts.
This movie too often failed whenever it deviated from battles, and several scenes involving civilians were not only out of place but poorly - painfully so - acted. Why is that actresses lose any ability to act when they put on a hoop skirt, braid their hair, and cop a bad Southern accent? Some of the minor actors in lesser military roles were just dreadful.
Moreover, by spending too much time on such scenes, which did nothing to advance the plot, the film (unlike its precursor, GETTYSBURG) failed to provide the viewer with an understanding about the great military struggle, Lee's (and Jackson's) military brilliance, and the attendant high stakes.
I understand that Ron Maxwell, the director, has a six hour "director's cut" that Warner Bros./Turner will release direct to DVD. Hopefully, this cut will correct the uneven plotting of the feature release.
The film should have focused on one aspect of the war - such as Lee's close military relationship with Jackson and Jackson's sneak attack and death at Chancellorsville - and built the movie around it (as was done with Lee and Longstreet for GETTYSBURG, a well done movie). Part of the problem is that GETTYSBURG's source work, THE KILLER ANGELS, won a Pulitzer Prize. The novel G&G, while good, simply does not approach its level. And Maxwell, who adopted the screenplay, could not make it work.
Most of the people at this screening were Civil War reenactors and Civil War Roundtable types. An extremely receptive audience. At the conclusion of the film, no one applauded, and everyone sprang out of their chairs to leave. If most of this crowd thought it mediocre or poor, then general movie audiences will reject it entirely. How unfortunate.
I note that the movie did get the technical items correct: uniforms, flags, drill, weapons, tactics, and the history. But it was a classic case of missing the forest for the trees.
Respectfully submitted,
Pvt. Bob the Walker Rough
This next guy didn’t see the whole film, but he did attend a Q&A with the director and some of the actors, and if you’re still fascinated by this one, this may be of some value to you:
Hey there,
First time reporter here. I've been coming to the site for a long time, as you could probably tell since I felt the need to point out that I'm a first time reporter.
In any case, I just got back from a screening of "Gods and Generals" with the director Ron Maxwell at Georgetown University. The screening was part of a college tour. What we were actually shown was a half-hour "impression" of the film, followed by a Q&A session with the director and three actors from the movie, Scott Cooper, Stephen Spacek, and a third actor whose name I can't remember.
I wasn't the world's biggest fan of the first movie, "Gettysburg". Although my uncle showed it to me a few years ago after he took me and my cousin to the actual battlefield, which was a pretty emotional way to look at the movie. I found it to be a little dry and thought the visuals could have benefited from a more experienced director. (I mean inexperienced only in the genre of battle. "Little Darlings" and "Kidco" were staples of my childhood.) But I thought the movie was well-made and true to the spirit of what took place in that terrible battle.
"Gods and Generals" is a prequel to the first movie, spanning over two years in an attempt to chronicle the events that lead to Gettysburg. The director stated that both films are part of what will eventually be a trilogy. The third film will take place after "Gettysburg." The film contains three battle scenes. A fourth scene, the Battle of Antietam, was shot for the film. However, the director says that the movie with only three scenes is already three and a half hours long. That fourth battle will be on the DVD of the film. The decision was Maxwell's, not the producers. He says that he had much more room to breath on this film, stating that Ted Turner himself gave Maxwell complete creative control.
My impressions of the film? Well, like I said, I did not see the entire film so I saw scenes out of context. However, what I saw was very good. Maxwell said that he believed the historical movies should be as accurate as possible, and not change things just to make them more exciting in the Hollywood mold. And that was clear from the battle scenes. The scenes give the audience a very clear idea of what is going on amidst the chaos. You feel the sense of strategy involved as well as what it must have been like to march directly at firing cannons and musket shots. They're not over-produced to turn the movie into an action film. There are no CGI bouncing cannonballs lopping people's heads off.
The movie also seems to really look at the war from as many perspectives as possible. It seems that the human relationships are deeper in this movie than the first one. There's a lot of focus on the men and their wives, as well as eachother. North, South, soldiers, slaves, wives, children, generals, presidents, everyone is examined. There is also a lot of attention placed on the men's (especially Jackson's) relationship with God, hence the title. In reality, the movie deals with everyday men fighting for what they believe to be a just cause, each believing to have God on their side. The psychology of this movie appears to have a lot more going on.
As for the acting, most of it was pretty good. Robert Duvall takes over as Robert E. Lee, which Martin Sheen played in "Gettysburg." Jeff Daniels returns. Both of their scenes were very good, and they breathed life into the script. The script was in my opinion the only major fault of the movie. A lot of the lines are kind of cheesy. Not "Independence Day" cheesy, but like Hallmark Movie Special of the week cheesy. Everyone sounds liek they're saying something profound. I imagine it was difficult to get around some of these lines and not all of the actors are as successful as Duvall and Daniels. Stephen Lang, who was so good as Pickett in the first film, plays "Stonewall" Jackson here. It seems that he either cries or whispers every single one of his lines. It doesn't help that he's given scenes involving his wife comforting him as the supportive wise wife type, or the ones involving his relationship with a little girl who reminds him of the daughter he's never scene. "I imagine you miss your daddy as much as I miss my daughter." "Will my daddy ever come home?" "Yes, your daddy will come home. All the daddies will come home." Something like that. The scene involves the requisite gift exchange and cutting paper dolls together. The true worst acting in the footage was Mira Sorvino, who's acting in the movie was terrible even before I recognized her as Mira Sorvino.
I really liked the music, a lot of nice Irish touches. Not sure if this was original music or not, but it was done really well. The Q&A session was rather boring. Kids at Georgetown were of course more intrigued by the fact that Senator Bird was listed in the credits than the film itself. I did get the chance to ask about Bob Dylan's involvement in the film. Maxwell said that originally he pulled a James Cameron and said that no way in hell would there be any lyrical songs in his movie. But he said that Dylan really went back to his Appalchian roots for this song "Over the Green Mountain" and said that it fit in perfectly with the movie. It said that it was really good and that the soundtrack was out now. Not sure why I'm doing a commercial for the soundtrack, but hey it's Bob.
So in conclusion, if you like movies like "Gettysburg," you'll like this movie. If not, then you probably won't. It's not an action movie, although the action is more emotionally harrowing than most "realistic" war movies. Maxwell said that his intent was to make a movie that today's generation could appreciate and learn about something important. It still seems like the movie's dialogue appeals to old people more than the average movie-goer, but that's just one man's opinion. I'll probably wait until TNT plays this over and over again right after "Shawshank Redemption" before I see this one.
I get to come up with a movie reference name right? Just call me Alfie Singer.
Thanks, guys.
"Moriarty" out.
