Kingdom of Heaven

Caught it last night. As the movie ended, I thought to myself, "Hey, that wasn't too bad."

The battle scenes were in that dirt-flying, blood-squirting, shaky camera style Ridley Scott used for Gladiator, and some of the scenery is incredible. One battle was especially dope, with an army lighting up a night sky with a heavy barrage of siege weapons aimed at Jerusalem.

But the movie also overuses the standard epic ethnic wail music, the "rally the troops" speeches are cringe-inducing (worse than Eric Bana's speech to the Trojans in Troy), and there's a whole lot of lofty bullshit about religion that really has no place in a Ridley Scott movie.

I shit ya'll not when I say that Liam Neeson literally walks up to Orlando Bloom and says, "I am your father," all serious and Star Wars-style. Half the people in the theater were cracking up.

And they never quite get around to explaining how Orlando Bloom is a lifelong blacksmith but suddenly becomes a regular Gengis Khan on the battlefield with like five minutes of training.

By the way, these are not spoilers, since all of the reviews I've seen get into this stuff to some degree. But as a fair warning to all the other people like me who love these ridiculous sword and battle epics -- this movie is not even near the level of Gladiator, and I even think Troy was a better movie.

I didn't really care too much for it. yes the visuals and the action scenes were great, but the story was a bit lacking. When it was over, and the way the conflict was resolved, I really was disappointed.