The Patriot

SC: Can someone pllleeaassee do a little research? Is it that hard to produce a movie about The Revolutionary War that actually maintains a shred of historical accuracy and dignity? Why are filmmakers so afraid of complexity? Those were just a few of the torrent of questions that flooded my brain while enduring the mind-numbing Mel Gibson epic, The Patriot, over the Fourth of July weekend. I didnt hate the movie, I just didn't understand the point of it. Why make an American Revolution epic if you aren't going to imbue it with at least a semblance of the truth? According to Mel's version, one man basically brought down the British army (the British, meanwhile, were themselves controlled by a single man who was inexplicably sadistic and decidedly un-British in decorum). I got so bored during the film (I even yawned during the infamous cannonball decapitation) that I started thinking about what might have happened if we had lost the American Revolution. We'd probably still be controlled by the British, we'd have better movies, Jude Law would thankfully be playing all of Mel Gibson's roles, our clubs would be hipper, our music edgier, our people smarter, our culture more respectable - in short, we'd be better off. Inducing such thoughts surely wasn't the filmmakers intent.

WG: Otherwise known as the Mel Gibson tutorial in American history. The Patriot is a big, rousing cornball of a movie, rampant with cliches, bombast, and historical inaccuracy. It was also one of the best movies of the summer. Far closer to a colonial Braveheart than the American Revolution of tea and powdered wigs and declarations drawn up with quill-feathered pens, The Patriot is epic in every sense of the word. It's robust form of sweeping, old-fashioned entertainment that knows exactly which buttons to push and has, unlike the much more remote Gladiator, an honest-to-goodness heart. Okay, so Gibson was a Southern planter who didn't own slaves and the British were so villainous that they burned people in churches-who goes to the movies for their history lesson anyway? Director Roland Emmerich will never be much more than flashy blockbuster peddler, but he certainly knows how to handle a project with daunting logistics and he makes the most of some lavish production values. The Patriot has too many flaws to be called a great piece of filmmaking, but I'd say it's a superb piece of moviemaking. And yes, there is a difference-the former is what you look for in the fall and the latter is what you hope for in a season committed solely to the box office.

The Perfect Storm