75. KINGDOM OF HEAVEN (2005)

KINGDOM OF HEAVEN (2005)

Language               -       English (United States)

Genre                     -       War, Period Drama

Director                 -       Ridley Scott

*ing                        -       Orlando Bloom (Balian), Eva Green (Sibylla), Jeremy Irons (Tiberias)

IMDB Score          -      7.2/10

PLOT

                                        The movie takes place after 100 years since Christian armies from Europe seized Jerusalem. A knight who was fighting in the east for the Holy Land is returning in search of his son. He finds his son, Balian as a grief-stricken blacksmith due to the suicide of his wife. The knight asks him to join the force to get salvation from the Holy Land, but he rejects the offer from his father. But later he gets involves in a murder of a priest and flees towards his father. The knight is happy by the return of his son, so that he can continue his legacy, while Balian looks for salvation for himself and his wife in the Holy Land. But the destiny of Balian is to become the Defender of Jerusalem from the huge Muslim army who is looking for an opportunity to retaliate for the previous war.

MY VIEW

                                        Kingdom Heaven is another period drama from the acclaimed director Ridley Scott. It deals with the Crusades (Cross wars) between Christians and Muslims for the Holy Land of Jerusalem. The movie doesn’t give a proper idea of Crusades to a person, who doesn’t know much about the historical incident. It starts with the life of Balian, his rise from a poor blacksmith to chivalrous knight who became the defender of Jerusalem. So in the first half of the movie it lacks pace, as it only deals with the life of Balian. But in the second half, the story become more wide open with many characters and the rivalry between Christians and Muslims comes to take place.

                                        It was not a memorable performance from Orlando Bloom. He came to steal the scenes only during the final Battle of the movie. But on the other part Eva Green puts a better performance than Bloom. She shows the lust and love of Sybilla to Balian in the first half, while in the second half she depicted the helplessness of a mother and a queen. The antagonists in the movie was presented as a noble king, unlike other king who butcher their enemy he keeps his word in every scene and tries to avoid War with Christians even though he possesses huge army.

                              Graphic scenes in the movie does not comes to a quality, I felt the same problem with Ridley Scott’s “Gladiator” also. Fight choreography was only taken with average quality, because in many scenes it was not clear about the things happening during the war. But in case of costume it was outstanding each costume gave us a feel of medieval world. There were costumes for Templers, knights, Armies of Saladin which proves that they made proper research before starting this project. Ridley Scott even made a huge replica of Jerusalem in the deserts.

VERDICT

                           20^th century Fox marketed the movie as an action, adventure, drama but for Ridley Scott it was like a story showing the religious conflict. This move of the studio made a negative impact for the movie by gaining mixed reaction in Box-office and it didn’t perform well in US and Canada but made great collection in other parts of the world. Ridley Scott blamed himself on paying too much attention to Fox’s request to shorten the film by 45 minutes. As a result, he later released a director’s cut which gained positive response from everywhere. I saw his director’s cut and if you like to watch this movie; better go for the Directors cut.

Movie Trailer- https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0320661/videoplayer/vi2492727577?ref_=tt_ov_vi