Braveheart

1995 was early enough in Mel Gibson's career that women wanted him and men wanted to be him. His career hadn't been defined by drunken anti semitic comments or incredibly graphic depictions of the death of Christ.

I will give him a lot of credit. Mel Gibson at one point was an incredibly famous and did some really great movies. The Patriot, Lethal Weapon, We Were Soldiers. One of those great movies was Braveheart. At least it was successful, winning Best Picture and more awards.

But is it that great?

In short, yeah it is. It is that great.

Braveheart is the story of William Wallace, one of the leaders of the War for Scottish Independence.

The movie takes place in the late 1200's when England was dominant over Scotland, ordering insane laws to quell Scottish populations. One such law is that with every Scottish marriage, the British Lord of the area has sexual privileges to "bless" the marriage.

I'm not sure if this or anything in this movie is historically accurate, apparently historians look at it now as one of the most historically inaccurate movies ever made, but it does a really good job at making the English just incredible bastards, which I'm sure that they were.

So anyways, William Wallace is the son of a Scot who fought the English and died. He goes off to get an education... somewhere, its not totally clear. So eventually he comes back to Scotland and intends to just start his own farm.

The beginning of the movie really does set up for a great movie because Wallace has no intentions of fighting in this war the Scots have. He just wants to live a normal life.

He finds a childhood friend who he falls in love with. He sees the laws that give English lords sexual privileges and he he refuses to let that happen to his new wife. So they marry in secret... a secret that does not last very long... at all....

As you may have guess, the English figure out this secret marriage and try and get what is "theirs". Wallace fights them off but they eventually capture her and kill her.

So when the English kill off William Wallace's wife, he just comes in and massacres the hell out of all the soldiers. When he finds the guy who killed her, he doesn't say anything, he just gives him a look and all I could think was...

Suddenly Wallace is 100% behind this war and becomes the leader of the Scottish forces with the mission to not only free Scotland but to invade England. I thought this was a very sudden and slightly random change of heart but I'll overlook it because he's so distraught from the death of his wife. 

The rest of the movie is Wallace's campaign against England, the battles he fights, a little bit of the politics that come along with the war he fights, and finally his capture and death at the hands of English torturers. 

Now this movie was really the movie that made Mel Gibson's career, at least as a director. And Gibson does an alright job acting in the movie. I mean you have to overlook his accent, and his 90's flow he's

got going. While I don't think he was the best choice to portray William Wallace, I enjoyed him as the character.

And its Gibson. Even in 95' he was giving little nods to his faith and eccentric ways. Don't get me wrong, I think its totally within Gibson's right as a Director to do whatever he wants to do with his movies, and if that means he puts in some Christ symbology in Braveheart, go right ahead.

But there were times when I felt I wasn't watching William Wallace lead troops into battle, I felt I was watching Mel Gibson with war paint, and a mediocre Scottish accent, leading people into a scripted battle.

It still had the epic feeling to it, it just didn't feel like an accurate depiction of how these battles happened back in 1297.

BUT, it did give Gibson the opportunity to contribute one of the most quoted speeches in movie history.

It's a solid speech. I think a dangerous drinking game to play with this movie is to drink every time Gibson says Freedom!

Other good things about this movie is that it actually goes a little bit into the politics of medieval England and Scotland. Part of the movie focuses on Wallace getting support from different lords of Scotland. It reminded me of Game of Thrones which is always a good thing.

One of the criticisms I have of the movie, besides the mass amounts of liberties, is the role of the Princess of England (played by Sophie Marceau). Since the Prince is kind of a pansy, the Princess does some of the negotiating between the King of England and Wallace. By doing this she develops feelings for Wallace and the two actually have sex at one point. It was incredibly random and really held no purpose in the movie. It also kind of detracts from the final scene when Wallace is about to be beheaded and he sees a vision of his dead wife... just kind of odd.

All of that said with a few criticisms, Braveheart is really a solid movie. If you're a guy and need a testosterone surge, watch this movie. If you're a woman and you like young not so crazy Mel Gibson with 90's flow, watch this movie.

I won't say its a movie you absolutely need to see because some people might walk out of this movie saying, "Eh, it was alright" or not liking it at all. It all depends on if you like violent chest beating war movies.

If that's you, this movie is perfect for you. You'll also get some medieval politics, which isn't a bad thing at all. The only thing you will get that you may not want is historical inaccuracies and pointless romance subplots.

I'll let you decide on that one. I enjoyed Braveheart. Plain and simple. While it may be pretty much the same movie as The Patriot that Gibson also did in 2000, its still a pretty solid movie.

What do you think? Have you seen Braveheart? Did you enjoy it? Let me know by commenting below.

I'll leave you with this. Remember Papa Elf from Elf? Yeah he did a spoof of the famous speech. Check it out. Its pretty good.