[WL-law]

I saw it opening weekend, in Lexington VA -- at the old/only movie theatre in town -- and it wasn't sold out, which surprised me. Sat next to a group of VMI cadets, and we were all choked up at the local scenes, as well as the battle scenes.

Having said that, it was a deeply flawed movie on many levels. This was a case where one person's vision (director/screenwriter) was just too claustrophobic. He needed another pair of critical eyes in the editing.

The re-enactors were too fat and too old.

The southern women were ridiculous cartoon caricatures of 'southern belles', when real and natural performances would have been so much more effective.

And Jackson was, in real life, far more idiosyncratic than he was portrayed. That doesn't mean artistic license couldn't be used, but it was wrong to use it the way the director did, which was to caste all things southern in a false, cloying, over-romanticised light.

Jackson was zealously religious,yes, but that's not the same as PRESENTING the CHARACTERS as god-like, rather than real historical people. Unfortunate, in that the director's shortcomings make it too easy for the masses to dismiss the ideas (attempted to be) presented in the film (and in the eventual trilogy), i.e., why the war was fought, whether it needed to be fought

[ewing]

I think that 'Gettysburg' was a better Civil War film, but I think that the historical accuracy of the period of the time was still better than most any other movie out there.

[Polybius]

The re-enactors were too fat and too old.

I fully accepted the fat re-enactors at the scenes of First Manassas. Fat boys are patriotic too and this was one of the first battles of the war.

However, after that, there was no way that those Butterballs could have maintained their weight on a diet of marches and Confederate rations. :-)