So far, the bile the Coasties are puking up is a hopeful sign. It's not that they hate the movie, it's what they hate about it that is so encouraging.
Several of the complaints seemed to center around portrayals of Victorian speech and manners. Maybe casting should have called in Will Smith and Eminem to help out with the demographic and the dialogue. What think?
I liked this review as telling:
"There is in fact much to relish in this epic but somehow, despite a nearly four-hour running time, there is something missing."
-- Stephen Jared, BOXOFFICE MAGAZINE
Yeah. What's missing is the neat denouement with the ribbon on top, and the action heroine slapping her boy-toy on the butt as they all exit stage left to go get a beer: It's Miller time!
Or maybe not, whaddayathink? Maybe the end of the Civil War left the country slap in the middle of Reconstruction, and things stayed really messy for a long time and, like, unresolved. Do ya think?
"Lang carves Jackson in flesh and blood, but in almost every other way, the 3-hour-and-35-minute ''Gods and Generals'' is a trial to sit through: stiff, ponderous, fluttering in its ''poetry,'' and crudely simplistic as an apologia for the Confederate ideology. A prequel to the 1993 ''Gettysburg,'' ''Gods and Generals,'' too, was executive-produced by Ted Turner, who backed it financially. It's fine for a film to recognize that there were noble men in the South, but when Jackson speaks of the need to defend his beloved Virginia against ''the triumph of commerce -- the banks, factories,'' the sentiment rings empty and more than a little ironic given that this is a $60 million film bankrolled by a billionaire." - Owen Glieberman, Entertainmnent Weekly