Kingdom of Heaven - review

Ridley Scott has reached new depths with his latest historical epic. Plot holes? Scott makes stories out of them these days - there's more hole than plot.

He has discovered, or perhaps he just doesn't care anymore, that the majority of a modern audience will be satisfied if something appears to have meaning, even if it clearly does not. If it sounds good and looks good, that's good enough for Scott and it's good enough for most others, too.

I was astonished by the absurdity of some moments in the story. The final one - making the film one, gigantic anti-climax - is where our hero, Balian, having lead many of his men to their own slaughter, surrenders up the city with barely a flicker of conscience. He really doesn't seem all that bothered - in fact, he seems pretty pleased with himself. And as he announces their surrender, his men slap him on the back (as if Robin Hood's merry men had just seen their leader shoot a particularly fine arrow into a lump of wood) - the logic here being their intention was only ever to save the people.

The fact that they had plenty of opportunity to escape before the battle seems not to bother Scott, or Balian.

At no point in the story did any of the characters seem to be struggling with an internal battle of conscience, or a crisis of belief. Surely a film about the Crusades has to revolve around a conflict of beliefs, external and internal. At no point did any of the characters dislpay any kind of sophistication of thought, like they did in the good old days of historical epics.

This is what happens when you write a script to a formula - the pieces all appear to be there but, upon closer inspection, we discover they're from different puzzles.