The Patriot (Special Edition)
by Roland Emmerich
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Actor: Chris Cooper, Heath Ledger, Jason Isaacs, Joely Richardson, Mel GibsonDirector: Roland Emmerich
Brand: Sony
Producer: Dean Devlin
Producer: Dionne McNeff
Producer: Gary Levinsohn
Producer: Mark Gordon
Producer: Michael Dahan
Producer: Peter Winther
Writer: Robert Rodat
DVD: Region Code 99
Audio: English (Unknown), Dolby Digital 2.0 Surround; English (Subtitled); English (Original Language), Dolby Digital 2.0 Surround
Format: Anamorphic, Closed-captioned, Color, Dolby, DVD, NTSC, Special Edition, Subtitled, Widescreen
Picture Format: Anamorphic Widescreen, 2.35:1
Running Time: 165 minutes
DVD Release Date: 2000-10-24
Audience Rating: R (Restricted)
Studio: Sony Pictures Home Entertainment
DVD Reviews of The Patriot (Special Edition)
DVD Review: The Patriot, and the War for Independence
Summary: 4 Stars
"We hold these truths to be self-evident:
That all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness ... whenever any form of government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it, and to institute a new government ..."
1775:
After more than a decade of enduring various measures including highly unpopular taxations, insensitive customs regulation, peace-time quartering and maintenance of standing armies, deprivation of trial by jury, the largely unpunished act of the Boston Massacre, and other British misuses of authority and legality ... Colonial America was ready for war. Some colonists had started gathering arms for the eventuality.
And Britain - harboring the recent memory of the December `73 "tea party" in Boston harbor, as well as other acts of rebellion, riot, and intimidation - seemed just as ready to suppress.
In April, General Thomas Gage deployed troops to dismantle colonial military storages in Concord, New Hampshire. On the 19th local minutemen, forewarned by Paul Revere, met British redcoats on Lexington Green ...and however initially gradual it was to catch on, the colonies' historic fight for independence from England, famously known as the American Revolutionary War, began. (The quote above, excerpted from the Declaration itself, actually originated after the eruption of war; it does, however, open an incisive window into American political feeling at the time.) Colonial victory at Concord, and the immediate aftermath, drew out much patriotic support throughout New England. About 16,000 residents took up a siege of Boston, forcing the British to withdraw the next March (`76).
Later, in June, Thomas Jefferson drafted an official document stating the colonies' independence from the British Crown. The formal declaration was revised and finally adopted in the early evening of July 4, to be signed by an eventual fifty-six men. Not surprisingly, American statesmen shortly thereafter rejected terms of peace and pardon offered by England through (General) William and (Admiral Lord) Richard Howe. General Howe organized his troops and forced a colonial army under General George Washington in Long Island to retreat, first to Manhattan, then to White Plains. General Charles Cornwallis then pushed Washington from New York down to New Jersey, where the former stopped for winter at Trenton, and the latter camped opposite him along the Delaware River's Pennsylvania bank. Washington and company crossed the Delaware late Christmas night, and surprised Cornwallis' garrison. When Cornwallis regained control of Trenton, Washington escaped and proceeded to overpower British reinforcements at Princeton. His victory gave new life to the waning patriotic spirit of the war.
Further north, British General John Burgoyne began leading an army southward. His July of `77 capture of Fort Ticonderoga was briefly enjoyed, however. He suffered a double defeat at Albany by American Generals Horatio Gates and Benedict Arnold, and surrendered at Saratoga in October.
Following a loss at Brandywine Creek and a meager outcome at Germantown, Washington and his Continental Army wintered at Valley Forge. The general was fortunate, as he had in his services a Prussian officer (von Steuben) who trained his men in more efficient methods of combat, which turned out to be substantially helpful in securing a much-needed victory at Monmouth, NJ, the following June ('78).
That month, France declared War on England and mobilized a fleet, and would later become instrumental in the sieges of Savannah and Yorktown. The Spanish declared war on England the next year, 1779, with the Netherlands following suit in 1780. The insurgency was no longer a merely internal affair, but an international event.
Meanwhile, Cornwallis had regrouped in the South. In mid-August, he all but demolished General Gates' army at Camden, but saw defeat at Kings Mountain (October) and at Cowpens (January). After a brief clash in North Carolina, Cornwallis headed into Virginia and rooted himself within Yorktown. French naval forces drove the remaining British navy out of the Chesapeake, and then moved in on Cornwallis; Washington was there, and he too pressed in: the two surrounding him, working away at his forces. On 19 October 1781, Cornwallis surrendered.
The war on American soil had ended. Fighting still continued at sea, but from here out until its conclusion in 1783, most engagements took place between British, and corresponding European enemy, vessels.
The thirteen colonies emerged an infant nation.
--
Columbia TriStar's summertime fireworks-and-flags flick THE PATRIOT strives to set itself firmly on the historical ground of Revolutionary America, even if sometimes it loses its footing.
Set against the backdrop of the late-eighteenth century colonial period, the movie tells the story of Benjamin Martin, a South Carolina farmer who desires peace among a growing spirit of rebellion against England. But when an unusually cruel British colonel threatens his family, Martin turns deadly and joins in the fight. He bravely leads bands of enlisted men into battle, through victory and defeat, often outnumbered, in the struggle to win the independence of the states.
Benjamin Martin seems to have been partially modeled after Francis Marion, the elusive "Swamp Fox," as the British dubbed him. Like Martin, Marion was from South Carolina. Like Martin, he fought in the French & Indian War. Like Martin (occasionally), he fought redcoats guerilla-style. UN-like Martin, he probably never opposed the American rebellion. Nor is it likely that he ever faced Lord Cornwallis, let alone outwitted him. (The filmmakers really strayed from history here, since Cornwallis was, by all accounts, a highly intelligent strategist, and may have been England's most capable commander in North America.) Colonel Tavington is himself based on real-life British officer Banastre Tarleton, known as "Bloody Ban," a ranking lieutenant colonel commandant who employed cruel tactics against Americans during the war.
But the film does get other things right as well. The issues of tyranny and despotism were both apparent and decried by Americans, and treason was probably the commonest charge invoked by the British on those who advocated rebellion. Armies fought each other wherever open lands permitted. If that included your back or front yard, so be it. Many within the militia - most of whom were farmers - utilized guerilla warfare techniques, finding them to be their most useful defense strategy. The British, not unlike previous empires, had an affinity for using fire: they burned houses, barns, supply stores, and yes, even churches - in at least one or two cases. Christianity permeated much of colonial life. Preachers are known to have joined, and in some cases they led, the fight for a nation's liberty. Bundling bags were a means (at the time) of preserving virginity until marriage.
Mel Gibson appears convincing as Benjamin Martin. Jason Isaacs does better, as Colonel William Tavington. But it is Tom Wilkinson who puts in the best overall performance, as the General Lord Cornwallis. Where acting is not so much of a problem, the screenplay can be. When Martin politely asks to sit next to his sister-in-law, she replies, "It's a free country ... or at least it will be." Would any colonial have made such a casual remark, in the middle of war? Let us not forget that the `Amendments' of the Constitution were yet to be formed. Nobody at the time really had a great sense of freedom. They yearned for it, to be sure, but not so much to possess it as some abstract concept; what they sought was a self-governing liberty, total independence from Britain. Elsewhere, the Frenchman tells a slave-hater, "Your sense of freedom is as pale as your skin." While this is certainly possible, it in no way represents the general mood of the time toward slavery, which the director mostly glosses over. Instead, it would have looked better to drop the statement and show a bit more of the slave's struggle to acquire that freedom, amidst the ungrateful boos of racists. And what happened to the accents? Despite their opposition, most colonists were Englishmen enjoying English culture in English colonies. The majority should have had British accents, and those that didn't should have had other European accents. No specifically later-American ones. As for the plot, a couple of times elements during or following action sequences are improbably portrayed. Once, a British officer is shot in either the stomach (one of the most painful areas, it is said, in which to get hit) or the side, and falls over. Just before he is decisively stabbed, he inexplicably summons the strength (and knowledge?) to whirl around and thrust his sword into his would-be killer. Just before a character finishes off his nemesis, he says, "My sons were better men," knowing that he'd killed them. But, in the case of one son, he neither sees nor hears `who' killed him. He just finds his son on the ground, dying an on-the-battlefield death, with little further indication as to who may have fatally wounded him (it's knife-related, which would narrow the possibilities down but not single out any one person). This leaves us wondering how the father figured out the killer's identity. And, while not actually a flaw, it should be noted that the French helped the American cause NOT because they were pro-America, but because they were anti-British. Finally, in one scene, the special effects used to convey ship sails and masts look phony.
But none of these missteps make THE PATRIOT a bad movie. Nor does the fact that it is so much like Gibson's earlier film `Braveheart'. It is, in fact, quite good. Most of it is serious and very entertaining, and we can be thankful Roland Emmerich didn't repeat his earlier mistake ("Independence Day"). Too few movies have been made about this specific period of American history, and this one is noble in its attempt to show us what our forefathers and their contemporaries sacrificed to secure our freedom.
DVD features include director/producer commentary, various featurettes, deleted scenes, photo galleries, and theatrical trailers.
Description of The Patriot (Special Edition)
In 1776 South Carolina, widower and legendary war hero Benjamin Martin (Mel Gibson) finds himself thrust into the midst of the American Revolutionary War as he helplessly watches his family torn apart by the savage forces of the British Redcoats. Unable to remain silent, he recruits a band of reluctant volunteers, including his idealistic patriot son, Gabriel (Heath Ledger), to take up arms against the British. Fighting to protect his family's freedom and his country's independence, Martin discovers the pain of betrayal, the redemption of revenge and the passion of love.Aimed directly at a mainstream audience, The Patriot qualifies as respectable entertainment, but anyone expecting a definitive drama about the American Revolution should look elsewhere. Rising above the blatant crowd pleasing of Stargate, Independence Day, and Godzilla, director Roland Emmerich crafts a marvelous re-creation of South Carolina in the late 1770s (aided immeasurably by cinematographer Caleb Deschanel), and Robert Rodat's screenplay offers the same balance of epic scale and emotional urgency that elevated his earlier script for Saving Private Ryan. Unfortunately, Emmerich embraces clichés and hackneyed melodrama that a more gifted director would have avoided. Instead of attempting a truly great film about the most pivotal years of American history, Emmerich settles for a standard revenge plot with the Revolutionary War as an incidental backdrop.
On those terms, the film is engrossing and sufficiently intelligent, especially when militia leader Benjamin Martin (Mel Gibson) cagily negotiates with British General Cornwallis (Tom Wilkinson) in one of the most rewarding scenes. For the most part, the story concerns Martin's anguished quest for revenge against ruthless redcoat Colonel Tavington (played with snide relish by Jason Isaacs), and the rise to manhood of Martin's eldest son, Gabriel (Heath Ledger), whose battlefield honor exceeds even that of his brutally volatile father. At its best, The Patriot conveys the horror of war among innocent civilians, and the epic battle scenes, while by no means masterful, are graphically intense and impressive. And although Ledger's love interest (Lisa Brenner) is too bland to register much emotion, the focus on family (which frequently relegates the war to background history) provides a suitable vehicle for Gibson, who matches his achievement in Braveheart with an effectively brooding performance. --Jeff Shannon
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