Gods and Generals

Rating:
Summary: Great Movie!!!
Review: Great movie with a perspective not common in the Liberal dominated mainstream media or academia.

For the lefty in CA, "red neck" is a racist term you biggot!!!

Rating:
Summary: REDNECK REVIEWS ON AMAZON
Review: Since when did Amazon start Spotlighting redneck views in their reviews section? Especially since Pastor Lovelace's review bearly constitutes a review.

Well, as long as they're printing political diatribes by Confederate anachronisms here we go...

God kicked the collective Confederate rear for a reason. Anyone who feels it's a Christian's God given right to own another human being deserves an ignominious thrashing. Get over it, Pastor Lovelace, your side lost. It's over. The Yanks had God on their side. The South was saying prayers to the Devil. You want to save your heritage? Stop sleeping with your sister. If you removed the hood maybe you would see that you're related.

Watching the battles in this film was like watching Hannibal Lecter eat Fruit Loops. Watch GLORY instead. At least you won't have to listen to redneck southern inbreds talk trash about Yankees. Three Cheers for the Buffalo Soldier!! Thank God I live in California where it's civilized

UNBELIEVABLE!!

Rating:
Summary: Great film! A must see and appreciate!
Review: This is is every bit as good as "Gettysburg" and accuracy is the order of the day. I now want the third film of the trilogy. It truly presents life as it was, human feelings as they were experienced, and battles accurately depicted. I live in the southern war area and the film touched me greatly. You must also be aware of the fact that all those people who took part in this film who were from the reenactment units are locked in on doing everything to the endth degree of accuracy. It is the code of their pride and they do not do anything that derides that code or that pride. Enjoy it! By the way. Stephen Lang did an outstanding job as Stonewall Jackson.

Rating:
Summary: The way it was.
Review: This movie tells the story of the people who were faced with great decisions in their lives and stepped up to the plate. Most people today would not have the courage or conviction to stay the course as these characters. History is portrayed correctly and not popularized. "We are what we are because of what we have been".

Rating:
Summary: So Long - So Dull. All Most like the War...
Review: Compared to Gettysburg, this movie is a flop. It's long, dull, drawn out, and it is astonishing to me that anyone in the South ever had children if all they ever did (according to this movie's depictations) ever did is snuggle in bed with full nighshirts/gowns on and talk. While I wasn't expecting all out sex, for krimminie's sake, let's see some passion -- even in the acting!
This movie could have been half the length and probably have suffered little in the cut. God help us if the third installment is this bad. Forget this dud and watch Gettysburg, instead.

Rating:
Summary: quite good
Review: I am not a civil war buff and did not see this film in the theater, but watching it on DVD at a friends house made me want to see the film Gettysburg. I'm not a Jeff Daniels fan as a rule, but I greatly enjoyed his performance here. I also thought Robert Duval did a fine job as Lee. The battle scenes were quite believable and exciting. God's and Generals is very enjoyable and I wouldn't mind watching it again.

Rating:
Summary: Accurate, But Boring...
Review: As a student of Civil War history, I looked forward to seeing this film. It was a big disappointment: too long, and extremely BORING. The battle scenes, which really are what the whole thing is supposed to be about (Civil War, remember?) get lost in all the contrived, stilted dialogue and preaching. Every statement-particularly from the Confederate side-reminds one of the bombast from a Cecil B. DeMille religious epic (The Ten Commandments comes to mind).

The three great battles of Bull Run, Fredricksburg, and Chancellorsville are separated by long, long stretches of tedious conversation. Nevertheless, I certainly give credit to Stephen Lang's portrayal of Gen. 'Stonewall' Jackson; he humanizes the legendary Confederate leader, who genuinely believed that God was on his side. The battle scenes were sanitized a bit too much, in my opinion. Due to such films as 'Saving Private Ryan' and 'Gladiator'audiences are now more accepting of war movie violence than in the past, so such watering down makes the film less believable.

There is much to like in this movie. The overall 'look' of the film is believable; the creators actually saw fit to have artillery recoil after firing (many war films forget to do this). The large numbers of men standing out in the open in Napoleonic fashion while getting shot to pieces is difficult to watch-even though there are no body parts to be seen when struck directly by cannon fire. The scene of Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain and his men in the field of the dead and dying after Fredricksburg is particularly poignant. The uniforms, weaponry, and tactics are very accurate indeed.

Some gaffes are inexcusable in a film of this magnitude and historical importance. An example? The scene portraying Jackson's famous flanking attack at Chancellorsville contains a blatant faux pas: One of the reenactors in the Union camp fleeing the Confederate onslaught has a HUGE SMILE on his face as he runs toward the camera! Isn't this what editing is for? In addition, most modern moviegoers KNOW what good CGI effects look like...and there are several instances in this film where they are just plain bad.

'Gods and Generals' could have been a great film, but instead it is just mediocre. I feel 1 whole hour could be excised and the movie would lose little in the translation. There is always a fine balance between historical accuracy and entertainment; a feature filmmaker does not want his creation to appear like a documentary. This film may be historically accurate, but overall is just not very entertaining. I found Ken Burns 'Civil War' far more interesting.

Rating:
Summary: a very important, but eccentric and uneven movie
Review: There's a trend in modern movies (Dances with Wolves, The Last Samurai)to feature western characters who disavowe their own history and culture to take new identities in (highly idealized)cultures alien to their upbringing. The question Gods and Generals asks is, does your own culture, despite all of its defects and sins (both past and present), merit preservation and loyalty -are you willing to fight to keep it?

This is what makes the Civil War so important, beyond the issue of slavery. It is a contest between an agrarian, religious, aristocratic culture, and a city dwelling, industrialist, secular one. None of this is to obscure the issue of slavery, but, if you are going to say that the confederacy was illegitimate because of slavery, then what world culture, in it's roots, is legitimate? Is it worth asking whether slavery (as an unnatural institution and with the advance of new technology, etc.) would not have soon died out on its own, without the massive blood shed and destruction the interference of the north caused, and perhaps with a lot less of the undeniable racial acrimony that the Reconstruction era caused, extending even into the present day?

Gods and Generals is the only movie which even hints at asking these (in our politically correct, present day) almost unspeakable questions.

As for the movie itself:

At almost 4 hours it is a very long and not particularly focused movie; as opposed to other movies of the same genre, say, Braveheart. It's often hard to follow the thread of events from one scene to the next. There are very powerful scenes next to scenes that left me completly baffled(the train conductor scene, the bonnie blue flag folk dance). In some ways it works almost as well as a sort of anthology of civil war video images, as it does a movie. The battle scenes get the job done, sometimes very realistically, but director Maxwell's decision to use re-enactors instead of real soldiers was kind of unfortunate.. Re-enactors tend to be people who have the money and leisure time to pursue such an expensive, involved hobby (middle aged men).

I would second all the praise that's been given to Stephen Lang's perfomance as Jackson, and I'll advise you not to pay any attention to reviewers who characterise the movie's characters open (and historically correct) expression of their religious faith as smarmy televangelist displays of religion. These reviewers strike me as people with a chip on their shoulder, who would most probably describe any display of Christianity in such a broad, stereotypical manner.

To finish, just let me say that, yes, people very probably did talk like that! The educated of those times lived and breathed the classics of western civilization and it was almost certainly reflected in the way they chose to speak. If you don't believe me look up the letters and writings of some of the movies characters. They are readily available on the internet.

Rating:
Summary: A Movie Only a Civil War Junkie Could Appreciate
Review: I am an ardent fan of Gettysburg, and I was expecting the same quality when I sat down to watch Gods & Generals. I felt that the battle scenes were interesting, but they didn't compare to the massive display of troops like Gettysburg. I support this movie's effort, but it was definitely not what it could or should have been.

Many people complain of the movie's Christian allusions and references, but in actuality Civil War commanders were very religious, and they sought God for strength and guidance.

I enjoyed this movie, but I would not recommend it to anyone who is not a big enough follower of the Civil War to watch four hours of mainly soliloquies of perhaps one of the most skilled generals of the Confederacy. The movie focused too much on General Jackson, and I felt that it could have been improved with separate views(like those from Gettysburg). If producers decide to make "The Last Full Measure" by Jeff Shaara into a movie, hopefully it will prove to be better than Gods and Generals.

Rating:
Summary: great historical film
Review: My family and I enjoyed this film very much. It was a war movie suitable for the children, and it allowed them to see a bit of our history in action. The only reason I rated "Gods and Generals" four stars instead of five was due to the length. The movie was so long and drawn out that at times we had to rewatch parts to refresh our memory on certain events. Other than that, it was a really good movie for those who appreciate American history.