My Review of "Braveheart"

Braveheart is an epic adventure that was released back in 1995. Surprisingly this movie kind of stands the test of time. Being a period piece makes this a little easier to transition through different generations. Though you could not make a movie like this in today's social climate. This has a lot of real animals in the movie. It also doesn't have any CGI that I can see despite the fact that there are epic war action sequences.

The movie starts off with the introduction of the Wallace family. William is the main character of the movie however we learn who his father and older brother were in the first part of the movie. His father was a proud warrior but unfortunately died in battle along with his older brother. These first scenes really sets the tone of the movie and explains to us the oppression the Scottish people felt under English rule.

Then orphaned, William is then adopted by his uncle where he would set off around the world to learn new things. After a few years he comes back as a learned man. I honestly thought they should have had a younger actor play William in this stage of his life. It's kind of weird seeing a middle aged man coming back to the village to woo the girl that he loved from boyhood. The story is sweet but kind of a little off.

William eventually wins the heart of Murron but the two need to keep the relationship under wraps. The English have this law that allows English Nobles to bed Scottish women on their wedding day. Eventually everything gets screwed up as one of the English knights tries to rape Murron. She gets murdered in front of the whole village for escaping her abuser.

Obviously William goes red and kills all of the English knights involved. This starts up a Scottish uprising and that's where the movie really starts up. There are some crazy battle scenes and a lot of cunning on the part of William and his band of ragamuffins. They should have added Mel Gibson to the mix when they built up of William Wallace's mythical come up.

It's funny because 5 years after this movie came out we have The Patriot which I also really like and stars Mel Gibson. The two movies are practically identical. This movie feels a little more epic and I like the acting in this movie a lot more. If you like that movie you have to see this one and vice versa.

This movie takes me back to a time when wild epic practical effects can awe-struck you. The gigantic battles and the huge sets and scenery are a lot of eye candy that you'll love to absorb while watching this movie. The fights are quite intense and violent. If you have a queasy stomach you might not be able to take some of it.

The runtime of the movie is three hours as well. It's a long time but honestly it just passes by pretty quick as the pacing of the movie is really well done. I mentioned earlier about the acting and yes some of the acting is kind of over the top but some of these cartoonish characters really put you into the movie. The bad guys are really bad and the good guys are really good. You know exactly who to root for and it kind of feels like a professional wrestling TV program. Again I love pro wrestling so that kind of put me in a headlock.

Overall, I really enjoyed this movie. I can't believe this movie is almost 30 years old and it still looks so good. They don't make them like this anymore nor can they. If you're into some good old dumb fun you're going to love this movie. That's what I love and that's why I loved this movie. I have to give this movie a 9 out of 10. There's a good amount of people that might not like the historical inaccuracies of this movie. They also have to realize it never claimed to be a documentary either.