Gettysburg (1993)
In the summer of 1863, General Robert E. Lee leads the Confederate Army of Northern Virginia into Gettysburg, Pennsylvania with the goal of marching through to Washington, D.C. The Union Army of the Potomac, under the command of General George G. Meade, forms a defensive position to confront the rebel forces in what will prove to be the decisive battle of the American Civil War.
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Simply Perfect
hyped garbage
Best movie of this year hands down!
It is encouraging that the film ends so strongly.Otherwise, it wouldn't have been a particularly memorable film
As Gettysburg tries to be very accurate on what happened on the battlefield when you look at the formations, historic weaponry, correct uniforms etc. it utterly fails to show the psychological "cracks", the inconsistencies, the doubts that every participant in a war always has. Even when the men are exhausted and deadly wounded, there is always a general in this film with some heroic words that can keep the moral of the troops up. Under the utterly heroic tunes of the pathetic soundtrack you see thousands die, just to make a few hundred meters on some grassland hills. Nobody deserts, nobody goes crazy by the horrors. This is as glorifying as the Riefenstahl-Movies in the 30s.This might work for civil war romantics, but as a propaganda movie its a bad one. Its at least two hours too long, badly edited, it has no tight rhythm and only alternates between overlong large battlefield scenes and heroic speeches on both sides.So I think the only ones I would recommend this are film-buffs and historians, who are interested in how even badly made propaganda movies about the civil war get so much praise from their fans.
The music and melodrama in this movie, make war seem like a glorious event. In fact, of course, war is foremost horrific. All the men in the movie, act like little boys and murder each other. But this no less true in real life, so one could say it is a realistic representation of war, or men fighting each other. Still, murdering and wasting lives is kind of depicted as meaningul and heroic in these movie. Typically American and totally moronic and detrimental to society's values.
This movie was extremely well done with many memorable quotes, the movie does take a very long time to reach its point but it does relive many skirmishes of the Gettysburg battle. All casting choices were great especially with Martin Sheen as Robert E Lee. The movie reviews the rise and fall of the great military leader "Stonewall" Jackson and the charge of the Confederates farthest advancement into the northern states. This is a relatively accurate representation of the battles and the book written by Michael Shaara. If you are looking for a good film with accurate battle descriptions then this is a good movie (If you have the time that is).
I found the movie very interesting especially how well the attacks were planned by both sides before battle also the mind set of the soldiers both for the north and the south impressed me. They showed just how much they cared for what they were fighting for and what they wanted as a result from this war. This movie also shows just how bad the civil war really was. Also I didn't realize that so many generals and high ranking officials died during this war. It just shows that they didn't put their lives before the lives of the soldiers that they were commanding. One other thing I was surprised about was how Robert E.Lee didn't really listen to his fellow generals about how they feel they should attack the Union instead he felt his way was always the best but that proved to be wrong at Gettysburg.