The Film Kingdom of Heaven - Essay Example

18 Dec Kingdom of Heaven Filmmakers when making a film which involves the past along with historical locations in the world have responsibilities to the film. The first responsibility of the filmmaker is to try and keep the historical facts true to their nature as they happened in real life. But with historical fiction, the filmmaker needs to fit the story into the facts as best as possible. The second responsibility of the filmmaker is to keep the customs, dress, and all landmarks accurate to the period of time in which the story takes place. For example, if a film is set in the time of Christ, the people need to be following the customs of the Roman Empire along with wearing the correct robes. They should not be in a three piece suit and penny loafers, unless the movie has to deal with a man out of time. The third responsibility of the filmmaker is to not keep the locations to their accurate size so that the viewer seems as though they were there. The historical piece that will be used to determine the three responsibilities is Ridley Scott’s 12th Century epic, Kingdom of Heaven. Kingdom of Heaven is a film set during the Crusades about a French blacksmith named Balian, who is searching for a reason to go on after the death of his wife and children. A fabled knight, Godfrey of Ibelin, has briefly returned home after serving in thr East. Godfrey approaches Balian and let’s the blacksmith know that he himself is the blacksmith’s true father. Godfrey, then, asks Balian to join him and his troops in their journey to return to the Holy City of Jerusalem to help in the city’s defense. The blacksmith accepts the offer of Godfrey. Their arrival falls in between the Second and Third Crusades when Jerusalem is enjoying a period of peace between the Muslims and the Christians. This peace was all thanks to the Christian monarch King Baldwin IV, his second-in-command Tiberius, and the Muslim potentate Saladin. Unfortunately, the peace does last since violent agitators set out to increase their power. Saladin had to bow down to the pressure Godfey and his men stayed o give their allegiance to the king and his community of diversity. The knights, as well as Balian, use their skills as warriors to build a lasting peace. Orlando Bloom (Balian) is one of the main stars of the film along with Liam Neeson (Godfrey), Edward Norton (Baldwin IV), and Jeremy Iron (Tiberias). In Kingdom of Heaven, I noticed that the overall peace between the Muslims and Christians seemed to show the lack of religiousness. Rather, the situational tension amongst the Christians and the Muslims seem to be more like a backdrop, than a major part of the story. The story is set between the Second and Third Crusades. However, the action and fighting as warriors is more prevalent than the religious aspects of the Crusade that should be more available. King Baldwin IV was a monarch who wanted to convey peace and diversity amongst the religious factions that want to control the Holy City of Jerusalem. Thus, the filmmaker seemed to use the facts of the time period as more of a symbol for the setting, than as the setting itself. The fighting may have been more gruesome for a film that should be more focused upon Baldwin’s Kingdom of Heaven, then the relationships of a lone person. The relationships should be more about the groups trying to vie for power in Jerusalem, than that of a single man. This story portrays single man being effective in the war to maintain the peace and diversity throughout the city of Jerusalem during the reign of Baldwin IV. However, the portrayal should be how Baldwin could bring about the change in the ancient fight of the Muslims and the Christians, not how a French blacksmith becomes a knight to help defend the ancient, Holy City from the agitators that wish to overthrow Baldwin IV and claim power for themselves. I feel the overall responsibility of keeping the accuracy of the facts was a little massacred instead of being kept intact by the screenwriters or even portrayed effectively by the filmmakers and the actors. I also found that even though they convey the proper attire, settings, customs, and etc, a lot of the feelings of the characters see to be rather forced by the actors portraying them. For example, there is one scene before the major battle of Jerusalem where a knight comes up to Balian and asks him to pray with him since he is afraid of what will happen during the upcoming battle to defend the Holy City. However, the actor does not portray the knight as being genuine when it comes to asking for a prayer from Balian. Furthermore, that same character claims to be fearful, but that is really hard to tell since the knight seems more stoic, and apathetic, than fearful of the upcoming battle. Emotion is something that a character needs to portray for the film to be plausible rather than to be flat as this movie seems to be. In my opinion, this movie more conveys a feeling of Orlando Bloom’s other action flicks, such as Lord of the Rings trilogy or the first three Pirates of the Carribean where he played an English blacksmith turned pirate. The movie does not have the feeling of being a period piece, but just your standard action movie with two armies fighting being in the setting of Jerusalem during the 12th Century. It feels to me that this type of movie could have been plopped down in any time and showing the same action. This movie does not portray the overall feel of the tensions that needed to be portrayed to give the feel of the two religions and their various factions vying for power over the control of Jerusalem, which is a holy city in both the Christian and Islamic religions. In conclusion, Kingdom of Heaven does not portray the facts of the real historical situation that is shown in the film. The accuracy of the facts and the story is not very well kept intact by the filmmakers. The responsibilities of the filmmakers when handling a historical fiction is rather bashed. As stated earlier, the three responsibilities are all mainly about keeping the facts of the event portrayed accurate along with the customs, clothing, etc. along with the size of the actual locations. Two of the responsibilities are met, but the facts of the event portrayed seems to be slaughtered. They still resemble the actual events that occurred where Baldwin IV’s “Kingdom of Heaven” was destroyed by the religious factions that wanted to remove the king, who was about peace and diversity in the city of Jerusalem, from the throne. Thus, Ridley Scott and his crew did make a wonderful action flick, but it does not fit with the period piece very well. Works Cited Scott, Ridley, dir. Kingdom of Heaven. Perf. Orlando Bloom, Eva Green, Jeremy Irons, David Thewlis, Liam Neeson, Brendon Gleeson, Edward Norton, and Martin Csokas. 20th Century Fox. 2005. Film. Read More