Braveheart (1995)

“I hope you’ve washed your ass this morning, it’s about to be kissed by a king.” – English Commander

Number of Times Seen – at least 10 times (Twice in Theater in 1995, Video, DVD, 26 Aug 2000, Feb 2013 and 31 Oct 2013)

Brief Synopsis – The fictional depiction of the story of how the Scottish people began their fight for freedom from the English Monarchy.

My Take on it – I remember seeing this movie twice in the theater. The war scenes are so vivid and seem quite realistic. Mel Gibson (who isn’t truly known as a great director (or even a great actor for that matter, good not great) did an amazing job directing this epic movie.

This was only his second time as a feature director (out of a total of 4 to date) and was able to use Randall Wallace’s script to it’s full potential.  The story works very well as an action movie, as a dramatic historical epic, as a love story and as proof that freedom is the ultimate goal that every nation wishes to achieve.

Winner of 5 (of 10) Oscars – Picture, Director, Makeup, Sound Effects Editing and Cinematography.  It lost Original Screenplay, Musical score, Film Editing, Sound and Costume Design.

It beat Apollo 13 (1995) for Best picture and to this day, I can’t decide which one is better.

I remember that in order to see the Oscar telecast that year live (like I have done every year since 1992, keeping in mind that I live 10 hrs ahead of Pacific coast), I watched it on Italian (or maybe it was Turkish) channel which is just gibberish for me and each time trying to hear the English behind the simultaneous translations.

Truly an experience.

Bottom Line – Excellent epic movie. Gibson’s best movie. Great action scenes and thoroughly entertaining movie. Highly recommended!

Rating – Oscar Worthy