Reviews

I can understand why a viewer would think this film is outstanding if you haven't seen Kenneth Branagh's production of Shakespeare's Henry V, but if you have, this film on the same subject just doesn't measure up. For one issue, why introduce Shakespeare's fictional character Falstaff, if you're not doing the Shakespeare version. And then to make him a seasoned warrior and great strategist, but still only a simple knight? If he's fought that many battles and had such good strategic insights, why wouldn't still have such a low rank? If you are doing a purely historical film and not a production of Shakespeare, why introduce his fictional character at all, let alone make him the opposite of the original fictional character? Maybe because Joel Edgerton, who played the role, was also one of the screenwriters? And although the Battle of Agincourt was well conceived and filmed, it still isn't quite up to the Branaugh version in its historical accuracy and cinematography. If you are taking on an iconic version of the story, you should better it instead of just hoping your audience hasn't seen it. The best part of the film was Robert Pattinson's gleefully evil Dauphin. But then the plot here killed him off, which is h huge historical gaffe! Who is there for Joan of Arc to rescue in exile and save the kingdom for? Making a historical picture with a plot that will totally cuts out Joan of Arc is rather a jaw dropping mistake! Besides, a more fitting punishment is to have Henry take the Dauphin's place as heir to the throne of France while the former Dauphin has to look on at the man usurping his right to inherit. I was so looking forward to this film, but having seen Branagh's production of the same story, even leaving out the genius of Shakespeare's words, this production was rather a disappointment.

An intriguing flick with wonderful performances by two of my favorite actors in parts that display their range. Both can be funny, ironic and can play a great hero or a villain with equal ease. The humor and the irony are subtle in this character driven film that truly captures your heart.

Meet the Hitlers is a very absorbing documentary about the consequences of having a particular name--in this instance, that of the notorious and murderous Adolphe Hitler. We follow the story of several families of that surname, one whose ancestors came over to America from Germany in 1799, and whose lives changed for the worse during WWII, the family of the only known living family of Adolphe Hitler, that of his nephew, who fought for the United States in WWII and afterward changed his name, another family of a dying father and his teenage daughter who seem to be no relation, a racist and his wife named Campbell who named two of their children Adolphe Hitler and Himmler Campbell and had them taken away from them by Child Protective Services for the state of New Jersey, and a German man who claims to be a nephew of the Nazi leader, but whom Hitler family scholars maintain is no blood relation. Then there is an artist who makes his living by doing photographic studies of all the strange Hitler items one can buy in America today. What I found most interesting was that Hitler's actual nephew, who served under the family surname in WWII, thereafter changed it, and when a now elderly lady who went to the prom with one of his three sons was acquainted with the fact that her date had been Hitler's grandnephew, and was asked if she would have gone with him if she had known that then, answered probably not. It is a very revealing study that answers Shakespeare's age old question, "Would not that which we call a rose by any other name smell as sweet?" Here we find out.