THE PATRIOT R
Starring Mel Gibson, Heath Ledger, and Donal Logue
Eric says: ******* 1/2 (7 1/2)
The true test of The Patriot has me. By the ending credits I felt a shot of jingoistic patriotist in spite of myself.
Gibson is a frontiersman in the year 1776 who has retired from the fighting life, having served his country (England, officially) proudly in the French - Indian War. Now a revolution is gaining power right in his front yard to secede from England with the locals citing allof the pat reasons like the whole "taxation without representation" line. He knows that a war is a'brewin' and he knows that it will be fought in their own front yards. He is literally right when his son, a courier who enlisted against a direct order from his father, is injured in a battle, and he and other soldiers take up refuge in dad's house. The trouble begins when an English officer with simply no good manners kills one of his sons and captures the courier. All hell is about to break loose as the Ghost, the nickname the British assign to Gibson's character, unleashes his one-man wrecking crew on all redcoats.
The next 2 hours (it's 2 hours and 45 minutes) are a fun blend of period piece intelligent war film and over-the-top summer movie action. The entire climactic final battle scene seems to exist within two realities. All around Gibson, blood is being shed, men are dying, general unpleasantness abounds. Yet he is almostly peacefully sauntering through the crowd, taking a moment here and there to kill himself an Englishman. He is the Rambo amid all of the gunfire, more lucky than particularly gifted in these scenes.
Aussie newcomer Heath Ledger is Gibson's son, a generally good boy as self-determined as dad. He brings a quality to the film that I'm sure women will enjoy.
A rousing story of love of country and love of family with a touch of the Rambo sensibility thrown in, see this one while it's still in theaters, or see it on video. You can do what you want, it is a free country, after all.