Blew off 'Gettysburg' and 'Gods & Gens', mistake? (1 Viewer)

[Frank@N]

I was at the big Circuit City 2/$15, 1/$8, 2/$20 this week.

Was happy to snag copies of 'Primal Fear' & 'Pretty in Pink' for $15 total.

Combing the racks also produced a copy of 'To Live and Die in LA' for $8.

But the 2/$20 bin gave me trouble...

I walked around with copies of 'Gettysburg' and 'Gods & Generals' for awhile, but couldn't drop the hammer.

Nine hours of Civil War drama seems like a good deal for $20...

'Gettysburg' got better reviews, but is now a fairly dated production (which apparently wasn't topnotch to begin with due to budget/TV-origins/union issues).

'Gods & Generals' apparently has better production values, but was slagged by many for pacing/acting/script/effects issues.

I liked the fact that most of the cast & crew were the same, but some key changes could be jarring (Sheen vs. Duvall).

After 10 years, the director may have also lost his touch.

There is still time left on the sale, is this combo worth $20 for folks who like historical dramas or is this just too much of a 'good thing'?

 

[Robert Crawford]

I found Gettysburg to be one of the best war films ever made and I would never consider it a dated production.





Crawdaddy

 

[Frank@N]

I read somewhere that 'Gettysburg' is also OP.

Unfortunately, you had to buy two items to get it for $10.

I'll probably come across a used copy and pick it up separately at some point.

As for 'Gods & Generals', not really sure...

 

[Jon Martin]

I think GETTYSBURG is back in print.

It is a good film, although having seen it in the theatre, seeing it once is enough. The extreme length makes rewatching it not much of a possibility.

I haven't seen the even longer GODS AND GENERALS, but the reviews were mixed.

 

[Paul Bond]

I believe the Gettysburg went out of print for a while and was then brought back a couple of months ago. I suspect that was some sort of PR ploy to go with Gods and Generals.

I much prefer Gettysburg, and the extra features accompanying it are very good.

If you cannot find it by itself, the I'd say it is worth the money to get the 2fer.

As for the cast changes, Going from Martin Sheen to Robert Duvall as R.E.Lee only made me wish they had gotten Duvall in the first place. The true oddity is seeing Stephen Lang go from Pickett to Jackson, but he did an outstanding job on both parts, so it is something one can just deal with.

Bond. Paul Bond.

 

[Marty M]

I have thrououghly enjoyed Gettysburg and I highly recommend this movie. I try to judge a DVD by the quality of the movie and not the quality of the production.

Robert Duvall wass the first choice for Lee in Gettysburg, but he must have had a conflicting commitment at that time.

 

[Eric Fisher]

Gettysburg is one of the best war films.

Gods & Generals is ok.

 

[Ronnie Schildha]

Buy them. I guarentee you won't be sorry.

 

[Zachary Cohen]

What ever happened to that extra long cut of "Gods & Generals" that was (supposedly) coming to DVD?

 

[Rich Malloy]

I still haven't seen "Gettysburg", but I thought "Gods and Generals" blew.

 

[Marty M]

Rich, your opinion of Gods & Generals was shared by most reviewers. You should at least rent Gettysburg and give it a try.

 

[GarySchrock]

I found gettysburg to be pretty good myself, my only real disappointment with the dvd is that it's 5.0 sound. (And quite frankly, the canon firing sounds pretty weak as a result). It's also an almost exact transfer of the book to the screen (almost word for word). (I'm not complaining about that, Killer Angels is actually probably the reason I finally started getting interested in civil war stuff, naturally right before I moved out of virginia, before that my parents kept dragging me to all these civil war sights and I was bored out of my mind).

Gods and Generals I would say is probably ok at best. I own it, but I'm far more likely to watch gettysburg than it. If you're something of a civil war buff, I suspect you'll find G and G more interesting, but if you aren't, you'll probably find it a long, tedious movie.

Personally, I'd have to question whether it was really a good idea to try making G and G into a movie. The book isn't too bad, but the real problem is the scope. It covers everything up to the beginning of the battle of gettysburg. Even for the 4 hours or so the movie ran, that's just way too much to cover. Meanwhile, gettysburg covers a span of something like 4 days, and as such lends itself much more favourably to a movie. (It also has a much more defined staring point and ending point, instead of G and G ending just as they're headed to gettysburg).

So personally, I'd say of the two, gettysburg is definitely the far better movie to pick up. I have both because I really enjoyed the books. If you're hesitant about picking up G and G, I'd say read the book, and get an idea of whether you like the premise (although keep in mind that a fair amount of that book was cut for the movie, it's nowhere near as faithfull an adaptation as gettysburg was).

 

[Ernest Rister]

I thought Gettysburgh was fantastic, and I've watched it several times. Of course, I'm also a Civil War nut. I, too, thought the DVD was OOP. Gods and Generals was pretty lousy - sort of a trainwreck of a movie, actually - and a giant missed opportunity. Stephen Lang is excellent, however, as Stonewall Jackson.

 

[Michael Harris]

I had only two complaints regarding "Gettysburg". Martin Sheen was miscast as Robert E. Lee and some of the beard make-up was terrible. So bad that my eyes kept focusing on it and not the action on the screen.

I've not seen "Gods and General" because my civil war expert buddy told me to avoid it like the plague and I respect his judgement but I am curious to see Duvall's version of Robert E. Lee.

 

[Ernest Rister]

I thought Sheen gave the performance of his life as Robert E. Lee. Hands down my fave Sheen perf.

 

[Chris Cheese]

I'm apparently one of the very few but I am not a Civil War buff (though I do find it fascinating, like much of history) and I loved Gods & Generals. I saw it on opening night in the theater and loved every minute of its 4 hours. There is a bit of "speechifying" but I didn't mind at all. I love Gettysburg too, but Gods & Generals really hit the spot for me. I also took my girlfriend who was only modestly entertained by Gettysburg and she loved it a lot as well. We both appreciated having more of the non-battlefield parts to fill in the narrative holes some. Anyway, it's a good DVD of a good movie so I'd definitely recommend getting both.

 

[Jack _Webster]

The internet is a strange place. It seems that so many people on the internet dislike certain things. However, when I go out to the store, people are picking up that thing and agreeing with me that it is quite magnificent. 'Gods and Generals' is one of those things. I remember being prepared for the worst when I went to the theater, but lo and behold I witnessed a masterpiece. And before all of you say anything, don't waste your breath. I've heard it all before - and I've argued my opinions countless times, so I'm not going to waste my time here.

An earlier poster was absolutely right about Stephen Lang. He is an incredible actor, and I regreted that so many people had such a low opinion of this film, because I thought he should have gotten the Oscar last year. Bottom line - see the movie for yourself. Because for people on both sides of the fence, it's hard to understand the others' stance on it, because it seems like they're watching a completely different film.

 

[Ernest Rister]

I own Gods and Generals, and I wanted to like it. I was really pulling for it, but it frustrated me. Would it kill Ron Maxwell to use an overhead shot or a crane shot once in a while to orient viewers during the battle scenes? Would it kill him to move his camera so Jeff Daniels doesn't have to give a long (long) reading of a Yeates poem in a static, single unbroken shot? I have never seen the theatrical version of Gettysburgh, I've only seen the complete "extended" cut. If the extended cut of Gods and Monsters was ever released, I'd snap it up in a second, because I suspect the guts of that movie were chopped out to just the battle scenes and a some speeches. I don't hate the movie, but I felt deeply let down by it.

 

[Darren Gross]

Chris, Jack, you're not alone... I also love GODS AND GENERALS...It actually sparked an interest in Civil War history in me...(And if you know me, you'll know how odd that is)...Agreed, totally. A very underrated film.

And Mary Fahl's GOING HOME should have garnered an Academy Nomination for best song. Perhaps if it had been released later in the year it might have.

I should probably mention that it now being July 3rd, its the anniversary of the last battle of Gettysburg, including Pickett's charge etc.

 

[Chris Cheese]

I actually didn't like the Mary Fahl song much at all. Sounded like new-agey garbage to me. The Dylan song however, is one of the best songs he's done in a long time, and a complete masterpiece.