THE KINGDOM OF HEAVEN Directed by Ridley Scott
Certificate PG

FOR pure visual artistry and visceral excitement as well as an examination into the delicacies of religion Ridley Scott’s latest epic achieves more than either Troy or Alexander.
In fact, Scott has made a film so utterly cinematic that it could be difficult to wrangle onto a small screen. Huge in scale, massive in appearance and enormous in ambition, Kingdom of Heaven is set between the second and third Crusades, beginning in France where Orlando Bloom plays a mourning blacksmith who has lost both his wife and child.
A knight (Liam Neeson) rides into his village, proclaims him his son and then rides off, after not persuading the blacksmith to join him. In the event that Bloom’s character, the true and noble Balian, changes his mind, however, Godfrey of Ibelin (Neeson) beckons, “It is easy to get to Jerusalem. You travel til the men speak Italian. Then you travel til they don’t. We sail from Messina.”
Without giving the story away Balian does follow his father and so his life unfolds before him.
Comparisons to Gladiator are inevitable: this tale, like that one, has an emotional and ethical centre yet the much anticipated religious statement it makes is one of moderation on both sides.
Although some are unhappy with the thought of juxtaposing Islamic and Christian faiths, what you learn from the film is that the real place of forgiveness and victory is not in the Holy Land at all.
Edited to evoke an adrenaline rush by Oscar-nominated Dody Doran (Memento), Kingdom of Heaven is Scott eclipsing his own previous achievements, a claim which holds even if you don’t think Bloom can pull off the role of the mega-hero.
Edward Norton, Jeremy Irons, David Thewlis and Syrian actor (and Muslim scholar) Ghassan Massoud turn in powerful performances which lend further emotional weight to the inevitable and brilliantly choreographed swordfights, battles and back-stabbing.
Made with as much historical accuracy as cinematically allowed, it is Scott’s vision of Jerusalem itself which recoups the cost of the ticket.