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After he is bought by the owner of a Roman gladiator school and trained as an gladiator A slave leads a rebellion of slaves and gladiators into revolt against Rome.
A romanced story of Attila the Hun, from when he lost his parents in childhood until his death. Attila is disclosed as a great leader, strategist and lover and the movie shows his respect ... See full summary »
This film tells the story of Chinese Martial Arts Master Huo Yuanjia (1869-1910). Huo Yuanjia was the founder and spiritual guru of the Jin Wu Sports Federation.
A unique slant, profiling the life of Adolf Hitler as a child and his rise through the ranks of the National German Workers' Party prior to World War II.
Director:
Christian Duguay
Stars:
Robert Carlyle,
Stockard Channing,
Jena Malone
A look at the life of Alfred Kinsey (Neeson), a pioneer in the area of human sexuality research, whose 1948 publication "Sexual Behavior in the Human Male" was one of the first recorded works that saw science address sexual behavior.
Mexican revolutionary Pancho Villa (Antonio Banderas) finds himself without adequate funding to finance his war against the military-run government. He also finds himself at odds with the Americans because of the Hearst media empire's press campaign against him. To counter both of these, he sends emissaries to movie producers to convince them to pay to film his progress and the actual battles. Producer D.W. Griffith (Colm Feore) becomes interested and sends Frank Thayer (Eion Bailey) with a film crew to develop film reels. Thayer becomes horrified and fascinated by the bandit. He finds an enigmatic individual that is both ghoulishly brutal and charmingly captivating. The resulting film became the first feature length movie, introducing scores of Americans to the true horrors of war that they had never personally seen. Thayer sold the studios on making the film despite their concerns that no one would sit through a movie longer than 1 hour by convincing them that they could raise the ... Written by
John Sacksteder <jsackste@bellsouth.net>
Pancho Villa was actually considered a "Producer" on this film by Biograph Company. See more »
Goofs
Griffith is shown to be making a short western in New York in 1914. It is a very cloudy and overcast day. In reality, Griffith has already moved his stock company out to California by then, plus he would have known not to shoot on such a cloudy day (there would not be enough light for the exposure). He also did not film any westerns in 1914, and would have been at work on Battle of the Sexes (1914) at this time. See more »
Quotes
Pancho Villa:
[after hearing a gunshot]
Sometimes justice can be loud.
See more »
Every hero is guilty of some atrocities, and Pancho Villa was no exception. Antonio Banderas delivers a convincing performance as a complicated man who had the brilliance to use the majesty of his own personality to help finance a peasant revolution in Mexico.
As docudramas go, this one is very well balanced ... it reveals the darker side of a legend, the people who tried to manipulate him, and the people he manipulated. Although the original film, the making of which is the heart of this story, has been lost to the ages, it is nonetheless a moving story.
How much is history and how much is Hollywood? Who can say? All I know is that I was more impressed than I expected to be, and more than just being entertained and educated, I was given a lot of food for thought. I sincerely hope that a Spanish language version of this will be available so that the people of Mexico can learn a different version of his story than the one that is in the books in their schools.
This was two hours of my life that I'm glad I spent in front of the screen, and I thank everyone involved for the experience. It is not the best movie I've seen this year, nor will it ever be on my Top Ten list, but it *IS* a very good example of what cinema *SHOULD* be, and all too often is not ... a thought provoking drama that tells a slightly different story than the one we thought we knew.
18 of 24 people found this review helpful.
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Every hero is guilty of some atrocities, and Pancho Villa was no exception. Antonio Banderas delivers a convincing performance as a complicated man who had the brilliance to use the majesty of his own personality to help finance a peasant revolution in Mexico.
As docudramas go, this one is very well balanced ... it reveals the darker side of a legend, the people who tried to manipulate him, and the people he manipulated. Although the original film, the making of which is the heart of this story, has been lost to the ages, it is nonetheless a moving story.
How much is history and how much is Hollywood? Who can say? All I know is that I was more impressed than I expected to be, and more than just being entertained and educated, I was given a lot of food for thought. I sincerely hope that a Spanish language version of this will be available so that the people of Mexico can learn a different version of his story than the one that is in the books in their schools.
This was two hours of my life that I'm glad I spent in front of the screen, and I thank everyone involved for the experience. It is not the best movie I've seen this year, nor will it ever be on my Top Ten list, but it *IS* a very good example of what cinema *SHOULD* be, and all too often is not ... a thought provoking drama that tells a slightly different story than the one we thought we knew.