Watch The Alamo For Free

If you don't like this, we can't be friends.

Beautiful, moving film.

A movie that not only functions as a solid scarefest but a razor-sharp satire.

It's the kind of movie you'll want to see a second time with someone who hasn't seen it yet, to remember what it was like to watch it for the first time.

Texan John Lee Hancock certainly has the name to direct this revisionist epic but it lacks the bluster, hysterics of the liberties with the truth John Wayne production. Instead it is a prosaic and po faced film that feels too long and when the action finally comes you are reminded of Zulu and at one point you even sense Michael Caine will enter the Alamo shouting at the Mexicans not to fire any more cannons.Davy Crockett (Billy Bob Thornton) is a man living up to his legend but offered a monetary incentive of land and political power to fight for an independent Texas which at the time was held by Mexico. General Sam Houston (Dennis Quaid) is a boorish drunk politician organising a land grab, Jim Bowie (Jason Patric) is ill with TB but swaggers with an out-sized knife. Lt Colonel William Travis (Patrick Wilson) the earnest military leader who needs to earn respect from his troops.The film by wanting to flesh out its main characters ends up making the narrative choppy. As we wait for the epic battle, it just feels like an interminable hiatus but the film never misses a trick to show up Crockett as epic. If I had spotted him playing the fiddle I would had taken a pot shot at him.The Mexican leader is portrayed as an arrogant cartoon villain but the film's big mistake is not to include the history of Texas and give the audience who are not versed with American history some kind of potted history lesson of the lone star state that was not part of the USA and under Mexican control who as far as they were concerned were well within their rights to keep control of it.The film has tremendous sets and art direction, it tries to address the issue of slavery, the irony that Mexico abolished slavery and the whites wanted independence so they could maintain it. You see Bowie's slave thinking for a moment that he might had been set free and the film ignores the fact that other heroes in this movie were also slave owners.

THe Characters in the movie was probably the best part of the movie. The Alamo building itself was incorrectly built. If you look at the one in the movie, and see the the steeple isn't there. Even Hancock said he did this on purpose. Also Davey Crockett, was executed like they showed in the movie, it is documented though all different history books and first hand from the remaining people who were released from the Alamo, that he stood up fighting, swinging his gun like a club. Then in the battle of San Jacinto, you see the Texan army advancing with a US flag and not a Texas Flag. Also, the Mexican army was resting that day, in the movie it shows them in ready position to attack the advancing troops. If you are into history, this is not a movie to see. Incorrect information, a little research would provide you with what was correct and what is not. Don't waste your time watching this.

As the Mexicans sends an army of thousands to take back Texas(which was rightfully theirs), The Alamo becomes one of the main battlegrounds, in spite of being difficult to defend and possessing too few troops - the Americans simply didn't think there was much of a risk. We focus on general Houston(Quaid, a smart, if at times overly aggressive, commander) who some consider obsessed, Bowie(Patric, doing much better than in Speed 2, the only other thing I've seen him in... a man resigned to his terminally ill state, who still won't stand for just anything), Travis(Wilson, a man who has to prove that he isn't just a pampered rich kid) and Crockett(Thornton, stealing the film - having a complicated relationship with the mythical status he enjoys).There are some positives to this. Every major character is a human being, no one is a cardboard cutout, and our protagonists are not flawless. We have themes of legend vs. reality, ambition vs. Family and lower class vs. educated. We can understand both sides, and this does admit some gruesome things the Americans did(and in general there are a ton of little details that feel real, and are there purely for that, whether they reflect well on "our guys" or not). When Spanish should be spoken, it is, and convincingly so. The production design is good, with high authenticity.It's apparently the most(I haven't watched the others) historically accurate account, however, it is also Disney-fied. There is Little tension, the actual battle comes in late and is short(and violence tends to be implied). It's talky, and comes off as a made-for-TV piece, not reaching the levels of epic that it's clearly going for. There is no one vision shining through, and we're left wondering what to feel. As such, the 2 hour, 3 minute running time sans credits(or 2 hours and 11 minutes with) at times really snail-paces by.The DVD comes with an English Audio descriptive language track, the featurette Return of the Legend: The Making of The Alamo(18 minutes long; I will review this on its own separate page here on the site), 5 minutes of fine deleted scenes(with optional director's commentary), a 4 and a half minute decent Set Tour and a King Arthur trailer. I recommend this only to those easily roused, and those looking for a summary of what happened in the form of a film. 6/10

The Alamo is directed by John Lee Hancock, who co-writes with Leslie Bohem and Stephen Gaghan. It stars Billy Bob Thornton, Jason Patric, Patrick Wilson, Dennis Quaid, Emilio Echevarria and Jordi Molla. Music is scored by Carter Burwell and Dean Semler is the cinematographer. Story is a recreation of The Battle of the Alamo that ran for 13 days during the Texas Revolution of 1836.On release it was met with disdain at worst, indifference at best, and now historically it stands as the second biggest box office failure behind Cutthroat Island. The pre release word of mouth wasn't good, and with "difficulties" of the financial and creative kind leading to Ron Howard leaving the directors chair-and Russell Crowe and Ethan Hawke bowing out of roles for two of the main characters, the film has never had an equal footing from which to try and sell itself as a worthy epic. Yet if there is a western styled war film most likely to improve with age, then Hancock's Alamo is it. You see, in time it's hoped that people can embrace that this take on the Alamo legend thrives on humanistic depth, telling it not as a "hooray" hero piece, but as it was, men doomed to die. And more pertinent, men who "knew" that in all probability, they were waiting for death to come. Now that's a hard sell. It's highly unlikely that we will ever get an Alamo film to please everyone, because ultimately the story is a sombre one, an unforgiving 13 days of sadness and bitter disappointments. No matter how it gets dressed up, with Duke Wayne bravado or otherwise, this was a futile engagement. There's no chest beating stirring of the emotions for the outcome of this battle, for example such as the British being allowed to withdraw gracefully from Rorke's Drift, this is bleak history. It was a bold approach by Hancock and his team, to strip away the glitter and paint it in fallible humanistic greys. Heroic pop culture characters like Davy Crockett and Jim Bowie are not defined by glory rah rah rah, but by being men dealing with the harsh realities of war as best they can. It's telling that when Crockett turns up at the Alamo, he is genuinely stunned to learn that the fighting is not over, his plans for a comfortable life in politics vanquished the moment he sets foot upon Alamo turf. Hancock should be roundly applauded for having the courage to craft such an honest depiction of the siege, and it's not as if we aren't warned about it, either in history as fact, or during the downbeat opening five minutes of film! So a film rich with in depth characterisations, then, but also a picture layered over with considerable technical skill. Hancock himself only really misfires by having a tacked on coda that shows Houston defeating Santa Anna and gaining his surrender. Who made the decision for this "uplift" I'm not sure, but it feels forced and doesn't have the impact intended. It would have been more telling and poignant to just have a title card flash up to tell us that Houston defeated Santa Ann in 18 minutes. We don't need to see a hurried recreation, the sombre mood needed to be kept up right to the last end credit rolled. For that's the true pain of The Battle of the Alamo. However, Hancock gets mostly great performances from his leading cast members (Thornton hugely impressive as Crockett) and shoots his battle scenes with brutal distinction. His overhead shots are superb, especially as the Mexican army attacks for the final and telling time. The 100s of soldiers swarming over The Alamo looks like ants converging on a desert oasis, the hopelessness of the defenders of Mission San Antonio de Valero is never more evident than it is here. Semler and Burwell aid the mood considerably. The former is inspired by much of the film being set at night, utilising fires and candle lights to enforce the shadows (of death) hanging around the characters, while the textured brown, red and yellow hues used for the landscape gives off a parched beauty that lends one to understand why these men fight for the land they occupy. Burwell scores it evocatively, where tender swirls of emotion sit neatly along side the more broad action strains of the brass variety. The lavish sets and costuming, including some tremendous hats, are all good on production value, to round out a tip top production. It cries out for revisits by those who dismissed it so casually back on its release. Certainly I myself found it helped considerably knowing now that this was not some rousing spectacle, but that it's a detailed character story leading up to a sad and inevitable conclusion. That coda and some under nourished support characters stop it from being a fully formed classic from the genre, but that aside, it's still one terrific and thoughtful piece of film making. 9/10