Emperor

I watched this film with no prior history of Shield Green and loved the film. It's very well written and the acting and direction is top notch. And about time a good Hollywood film is made that puts an action packed theme to a black historical figure- and yes of course it obviously takes lots of liberties with historical accuracy much like Braveheart or Last of the Mohican but the end result is entertaining. It's funny to see bad reviews just because of Harper Ferry and John Brown historical inaccuracy but it's a hollywood film - not a silly documentary so just enjoy the show zand you'll love it. The main actor is phenomenal and could be next Denzel and the supporting actors are excellent esp the bounty hunter. A solid 8

They took quite a lot of liberties with the beginning and end of the story, making up details of Shields Greens life and completely changing the outcome of his fight at the armory. But besides all the historical inaccuracies, if you just wanted to watch it for pure entertainment, the script was a bit weak, which made it hard for the actors to shine. Even though their were some big named actors, their performances were average due to the poor script, direction, and sets. It was enjoyable enough but could have been so much better, IMHO! 6.5

Great historical untold story, reminiscent of 12 Years a Slave, I wish it could have been longer to focus more historical attributes and heroes .

I went into this movie knowing nothing about it so of course I looked up the characters afterward. It's not at all historically accurate. Hollywood thinks we are morons & can't appreciate a true story to be inspiring or entertaining as is, or they're idiots & cant make it to be so without elaborating & fictionalizing. Disrespects the actual characters too imo.

Viewers must know up front that Shields Green was an escaped slave. That is the only historically accurate fact in the first half of the movie. The first half of the movie is the writer's imagination. Please don't take it as history. Green's association with F. Douglas is true, as is his association with J. Brown and the Harper's Ferry raid. And the end of the movie doesn't accurately depict Green's final fate. It's too bad that with so much rich Black history that Hollywood chooses to make stuff up. It's a disservice to history and to a people who deserve better. Much better. This is an entertaining movie, with adequate acting albeit mediocre writing. It would have been better if the critical scenes had been shot on location. Maybe the director was looking for Harper's Ferry in Virginia. Watch it, but don't take it seriously. Shields Green deserves better.