Review by betelguese_1

The Alamo Documentary is a labor of love for the many San Antonio historians and reenactors who were interviewed. Sadly, this overly long work doesn't actually depict the full history of the Alamo itself. Interviewees refer at great length to the event as if the audience already possesses full knowledge of the story. Yet an actual account of the battle is no where to be found.

This piece was obviously produced in response to John Lee Hancock's 2004 "The Alamo," with the first third of documentary discussing various historically inaccurate Hollywood movies. Clips from silent films and from the John Wayne Alamo movie were interesting, but since the documentary producers likely did not have the rights to either the 2004 Alamo movie or Disney's "Davy Crockett," the interviewees were only able to refer awkwardly to aspects those films.

The second third of the movie looked more like a local TV station interviewed the world's biggest Alamo memorabilia collector, then covered this year's Alamo battle re-enactment. I am sure the members of the San Antonio Living History Association absolutely LOVE this documentary because it is mostly about them and their awesome hats from the period.

The final third of the documentary was a mishmash of partially-related historical political data. This laborious section of the documentary didn't follow a discernible story-telling pattern but appeared to be thrown in at the end because mercifully stopping the piece in under an hour just wasn't happening. It's Texas, after all, and everything is bigger there.

I love a good documentary and picked this movie up for $1 at the local Goodwill. I think I overpaid.