Gettysburg

You can make the case that the grammar of the regular enlisted man for North or South would be very basic, their vocabulary severely limited by a lifetime of not receiving any education.

But even the Generals and other officers, particularly those on the South, are speaking gibberish, not one discernible English phrase. And it takes away from me taking this program seriously to any degree.

I mean, do the actors get paid less if they just speak gibberish instead of English? Is that in the union contract or something? Case in point: Barksdale, he is shouting orders out that are in a language totally foreign to anything heard on planet earth. It really bothered me too because this was a pretty important commander in the "history" of the South, something the "history" channel doesn't take as seriously as most people, which in itself is confusing. Showing this man to be an illiterate buffoon that can't even muster a single properly structured sentence let alone a few words to his own troops does him a disservice.

Just nonsense. History Channel has produced another winner here.

I'm a cultural historian, and I've don't a good deal of work on representations of history. To expect that a movie will offer a completely accurate representation of events is to ask too much. Still, this one drips with inaccuracies. The devil is truly in the details. For example, maybe some would argue that showing LTG Richard S. Ewell arriving on horseback is forgivable, even though he really arrived in a carriage and his wooden leg was promptly shattered by a Union minie ball. Unfortunately, though, the arrival on horseback supports the idea that Ewell was eager to take vengeance for the leg he had lost. There's nothing to support this. Historians have found plenty of evidence that he was not fighter he had been. MG Isaac Trimble almost begged Ewell to order an attack on Culp's and Cemetery Hills on July 1, before Federal troops had entrenched and solidified a position. Ewell refused. There are similar gaffes throughout. It's not clear what point the producers wanted to make here; if it were, perhaps the reason for the easily avoided errors would be clear.

This "documentary"'s only positive quality might be as a comedy. But then, it's hard to laugh when you can barely stand the shaky cameras, the overtly jarring editing and supreme close-ups that would make even Stanley Kubrick cry out "enough!"

Bad cinematography aside, there's the acting. Apparently all men from the 1860's were jittery, ugly, and maniacal. Yes, War is Hell, and it makes demons out of normal people, but the people in this program are caricatures. This may have something to do with the fact that they hired a cast of Europeans, who do not speak a lick. They only grunt, yell, carry on, and generally make fools of themselves.

It's puzzling why the producers cast their gaze to Europe for reenactors. Apparently they didn't get the memo that the last Civil War movie was a dud, and that American Civil War reenactors are just dying to help someone get it right. For FREE. Movie producers have a ready-made cast of extras, who only want the privilege of portraying Civil War soldiers ACCURATELY.

And this documentary is horrendously inaccurate, not only in the minutiae of what the soldiers were wearing or what they looked like (Monty Python's rule about high-ranking people not having crap smeared all over them does not seem to apply here), but also in more important ways. Such as how cannons operate, or when the Federals reinforced the Round Tops, or who was making the decisions about the Federal left flank.

There is growing research about "negative knowledge." This is the idea that what some people say can actually DETRACT from the sum of knowledge in the world. This program fits that theory. It can only misinform, and one would do well to ignore this unqualified disaster.

As a student currently in U.S. history, I found this film to be informative in the battle of Gettysburg and what the strategic plans for it were. However the historical fallacies were inaccurate, such as terrain, uniforms,and they missed a large portion of the history in the first day. It was not necessary to focus on one or two generals, however the movie itself was informative and the graphic details well done. If the movie focused more on surrounding area and the question of escaped slaves - which was brought up and dropped - this would be slightly more riveting. It was not intended for the armies to meet, however it was not Lee's turning point in the war as this could've been pointed out in other battles. The movie itself was slightly unconnected as the plot moved forward, and the whole thing was drawn out, even for a three day battle. The highlights were the explanations of bullets and canister, which i identified as grapeshot, as these were helpful in showing how there were innumerable casualties with each hit. It was an interesting movie, but inaccurate in it details and portrayal of the event.

Ignore the reviews about inaccurate historical details, this film is very, very good. The action *must* be like it really was. Watch it. What a joke the reviewers here say about inaccurate historical details... they're just armchair historians giving poor reviews because they're obsessed with details about who did what and when. Who cares about who did what and when? It was such a chaotic battle, no one will ever really know the truth of what happened and when.

The action in this film blew me away. My great great uncle fought there, and I'm sure he'd agree that this is the way it was. One of the best CW films I've ever seen, maybe THE best. It's the combat scenes that make it and that's what I, and most other guys, want to see realistically depicted.

This film is simply the best. Ignore the nit-picking reviews. Darn the wannabe historians who think they have a corner on what the Civil War was about... Jeez.