Well, what KINGDOM OF HEAVEN shows is that Bloom isn't really a good actor, but if filmmakers play to make him act in a subtle manner, he is fine. Hell, his "speech" at the climax didn't make me wanna have a root canal, which I expected from Wood Elf.

If anything, GLADIATOR was a populist popcorn entertainment historical period flicks of the 50s/60s(like BEN HUR), while KINGDOM OF HEAVEN is of the humanistic liberal cerebral kind(SPARTACUS/EL CID) from that same time period. Truely, I was more amazed with some battle sequences that Ridley Scott does than I was with TWO TOWERS or even Ridley's GLADIATOR...but that is just me.

I'll explain what I dug about the picture, and so on in my future in-depth review. However, Don Vercetti is right in calling it a very nice picture...but I do like to see the so-called "Director's Cut" from Sir Ridley Scott that supposedly is 30-40 minutes longer than the 140 minute theatrical edit, and apparently fleshed out the story more. Who knows, maybe its a nice picture made better in the longer-expanded cut, as in Sam Fuller's THE BIG RED ONE.