Genre: Action, Biography, Drama
Logline: William Wallace, a commoner, unites the 13th
Century Scots in their battle to overthrow English rule.
Writer: Randall Wallace
As my first blog entry, I thought it would be more
than appropriate to begin by reviewing the screenplay of one of my all time
favorite films. It should also be acknowledged of what a monumental task it is
to get a movie like this made. Any writer who chooses to create a historical
biopic is going to have the deck stacked against them. In a DVD commentary, Mel
Gibson (at the height of his fame and long before certain career crushing
outbursts) described the script for Braveheart as “a haunting piece of work.”
Synopsis:
The story begins with the childhood of William
Wallace and the struggle that the Scottish have with the English king, Edward “Longshanks.”
His father dies in battle and young William is taken away by his uncle to be
raised and educated.
Years later, William Wallace returns as a man. He
reunites with childhood friends and begins to court his great love, Murron.
During this time Longshanks institutes Primae Noctis, the right for an English
Lord to bed newly married Scottish women on their wedding night. Murron and William
marry in secret to prevent her from going to bed with an English lord.
Later, when an English soldier attempts to rape
Murron, William Wallace fights off several soldiers and the couple attempt to
flee. Murron is captured and publicly executed by the local Sheriff. In return,
Wallace kills the entire contingent of English troops and executes the Sheriff.
This begins his rebellion against English rule in Scotland.
Analysis:
This is not going to be so much of an analysis of
the script as much as I am just going to gush all over it. Though, I’ll start
by addressing what I find to be the weakest element of this movie and that would
be the premise.
While still good, in and of itself, the idea of this
film has a number of things working against it, which makes it all the more
impressive that it got made. Namely, historical biography films are not what
Hollywood executives see as “a sure bet.” They are extremely expensive to make
and audiences tend to be more difficult to come by because it doesn’t fall into
that “high concept” category. Even with Mel Gibson attached to the project, it
still was a struggle to get this film made.
Why was this film such a success? To break it down
into the simplest of explanations, this film was a success because of the
emotional impact it had on its audience. That is a direct credit to the
characterization, both by the writer and the actors. Like William Wallace, I
fell in love with Murron and when she was killed, I latched onto him and his
quest for vengeance and liberation.
A second great example of why I love this movie was
the dialog in this film. There are so many great quotable moments in this film.
Couple that with more iconic movie moments than can be counted.
Overall, it’s because of films like this that I am inspired
to be a filmmaker.
Rating:
Premise - 7.00
Character - 10.00
Dialog - 10.00
Story - 10.00
Overall - 9.25
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