Attila (2001)

What a waste of my time!!!

Although it has its amusing moments, in eneral the plot does not convince.

Entertaining from beginning to end, it maintains the spirit of the franchise while establishing it's own seal with a fun cast

The tone of this movie is interesting -- the stakes are both dramatic and high, but it's balanced with a lot of fun, tongue and cheek dialogue.

This Attila version is about in the same league as the Anthony Quinn and Jack Palance efforts, but with better production values. Butler, who plays Attila is not quite up to Quinn's acting ability or Palance's screen presence, but he does benefit from having a much better supporting cast; especially Powers Booth, who does some of his best work. The battle scenes are well done, and reminiscent of Spartacus (especially the rolling fire bit). There is some question about some of the siege battles of the Huns, who were primarily a calvary unit; not big on big machinery, like catapults and middle-ages machines. But the film's the thing. And it is watchable and well-paced, so it is entertaining. Enjoy the carnage.

You can like this film a lot but you have to be either a woman because only they can spend four hours watching clothes and men or you have to be 15 years old who think anything big is good. This movie has no connection with the historical character Attila. After half an hour I realized my mistake and started fast forwarding the film. I think I finished this film in 1:45 minutes and read about the real character on wikipedia. Its funny that people found this movie great, epic drama etc etc. Its a cheap entertainment for people who cant even see historical foreigners as foreigners, they would rather have their own people act like Mongolians. I am waiting for the day when Hollywood make a film on martin Luther king with Tom cruise as Martin Luther king and peter 'O tool as Bayard Rustin. I'm sure Americans will love it. Its funny to read the reviews. People wrote how sexy and good looking Gerry is. How mindlessly can people watch TV? Still I will ask all history freaks to watch it because this film has so many mistakes that you end up reading the whole profile of Attila. The man was simply a barbarian. watch this film as his cartoon caricature and read about him. Barbarian bastard. 2/10

What more could one ask for on a cold and rainy afternoon than an engaging historical epic with some saucy looking men in muscle defining outfits? I'm not so sure about the historical accuracy of the film, but as I'm an early modern historian I'm not going to get all indignant on this issue. I leave that to the classicists. Instead I shall report that I sat there enjoying the scenery, wondering how the story would unfold and would Powers Boothe (the best baddie in the business) get it in the end and how did Gerard Butler get to be so yummy. It is a well done flick, beautifully filmed, competently acted by all, (including Australian Simmone Jade Mackinnon) and just a pleasant viewing indulgence for a lazy Sunday afternoon.

For someone who is a history buff, especially of the period this movie, Attila, is trying to portray (roughly 430 AD to 455 AD), I was happy to finally see a Roman Empire movie specifically about this period. Most Roman Empire movies before were either of the Julius Caesar or Marcus Aurelius periods (i.e. Gladiator). That said, there are a lot of historical inaccuracies (due to budgetary constraints for example, they used August era Roman costumes), but I was willing to overlook that because of the filmmakers' attempt to try to represent the widening cultural differences between the divided Western and Eastern (Byzantine) Roman Empires (the empire divided in 395 AD) - a good example is showing the Western Emperor Valentinian III as portrayed as a Roman in Augustus era Imperial regalia whereas the Eastern Emperor Theodosius II is accurately portrayed in more Oriental Persian influenced garb. Ironically, the actor that steals the show is not the title character Atilla but Powers Boothe, Flavius Aetius, also known by his nickname, the last Roman. Again, while there are many inaccuracies, this movie is entertaining for showing a period of Roman history (during its decline) that rarely is explored. A 7 out of 10.