Anthony Styles

I like thrillers based on real events. My wife told me that Black Doves was. Within 10 minutes I could see that it wasn’t. One reviewer says not to take it too seriously; what I would say to that is, ‘well, if you’re not taking it seriously why are you watching it?’ I do take my viewing tastes seriously you see and to see things happen in such a way when you know they wouldn’t insults my intelligence. I don’t care for sexual scenes either overly heterosexual or homosexual when they have little or no relevance to the subject matter. I just wonder sometimes just what kind of audience the producers are trying to attract to this, well, debacle which even for fiction, that I detest, when it could’ve been done so much better. Lots of fine actors too which also goes to show that actors would perform in your garden shed if you paid ‘em enough. Disappointing to say the least. I have no hesitation in awarding this zero stars.

Sadly I’d made my mind up on this movie within half an hour of its beginning. If you judged this travesty of a film purely on its battle scenes then it might’ve got a 4/10. As it is the historical inaccuracies alone let it down completely. When you make an historical epic you must do it right, or show that you’re trying to do it properly paying all respect to the person you’re portraying, and Ridley Scott, for all his directing accolades has bombed on this one. On top of that the acting is so wooden and monotone. Ask Ridley Scott to do better on a biopic of Nelson and he might redeem himself.