Balian (Orlando Bloom), a young French blacksmith, is mourning the loss of his wife and young son. The religious wars raging in the far-off Holy Land seem remote to him, yet he is pulled into that immense drama. Amid the pageantry and intrigues of medieval Jerusalem he falls in love, grows into a leader, and ultimately uses all his courage and skill to defend the city against staggering odds. Destiny comes seeking Balian in the form of a great knight, Godfrey of Ibelin (Liam Neeson), a Crusader briefly home to France from fighting in the East. Revealing himself as Balian's father, Godfrey shows him the true meaning of knighthood and takes him on a journey across continents to the fabled Holy City. In Jerusalem at that moment -- between the Second and Third Crusades -- a fragile peace prevails, through the efforts of its enlightened Christian king, Baldwin IV, aided by his advisor Tiberias (Jeremy Irons), and the military restraint of the legendary Muslim leader Saladin (Ghassan Massoud). But Baldwin's days are numbered, and strains of fanaticism, greed, and jealousy among the Crusaders threaten to shatter the truce. King Baldwin's vision of peace -- a "kingdom of heaven" -- is shared by a handful of knights, including Godfrey of Ibelin, who swear to uphold it with their lives and honor. As Godfrey passes his sword to his son, he also passes on that sacred oath: to protect the helpless, safeguard the peace, and work toward harmony between religions and cultures, so that a kingdom of heaven can flourish on earth. Balian takes the sword and steps into history.

I have to admit that I came into the film with many misgivings and ended up liking the movie more than I thought I would. Now although I liked the film and it was an ok movie there was tons wrong with it and some of my misgiving were very true, so the movie was good when it could have possibly have been great. Anytime you have that to say about a movie that it did not live up to its potential that is a sign that you should have done things differently. The entire epic genre is slowly being beat to death; period pieces and these sweeping epic movies are becoming less and less entertaining. Since 2000 when Ridley Scott gave the genre a boost with Gladiator each subsequent movie has been less and less grand including Scott’s new try at the genre Kingdom of Heaven. What was wrong with the movie mostly can be boiled down to character development, the movie has an ok story but it never takes time to develop the characters in that story. None of the characters except Balian are even memorable as they easily fall out of memory once they are off the screen. Understandably Balian is the main character and the rest are side roles but even Balian wasn’t developed as his motives are never truly explained and the only thing going for him was that he is a memorable character.

I absolutely despise Orlando Bloom he is another pretty boy that cannot act who is given role after role simply for his looks. This is the first role that I have liked him in since Legolas as while is acting still leaves much to be desired he at least pulled the part off with some success. Bloom really needs to find away from period pieces as he has yet to do anything contemporary and if he doesn’t show he has some versatility as an actor he will rightfully disappear in a few years time. The rest of the actors are almost not worth mentioning because of the lack of script and development none of them were really given a chance to do anything. Jeremy Irons does a favorable job as well as Liam Neeson but neither is around much enough to leave any kind of impression. The movie was good, the battle scenes were done marvelous but the movie will be easily forgotten like its characters.
3.5 stars out of 5