Kill Cavalry

Absolutely, mind-numbingly dire. After four years of grinding war.... immaculate uniforms and equipment? Incoherent dialogue, mumbled lines, wooden acting. It's not even school-play standard. Could I do any better? I'm not a director, nor a producer, nor an actor... but at least I'd try. I'd make an effort. No-one connected with this movie did.

My headline is not meant as a compliment. If you have the time, go to my user profile and read my review of GREYHOUND ATTACK. I started out my military career as an Air Force F-4 Phantom Weapons Systems Officer (backseater) and then as the F-4 was being replaced by single seat F-15s and F-16s, defected to the Army National Guard and spent the rest of my career as an Armor/Cavalry officer in the Guard and Reserve. I actually formed a ceremonial horse team within my Guard unit, out of my own pocket at no expense to the taxpayer. When asked to drive one of our tanks in a parade in the local area, we did them one better by having the team ride in front of the tank. As I liked to point out, "We ain't reenacting anything. We ARE the Cavalry!"

Reenactor units can be a mixed bag; some Guardsmen including some of my friends also belonged to reenactor units, and some of the other reenactors are very professional living historians, but you also find some of the worst military wannabes; I hold a special contempt for this one clown who, on a network TV newsmagazine, went through his first Civil War battle reenactment and then proudly boasted before the cameras, with all seriousness and not being in-character, "I've seen the elephant!"

I have to preface everything else by saying that IMHO, the greatest movie ever made-- not just the greatest war movie ever made but the greatest of any movie of any genre-- was GETTYSBURG (1993), and that it could not have been made without the over three hundred Civil War reenactment units that acted out the battle scenes for no direct pay, only donations by the production company to battlefield preservation funds. The film was great because it was arguably the most accurate reenactment of an actual historical battle ever filmed, and that was the largest battle ever fought in the Western Hemisphere in all of history. It was a faithful adaptation of Michael Shaara's Pulitzer Prize winning historical novel THE KILLER ANGELS, and on top of the historical accuracy depicting the battle itself, there was underlying drama ripe with Greek or Shakespearean Tragedy which Shaara found in the real-life historical figures who were his main characters.

KILL CAVALRY has none of that. It was a movie set during the Civil War with the principal characters being real-life historical figures, and made with the use of reenactor units, but that's all it has in common with GETTYSBURG. It's amazing that my all-time favorite movie and the movie now tied with GREYHOUND ATTACK for my absolute worst movie ever released had even that much in common. The main "plot": Union General Judson "Kill Cavalry" Kilpatrick and Confederate General Joe Wheeler were best buds at West Point before the war, and now they hate each other's guts. The End.

The acting was as bad or worse than that in GREYHOUND ATTACK, where one actor playing a British MI6 agent couldn't make up his mind whether he was a proper upperclass Englishman or a good ole boy from Alabama.

Even the so-called battle reenactments were incoherent and numbingly repetitive. It's pretty obvious that the production crew just took a bunch of already existing film of various battle reenactments along the South Carolina-Georgia border and spliced them together hodge-podge. The reenactors' firearms were obviously pointed upward over what would be the heads of their opponents 90% of the time. About the only thing close to Shakespearean in this film is that it was full of sound and fury and signifying nothing.

When I buy a video from the $5 bin at WalMart as I did for this, I usually shrug it off and tell myself, "You get what you pay for!" This is one of the few times I didn't even get my money's worth. In my review of GREYHOUND ATTACK, I at least gave kudos to the producers for having the chutzpah to release that film. I can't even say that about KILL CAVALRY; it looks like a shameless and unabashed ego trip for a bunch of reenactors with not even mediocre reenactment footage.

More like a reenactment of the Civil War than a movie. Watch it if you like reenactments of the Civil War otherwise skip.

The film was produced, directed, and written by the same person. Takes a rare talent to do that successfully. Sadly, he is not that rare talent. This was obviously done on a shoe string budget. The direction is abysmal and the acting is robotic. It is devoid of any emotion and the lines are delivered without any enthusiasm or emotion; almost monosyllabic. The battle scenes appear to be done by re-enactment hobbyists. There is only one scene where the combatants raise the rebel yell. For comparison, the battle scenes in "Gettysburg" were done with mostly hobbyists. There is no background information provided as to the characters and one is left to surmise that the animosity Gen. KilPatrick had against Gen. Wheeler may be just the Union/Confederate thing; although it hints there may be more stemming back to their days at West Point. The film is disjointed, has low production values, and poor acting. Unless you are a HARD CORE civil war buff, give it a pass.

Watched for about 10 minutes. A boring re-enactment film. When they were firing rifles, they were pointing most at the sky. Probably shot mire ducks than soldiers.