kng045 The Texas Revolution of 1835 to 1836, including the periods preceding and immediately following, is depicted in this mediocre 3-hour made-for-television film, whose only redeeming value is bringing light and paying homage to Stephen F. Austin, the so-called "Father of Texas" whose life story had long been overshadowed by that of the legendary Sam Houston. The rest of the film is simply the usual "Santa Anna is a tyrant" storyline and with a weak attempt to show the Mexican perspective with a fictional Hispanic character displaying stereotypical Latin machismo. Combined with short low-budget battle scenes, such as the Alamao and San Jacinto, this film is recommended only for real history buffs who who do not come from Mexico. To its credit, the Mexican uniforms look accurate and the romantic subplot (another love triangle) doesn't take up too much screen time. Overall, this movie depicts the violent secession movement by Texas' Anglo-Saxon racial minority to be a positive and just revolution against Mexican tyranny as personified by the general Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna, the so-called "Napoleon of the West".

Thund3rheart I rented this movie with really no expectations, other than I like western movies. The fact that it was 3 hours long seemed fine to me, I had some time to kill. To get down to the story I have no idea whether it follows the novel or not, but that's beside the point, since it's the movie we are reviewing not the book to movie relation. After some research on the Internet I found that it did, in fact, follow history very closly. Enough about that. I read in a comment above that someone praised Patrick Duffy's part in the movie, but I do not agree. Duffy can act, yes, but the problem is that it's basically the same character wether it's Step-By-Step, Dallas or any other part. This is a type of character that does not fit into the plot of a western in my view. What's really great is to see Rick Schroeder doing a rather large part and doing it very well. I first saw him in Blood River and was amazed at his acting talent in relation to the western theme.All in all, I do recommend that you see this movie, it's an entertaining piece and does not get "slow" because it's long running time.

KingJoeTX This movie was NEVER intended as a live, acted version of the novel. The reason, in fact, James Michener gave the movie his blessing was because of this. Michener writes novels, fictionalized stories very loosely based on actual history. The movie was intended simply to portray the actual history that inspired his novel, in a way that would relate to the novel itself.It is for that reason that one cannot simply dismiss this movie as worthless. The cinematography used has been a liability to some viewers, according to previous reviews, but was used for effect. In the end, anyone who knows Texas, American, and/or Mexican history will immediately understand the movie is slanted a bit to favor the (historical) Texan's point of view. This should in now way deter you from viewing the film objectively, either as a great representation of historical events, or simply for your own amusement. This movie's all star cast is akin to such a cast as was viewed in A Few Good Men, and few movies since.

dnwalker It's interesting that none of those who panned this movie were Texans. Whether or not it followed Michener's book closely is not the point; it followed history very well.The whole reason Americans came to settle in Texas in the first place - as the movie made abundantly clear through Patrick Duffy's Stephen F. Austin - was that Mexico had not and could not properly settle such a vast land. Austin's colony was established at the invitation of Santa Anna.It was only as Santa Anna systematically denied the Texicans - or Texians, if you prefer - basic rights that any citizen of any nation should reasonably expect from his government that they revolted. As the movie made clear, Austin did everything he could - with Sam Houston's concurrence - to keep his agreement with Santa Anna. The Mexican dictator literally drove him and the Texicans to revolt in order to give him an excuse to invade and slaughter them. His cruelty was best shown by what happened at Goliad - where the Texicans surrendered, only to be lined up and murdered after giving up all their weapons. This last could have been emphasized a little more to show the bleak reality of trying to deal with this despot, but that's my only quarrel with the entire movie. I gave it an 8 - and wondered how IMDB managed to come up with a weighted average of 4.1 when 55% of the voters gave it a 7 or better.