1492: Conquest of Paradise

Flawed, certainly, but by no means the horror-show its paltry box-office performance would suggest. Read full review

In its own way and up to a certain point, 1492 is a satisfactory film. Depardieu lends it gravity, the supporting performances are convincing, the locations are realistic, and we are inspired to reflect that it did indeed take a certain nerve to sail off into nowhere just because an orange was round. Read full review

The movie's pageantry and visual grandeur are its most impressive elements, along with Depardieu's command as Columbus. [09 Oct 1992, p.20]

He never gets the material under control. But what he has, in 1492, is dazzling. [09 Oct 1992, p.G5]

Scott and Bosch deserve credit for honoring the moral complexities and consequences of Columbus's conquests, but in trying to cram so much into a lavishly mainstream film, they've lost the impact of an adventure that is perhaps best relived in documentaries. [09 Oct 1992, p.3]

1492 is a pretty good movie, but it isn't as good as you might like. Part of the problem is Roselyne Bosch's script. The screenwriter (and co-producer) seems so determined to make a hero of Columbus that she can't resist giving him every virtue and virtuous motive available, and placing him in direct opposition to every bad guy or bad idea around, including decadent aristocrats, ignorant priests, and the Church and the Inquisition in general. [12 Oct 1992]

If 1492 is dramatically inert, it is just the opposite visually. Its director is Ridley Scott, a wizard at re-creating the look of other realities, and he's done a remarkable job here, filling the screen with ravishing sequences from both the Old World and the New that are dazzling and intoxicating. Read full review

1492 is not a terrible film. Yet because it is without any guiding point of view, it is a lot less interesting than the elaborate physical production that has been given it. Only a very great writer could do justice to all the themes the Columbus story suggests. Ms. Bosch may be a very good researcher, but she's not a very great writer. She can't even squeeze in many relevant facts, much less define the relevance of those she does include. Read full review

Both Scott and screenwriter Roselyne Bosch provide absorbing period detail. You learn about garrotings and massacres, Indian hairstyles and Spanish royal gowns. But this cinematic scrapbook of Columbian highlights is as beautiful as it is empty. Read full review

All Ridley Scott's vaunted visuals can't transform 1492 from a lumbering, one-dimensional historical fresco into the complex, ambiguous character study that it strives to be. Read full review

To director Scott and screenwriter Roselyne Bosch, the atrocities against the natives came about not as a product of evil but through Columbus's ineptitude as a political leader. Still, this failure -- and his frustration over never actually reaching mainland America -- renders him a tragic figure. Though he was the dreamer and pioneer who first set foot in the New World and brought treasures and territory to Spain, he died all but forgotten. The movie, alas, for all its wondrous beauty, is destined to suffer a similar fate. Read full review

Given the current political climate, it's hard to see how any film about Christopher Columbus could make everybody happy, and indeed, Ridley Scott's 1492: Conquest of Paradise seems unlikely to leave too many ticket buyers smiling. Read full review

The film takes a bold, intelligent approach to the explorer's story, providing scenes and images that are not to be forgotten. Then, midway into its journey, the movie sails right off the edge of the universe. [09 Oct 1992, p.C1]

A superficial glimpse at the man who symbolizes some of the most heroic and shameful aspects of Western heritage. Depardieu is fine as the explorer, and Weaver, Armand Assante and Fernando Rey are solid in support. But the writing never surpasses average and the exchanges on the above-mentioned issues come off sounding like a junior-high debate class or, worse yet, 15-second sound bites from political candidates. [09 Oct 1992, p.3G]

One thrilling shot of land's discovery - so good it's reprised at the end - hints at what might have been. But despite production values that advertise a first-class journey, 1492 is a long haul in steerage. [09 Oct 1992, p.8D]

In attempting to explore the man, Roselyne Bosch's script also embraces the myth, most obviously in some initial exchanges laden with significance. Vangelis' thunderous, intrusive score doesn't help; even more tedious is foppish villain Wincott, fashion victim and confirmed sadist. Read full review

If there is any reason at all to create a big-budget, 2 1/2-hour film epic about Columbus, it is to bring the explorer and the people around him into focus as human beings. But that's just what director Ridley Scott fails to do. [09 Oct 1992, p.17]

Although 1492: Conquest of Paradise is a classier failure than Christopher Columbus: The Discovery, the glum truth is that both are lost at sea. [09 Oct 1992, p.85]

The New World is a disaster, moans Queen Isabella. Yes, that's about right. Read full review

At 2.5 hours, 1492 is even harder to sit through than last month’s schlock extravaganza Christopher Columbus: The Discovery. In each case the filmmakers have fallen into a similar trap. Out of some vague mixture of historical ”duty” and commercial myopia, they’ve presented Columbus as the same cardboard visionary we learned about in school. Read full review

A lumbering journey that conveys none of the joy or mystery of exploration. Star Gerard Depardieu's unintelligible line readings and director Ridley Scott's murky mise-en-scene make it a hard film to hear and see, let alone like. Read full review