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Among the dead was Davy Crockett, a Tennessee Congressman whose life became legend without his permission. Crockett is played by Billy Bob Thornton, in a performance was that considered a career highlight, although I felt it was one of his least successful. Thornton was a little too clean and jovial and he seemed too modern for the 1830s. However, he does feature in two of the film’s best scenes: before their nightly barrage of cannon fire, the Mexican army band would serenade the Americans with a mournful march called De Guello, which is Spanish for "to cut the throat.” For the tired and scared troops trapped in the Alamo, the song was a creepy reminder that an attack was seconds away. One night, Crockett climbs a battlement with his violin and plays an accompaniment to the Mexican dirge, after which he notes that sometimes two enemies just need a little “harmony.” The other great Crockett scene is his death, when Santa Anna says he’ll spare Crockett’s life if he surrenders. Crockett replies by saying he’ll spare the General’s life if he surrenders.

Also dying in the Alamo siege was James Bowie (Jason Patric), creator of the knife that bears his name. After years of fighting, Bowie had more diseases and ailments than can be found in any medical textbook and watching the proud warrior lie on his deathbed and button his vest while enemy troops approached was another top moment. In life, as in film, the Alamo was run by Lt. Col. William Barrett Travis (Patrick Wilson), considered a scrub by most of the men, including Bowie. However, he rose to the occasion, eventually earning Bowie’s respect and the respect of all those under him.

And all those men had the horrible task of essentially waiting to die. Trapped in the fort, they continued to believe that General Sam Houston (Dennis Quaid) was coming with reinforcements, until Lt. Col. Travis, in another effective scene, admits that no such help is coming. Indeed, Sam Houston is on the outside looking in for most of the film, and Quaid did better as Doc Holliday in 1994’s Wyatt Earp. His scratchy Old West voice is just too much an affectation here.
Houston never made it to the Alamo, but after hearing of the slaughter, he regrouped and defeated Santa Anna’s army in less than twenty minutes in the Battle of San Jacinto. In a moment of juicy retribution, the cowardly Santa Anna agrees to give up the entire state of Texas to save his aging hide.

Despite everything going for it (including Dean Semler’s gorgeous cinematography) the movie collapses under the weight of its admirable intentions. Director John Lee Hancock’s (The Rookie) motives for making the film are above reproach, which may be part of the problem. The film is too long and seems rather stuffy and airless. None of the characters really come alive, as they all seem intent on proving to the audience they were flesh and blood people and not the far-off constructs of a high school history book. Also, the film was cut to pieces before finally being released theatrically and it shows. Certain characters, like General Houston, seem shortchanged. And worse, the setting up of the historical pieces is a bit disjointed, as if the lost scenes contained bits of connective tissue in the movie’s timeline. History has never been so momentarily confusing. In short, The Alamo never comes alive.

By the end, one feels a bit angry that the movie was so thoroughly slaughtered by the media, who tend up jump on behind-the-scenes disaster stories, if only because bad news always rates higher than good news. I’ll be the first to admit The Alamo is flawed, maybe fatally so, but may I also be the first to recommend it to anyone who’d rather see a film aim high and miss, then aim low and hit the target.

Video: How Does The Disc Look?

The picture is a bit soft. There, the bad news is out of the way. Now, I can focus on what is otherwise an absolutely beautiful 2.35:1 anamorphic transfer. The first set of kudos goes to the nighttime exteriors, which are dead black, without a trace of pixilation. Contrast in these scenes is terrific, with faces and clothing very discernable, even up against the darkness of night. Exterior daytime scenes are bright, with colors that tend towards the brown. There is not a lot of vibrant color in the film, the best being the red of the Mexican uniforms. There are no edge enhancements and fleshtones are fairly accurate, if a bit hot. The softness of the picture keeps the detail from being as good as it should have been. Still, it’s a really fine transfer from the Disney.

Audio: How Does the Disc Sound?

The Dolby Digital 5.1 audio is also outstanding. The battle scenes come alive with cannonballs flying across the sound spectrum and gunshots and explosions doing the same. It’s a very active mix, without being too busy or overbearing. Dialogue is clean and understandable, while Carter Burwell’s surprisingly average score, sounds sharp. Bass rattles nicely, giving the soundscape a solid foundation. Predictably, there are no audio dropouts or other anomalies.

Subtitles are available in English, Spanish and French. Oddly enough, there is no Spanish audio track, only a French audio track.

Supplements: What Goodies Are There?

Disney gave it the old college try with these supplements, but in the end they’re only watchably average. Better extras would have almost made the DVD a recommended purchase.

Return of the Legend: The Making of The Alamo is an 18-minute fluff job about how big and important and wonderful the film is. Producer Mark Johnson claims the movie is a “character study against a huge, epic background”, a claim I respectfully disagree with. Anyway, the piece takes you through the making of the Alamo set, costumes and props and (most interestingly) introduces us to the professional historians and re-enactors who helped director John Lee Hancock keep it real. Claims that The Alamo wasn’t just another job, that the crew felt they were helping convey history are pretty cheeseball. However, there is a bunch of interesting on-location material to sift through and all the principles are interviewed. The video is full- screen and very clean.

Deep in the Heart of Texans makes the argument that it was very important to shoot the film in the Lone Star State and not on some Hollywood soundstage. Director John Lee Hancock, a Texas-native, remembers visiting the fort as a child. Dennis Quaid even admits to being a kid and playfighting the very battle he’d lead as an adult on film. It’s six minutes of everyone admitting this is the most important story they’ve ever been a part of. If you believe that, I have a bridge.

Walking in the Footsteps of Heroes is most informative of the supplements. It introduces us to the four major players in the film, Lt. Col. Travis, Davy Crockett, Jim Bowie and Sam Houston. Their stories are told by the actors who played them, which make the piece less than scholarly, but viewers are more likely to listen to a celebrity then a historian. Eleven minutes long, the video is digital-clean, although John Lee Hancock’s audio tears a bit.

Also included are five deleted scenes, which can be played with or without commentary by director John Lee Hancock. The film was famously whittled down in the edit room before it was finally locked. And these dropped scenes flesh out some of the storylines that were eventually abandoned. Frankly, if the finished film had another ten minutes of deleted scenes, it would have been better off. Video quality is of strong workprint quality. Clean, but non-anamorphic and not timed. Audio is good.

Finally, there is an audio commentary by historians Alan Huffines and Stephen Hardin. Both are quite learned about the actual events and are admirably honest about what liberties were necessary in order to tell the story in cinematic fashion. God bless them, they keep the conversation going pretty well, which is quite a feat considering the film is over two hours.

Parting Thoughts