Conquest 1453 (2012)

This whole review section: English people not being able to accept the past. Yes it was exaggerated at some parts, but this wasn't a documentary nor educational video. Comments like: "The part where they dragged the ships over land was only 1 minute". Of course it is not done in one minute, but would you like to watch days of ships being dragged over land? The film gave the viewer adrenaline, not education. And to be honest, it gave Turkish people proud. I watched this movie in Rotterdam Pathé cinema. At the end of the movie the whole room of more than 400 people were applauding. The first and last time I had ever experienced such thing.

Where should we begin? The movie itself is not bad: decent acting, lots of action, exciting battle scenes. However, one should just watch it just as an action/war flick, because from a historical point of view, this is nothing but a pathetic, biased, and intellectually dishonest attempt to distort the FACTS. The Turkish director and producers tripped over themselves to portray Sultan Mehemet II as an archetypal hero, ferocious in battle and magnanimous in victory. I will just limit myself to point out the following gross omissions and distortions: 1) In the movie we see the sinking of some Venetian ships that tried to force their way past the Turkish blockade. However, nothing is said about the fate of the captain of one of these ships, Antonio Rizzo (look it up, folks!), who along his captured crew was impaled for daring such a feat. 2) The Turkish admiral Balthogu (look it up, folks!) in the movie, was slapped by Mehemet for failing to sink the Venetian fleet, which sailed safely into Constantinople's harbor. In reality Balthogu was almost put to death, had not some of his soldiers defended him to the Sultan: he was beaten to a pulp, stripped of his titles and property and sent into exile. Magnanimous Mehemet, eh? 3) At some point we see the "evil" defenders of Constantinople hanging some brave Turkish prisoners on the walls of the city, in full view of the besieging Turkish army. No mention is made of the FACT that this was IN RESPONSE to the Turks first beheading 125 Christian prisoners before the city walls. One more: my favorite distortion: 4) Mehemet walks into the main church of Consatntinople Haghia Sophia, promising peace and protection to the terrified civilians who found refuge there. Ehem, small detail: Constantinople was sacked for THREE full days: rape, pillage, murder, robbery galore!!! Look it up folks! Conclusion: shame on the director and producers of this movie for their corrupted, stupid, insulting portrayal of history. This is ONE MORE reason for distancing ourselves from anything that has a "made in Islam" tag attached to it......

This film has almost 8/10 rating and 66% of users gave it 10 stars but this doesn't make it a good film for several reasons. First of all, there is no character development and you cannot relate to any of the characters. Secondly, acting is horrible, even laughable at times. In addition, there are zillions of all sorts of goofs (mostly anachronisms and factual errors). Finally, an important historical event is unrealistically told while using too much propaganda which casts a shadow all throughout the film. A far better acting, a much bigger budget with superior visual effects, a way more realistic narration and a lot less propaganda could have created a great film. Now, why does this film have a high rating? It is hard for me to answer this without offending my fellow Turkish citizens. All in all, this film is an insult to the art of film-making and a hundred years of Turkish cinema. If you want to see a good Turkish film, you can try this year's Palme d'Or winner "Winter Sleep" by Nuri Bilge Ceylan.

When I first saw the title i was really interested in this them, especially because no film was made about the fall of Constantinople before, or not to my knowledge, I was excited about it. But to my huge disappointment this movie is all about glorification and exaggeration of the Ottomans, their ruler and other MACHETE SUPER heroes, a complete propaganda about the conquest of Constantinople and Balkan's. It remind's me of some cheap Turkish TV-shows and other trash movies,with bad acting, cheap special effects etc.. not a history movie that I was expecting at all! They really ruined the chance to make a good movie. Final scene of Sultan Mehmed II entering the Hagia Sophia almost made me throw up. I really wonder who gave this movie such a high grades.