Waterloo [1970]

The battle is somewhat accurately depicted, insofar as the order of engagements, charges, and skirmishes. Toward the end, however, it becomes confusing, and has obviously been severely edited for time. Other reviewers have stated that the film was originally four hours long. This version is only a little over two hours. I would not have complained had it been a full hour longer, so long as that hour was devoted to accurately depicting the battle, and showing off some of the amazing uniforms, especially of the French cavalry. Frankly, the battle itself seems to have been somewhat shortchanged in this shorter version.


The best!   August 7, 2004
Lain Iwakura (Sydney, Australia)
19 out of 21 found this review helpful

I am not a war or history movie buff. However I saw half of this movie by chance over 10 years ago and since then Napoleon's drive has remained in my memories.

I decided to re-watch this movie before purchasing it recently as memory has a way of making things greater than they were. I am glad to say that from the opening scene to the end this movie is amazing, everything I remember and more.

I highly recommend it to anyone with a dream.


Simply Surperb   September 11, 2003
Sheggy (Cornwall, England)
8 out of 9 found this review helpful

Needless to say this film tells the story and events of, and leading up to the battle of Waterloo in 1815. Much unlike most other films of this sort of genre, "Waterloo" shows the events of 1815 from both the French and British perspective, but suprisingly mostly from the french perspective. To make things even better for this film, the plot is very accurate to the actual events and creates an exciting and well developed build up to the main battle sequence.
Christopher Plummer makes an outstanding performance as Wellington, but without any doubt the finest performance comes from Rod Steiger as Napoleon. Steiger gives one of the finest performances that I have ever seen from any actor and creates a character that the audience can clearly relate to and suprisingly, grow to like. It simply cannot be said how brilliantly Steiger acted in this film.
For anybody who is interested in history or battles on a massive scale, this is the film for you. The only problem that I found with this film was the bad dubbing with some of the extras in the VHS version of the film. This however may have been cleaned up in the DVD but i dont really know.


Oh my Gosh! This film is legend!   October 11, 2006
Thomas Webber
7 out of 8 found this review helpful

This film is amazing, the amount of effort, research, extras and the music score make one of the best War films ever. The budget for the production must have been huge as there are hundreds of people all dressed accuratly in Napoleonic Uniforms. Another great thing about this fim is the cast eg: Christopher Plummer, orson Wells and Rod Steiger!
Overall it is well worth the price you have to pay for it!


First DVD transfer captures colour and detail   February 16, 2001
Seethru (Alloway)
10 out of 12 found this review helpful

Is it worth spending so much more on the DVD of this epic, when the VHS is so cheap. Yes, and worth every penny. The sharp detail and rich colour of the uniforms is brought to vivid life on DVD. The superb panoramic and wide angle shots of the complex battle sequences are preserved in full, whereas the poor man's Pan & Scan cuts out almost 2/3 of the detail. The sound is intriguing when played on an old style stereo system, the voices flying from side to side with each change of camera angle. I'm going to buy a Digital Decoder, 5 speakers and a giant Video projector, and watch the battle scenes again and again.