Class of '61 (1993)

Save your money for something good and enjoyable

Overrated and overhyped

Don't listen to the negative reviews

Very interesting film. Was caught on the premise when seeing the trailer but unsure as to what the outcome would be for the showing. As it turns out, it was a very good film.

I likes the first and last 20 minutes, when there is dramatic action. But between the two, there was much too much banal personal stuff. None of it done well enough to be interesting. I found myself uninterested in their personal concernI also found it offensive in the way it showed a lot of misbehavior on the Union side but not similar stuff among the Confederates. Both sides were intolerant and the Confederates were first with conscription. The Confederate government was so corrupt that the front line troops were hungry even thought the Confederacy had plenty of food. (Enough for General Sherman to live off later.)The battle scenes were realistic, but at the end of the day it was unclear what had happened. An explanation afterward would have improved the film for me.

Not the greatest of its kind, Class Of '61 suffers a hastily delivered plot, too many plot holes and sometimes, poor acting. Anyway, Clive Owen and Laura Linney alone saved this albeit a bit shallow effort, as their delivery is very decent and very deep. The sheer tragedy of a class split, of friendships destroyed, of mates killed in the same battle is shown here. Well, bother, that could have been much better, had Ron Maxwell done that in his sheer Gettysburg style and grandeur. What the movie does show well is the very banality of death at war, the immediacy of tragedy looming, the simplicity of bloodshed. No heroism, almost, just a real suffering of men and women. That could be a better movie, but even now, it is OK

CLASS OF '61 Aspect ratio: 1.33:1Sound format: StereoIn 1861, class members from the West Point Academy are torn apart by the outbreak of the Civil War.Gregory Hoblit's OK historical drama makes an obvious point - virtuous men are rendered blind by conflict - though the production seems a little stilted, despite authentic period detail and a cast of talented newcomers (Clive Owen, Christien Anholt, Josh Lucas, Andre Braugher, Laura Linney, etc.), toplined by Dan Futterman as a conscientious Southerner who takes up arms in defence of slavery, pitting him in direct conflict with his former Northern friends. The movie's emphasis on such a misguided - though sympathetic - character is particularly brave, but the drama is otherwise flat and superficial, and Hoblit's direction is efficient rather than inspired.

Class of 61 tells the story of a group of friends who are cadets at West Point at the outbreak of the civil war. While the story starts slow and lets us get to know about these folks as people and as friends, it ends abruptly at the Battle of Manassas.Not surprising really in that it was meant as the pilot for a TV series dealing with the civil war.As a movie it really doesn't stand alone all that well. Just as you get to know and care about the characters the film is over.