Why so much hype?

If you don't like this, we can't be friends.

Bad Acting and worse Bad Screenplay

It's easily one of the freshest, sharpest and most enjoyable films of this year.

This was heavily based by critics all over in 1992, when compared to "1492 - Conquest of Paradise". That film was also OK (7/10), and it took me years to seek out this, as it was bashed the way it was. However, I've seen later DVD-reviews being far more favorable, and they're right!This film is more of a dramas than an action movie. And it's most certainly way more true in depicting how the long sea trip took place, as well as how it all got to get that far. I found the waiting for them to see land as exciting as the action which is probably what was the reason critics didn't like it back in 1992. It was also said the acting was bad back them. That's pure crap. The acting is good.The way the film depicts the bad parts of the conquering is simply great. It goes down through the bone marrow. Sometimes critics just follow each other like a flock of seagulls. And all around the world they copy what's been said "over there". This premiered in USA and Germany 14 days before the rest of the world, which just followed up the bad critics. This was before the world had seen much of Internet. It shows Columbus as a kind, but also hard man. He is not shown as a pure hero. He steal the gold and silver from the Indians, and he lets crime happen. He also took slaves back, and forced the Christian religion upon them, to show how good the Indians were when brought back to Spain. It was purely awful. It's grim in many ways. No wonder it was seen upon as a travesty back at the 500 years anniversary.See it. See a much more true story than the other films, though it has no happy ending! Just as it was. The modern world ruined the Central Americas in an awful way.

If any story should make a fascinating movie, it's the story of Columbus: a voyage across the ocean and landing on a hitherto unknown continent. His colonization of the Americas set the stage for Europe's domination of the world.So how did they make such a lame-brained movie about it? Let's see: they cast Tom Selleck as King Ferdinand (whose idea was that?!) and gave the characters lines that sound more like something out of an Ed Wood movie. I understand that the Indians were initially planning to protest "Christopher Columbus: The Discovery", but when they saw how moronic it was, they realized that there was no need to protest it! The real irony is seeing Marlon Brando in the movie. He had come out in support of the American Indian Movement and famously sent a woman dressed in tribal regalia to accept his Oscar for "The Godfather". So why did he star in this? Basically, you'll feel tempted to make the sorts of comments that Mike, Servo and Crow hurl at the crummy movies on "Mystery Science Theater 3000". While the characters were walking through what appeared to be a torture chamber, I said "No one expects the Spanish Inquisition!" If you ask me, something that should get emphasized is the expulsion of the Jews and Muslims from Spain, and how the confiscation of their property financed the expeditions to the Americas. To say nothing of the Inquisition itself.If the movie has any points of interest, it's the early appearances of Catherine Zeta-Jones and Benicio Del Toro. Everyone had to start somewhere. Nonetheless, the best movie dealing with Columbus's landing on Hispaniola (NOT discovery) is "Even the Rain". I also recommend James Loewen's book "Lies My Teacher Told Me: Everything Your American History Textbook Got Wrong".

Corny, goofy, and with some of the worst non-acting you ever saw: It doesn't get much worse than Tom Selleck as an effete fop. Try and hear him say "Por-too-gahl" without busting out laughing.Or Rachel Ward playing Queen Isabela as a shallow minded slut who gives Columbus money because she was horny for him. Seriously, this film claims that! Try and reconcile that with the real life history: Isabella was a sharp, powerful queen who presided over the uniting of her nation, and one of the most devout Catholics to ever be on the throne. There's good reason she's called Isabela La Catolica and the Defender of the Faith.And Columbus as a supposed charming rake? (Actually this actor comes across as a conceited ass in love with his own reflection.)Oh yeah, and showing his wife as a hot young thing...Columbus married a widow older than him, for her money.Please! Columbus was a driven, obsessed religious fanatic who thought the world was coming to an end in hislifetime, a believer in The End Times who thought he would play a role in Arrmageddon.Which, of course, is the worst thing the film does. It whitewashes genocide, doesn't show Columbus as the man who killed at least 800,000 Taino Indians, chopping off hand if they didn't give him enough gold, handing over Indian girls for his soldiers to rape as rewards for jobs well done, feeding Indian bodies to his dogs, and personally raping Indian women and enslaving both Indians and Africans. And he went to prison in Spain, for falsely imprisoning and torturing Spaniards.Skip this travesty and see the far better films, Surviving Columbus or Columbus Didn't Discover Us. And unlike this sanitized fiction, these two films are the truth. And you can find them for free on Youtube.

I had a wonderful time watching this film. I know it's considered by some to be inferior in comparison to the more lofty Conquest of Paradise, but I just can't help liking it. I'd rather watch Christopher Columbus: The Discovery over The Conquest of Paradise any time. It's a swashbuckling high-adventure movie with plenty of panache. Perhaps that wasn't what many expected from a Columbus movie, but it works for me. One previous reviewer said it seemed like something Erol Flynn would have starred in. I agree. I first approached this flick as an entertaining tall-tale in the tradition of classic adventure/pirate films and greatly enjoyed The Discovery.