A competently directed historical piece, the film improves as it progresses and the concentration shifts from the romance at hand to politics, yet it still is not what I would call a very engaging experience. It has a large array of characters, and many of them are not fully developed; the ones that are felt a bit bland to me, and I could not find many sparks between Keaton and Beatty's characters. There are also quite a few subplots, which makes the whole film rather hard to grasp, since so many things are going on, and so few seem properly explained. Perhaps though I am being a bit harsh on the film. The quality of acting is quite reasonable, and so is the technical side of the production. The film has some good ideas and some good elements, and perhaps it is worth seeing for those, but I would be cautious as to whether one can sit through over three hours of it in one go.
