I watched the DVD knowing only vaguely that there are controversies regarding this film, but didn't know any of the particulars aside from the fact that it was gory. Well, it's a Mel Gibson movie after all, so that's a given.<br /><br />In short, Apocalypto is a beautiful, deeply moving presentation of a world that existed before Western contact, and was destroyed by it. After I watched the movie, I was dismayed to read reviews that charged it with being racist, that it depicted only the blood-thirsty brutality of Mayan savagery. But this is clearly not the case. The protagonist and his people demonstrate all the virtues that allow them to wear the "white hats:" they are intelligent, brave, loyal, and strong. They abide in a loving community and show great care and love of family and children. They're also a good looking bunch. <br /><br />The "Black Hats" are a dirty dozen if there ever were one -- the leader of the group reminded me of the Jack Palance character in Shane, but with a lot of human bone accouterments jangling about. And if you think this guy is bad, wait till you get to the big city and see what they're up to.<br /><br />But I digress. I'm trying to defend the film against the charge of racism. Okay. One characteristic of racism in films in that the depiction of the targeted race tends to be one- dimensional. Apocalypto is generously peopled with characters of great individual distinction, not cut-out characters. Another characteristic is that in a racist film is that it is we are to regard the targeted race with such disdain that we are not allowed to empathize with the villains or wear the villain's skin. But in Apocalypto we are as deeply engaged in Jaguar Paw's heroic quest as we are William Wallace's in Braveheart. <br /><br />Some reviewers have mistaken the arrival of the Spanish galleons as Gibson's intention to signify rescue and redemption from wanton bloodletting by Western "civilization" and Christianity, but this is getting things upside down. Don't we know by now that Cortes' arrival was the beginning of the brutal end of so many people and civilizations in America? If the ships were to signify rescue and redemption, Jaguar Paw would only have had to have been rescued right there on the beach. Great scene for a beach-side conversion, no? No. The film presents these dark ships as the foreboding vehicles of a continent-wide apocalypse.<br /><br />Okay, I do concede that if Apocalypto is primarily a movie "about" the Mayans, it fails because it is historically inaccurate. (The Mayans were gone long before Cortes' arrival -- it was the Aztecs that he managed to destroy.) But if it is, as I interpret it to be, about the many peoples, societies, and civilizations that were destroyed, that suffered an apocalyptic end on Western contact, then it puts faces in our historical picture where there have been only caricatures before.<br /><br />Update of 12/27/09: I was just reading through my reviews and have to update the fact that it took me a few days after posting the original for it to strike me that the film, while not racist, was sexist as heck. The women are not shown participating in any decision-making or the production or distribution of food or anything else. Their only real value is to serve as incubators for more Mayans. I apologize to my sisters for my blindness in this but ask them to take into consideration that I came back to correct myself without prompting or threats.