I did here this movie was good from various people. Plus I do like Natalie Portman and Javier Bardem as well as the director Milos Forman. Yet after watching this movie I really had nothing to admire about it.<br /><br />First off the acting was very much below average. The performances were just not powerful enough to really feel shocked by what the inquisition did. Javier Bardem did give a solid performance and was probably the only one who actually had as Spanish accent. It is pretty obvious why this Bardem was the only one. Natalie Portman, who I think is a very good up and coming actress did not really make me feel sorry for her being tortured. Like the movie there was nothing to admire about her performance. Stellan Skarsgaard who I do like gave a very average performance, like the other actors giving a boring performance. This movie was essentially about him since he plays Goya. Yet he did not become what he needed to be to make this movie good. What about Randy Quaid? You have just got to be kidding me. Him playing King Carlos IV. Look he is great in comedies but him playing a King that just describes the whole movie for you.<br /><br />The directing was just horrible in this movie. When a movie is a mess there are usually two people to blame for that: the director and the writer. I get the feeling that Milos Forman really didn't want his actors to put a Spanish accent on. From the very few battle scenes in here they were all displayed horribly. Also as a director he needs to give you the feeling of shock of what the inquisition did. After this movie I felt like I could careless about the event. To sum it all up he poorly shot the scenes and misguided the actors.<br /><br />The writing which was also done by Milos Forman was just as bad or maybe even worse than the directing. There really was nothing memorable of the movie except for one seen where Bardem does get the same treatment that Portman's character has gotten. Other then that the movie did not give you the feeling of the time period and at least it could have made up for it with a quote or two.<br /><br />After finishing this movie I was just looking at the T.V. thinking OK why should I care about any of this. I do care and are very much interested in history but when movies like this come up it feels like the producers robbed you of something good that could have been taken away from the movie. When movies are this bad we highlight a lot of the technical faults in a movie than if it was good. Like the accents. I'm not sure people would have emphasized the lack of Spanish accents if this movie was good.<br /><br />Thw whole point of this review is to say just don't watch it.