The Alamo Movie

"The Alamo" got off to a non-blockbuster start over the weekend. Walt Disney Co.'s $100-million feature tied for third place at the box office, with an estimated $9.2 million in ticket sales, as Mel Gibson's "The Passion of the Christ" went from fifth place to No. 1 and Sony Pictures Entertainment's "Hellboy" landed at No. 2. The other film that came in third, the Fox Searchlight comedy "Johnson Family Vacation," showed in roughly half as many theaters as "The Alamo."

Remember the Alamo? Unless you recall it as the last stand of a multicultural Paradise Lost, filmmaker John Lee Hancock is sure you remember it wrong. "Whites and browns lived together," said Hancock, a Texas native, describing his home state's pre-revolutionary past. "It was really culturally diverse. People intermarried. There was very little racism." For one brief moment in the still-aborning 19th century, he believes, "Tejas, Mexico, was a very, very interesting place."

It's show business custom to lie about your age. But when you make a historical movie such as "The Alamo," fudging the truth can land you in deep trouble. Having witnessed "The Hurricane," whose factual sloppiness cost the film dearly, the filmmakers telling the story of the legendary 1836 siege of Anglo Celtic colonists by Gen. Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna's Mexican army have toiled to make their film as accurate as possible.

Forget the Alamo -- at least for now. Walt Disney Co. has taken the unusual step of postponing the opening of "The Alamo," saying the much-anticipated film needs more work. Although trailers had begun promoting a Dec. 25 release, Disney said Tuesday that the movie wouldn't hit theaters until April. Though it is not uncommon for studios to change opening dates, it is rare for a studio to do so this close to the planned release of such a high-profile movie.