SCOTTISH actor Brian Cox has given a scathing review of the film Braveheart, calling it “bollocks”.
The Succession actor said the 1995 film, which features Mel Gibson in the starring role of William Wallace, was historically inaccurate and had a “crap” script.
According to Telegraph reports, the 79-year-old said during an appearance at the Edinburgh International Book Festival: “The film is just bollocks. It doesn’t make any sense.”
Cox appeared in Braveheart as Argyle Wallace, William Wallace’s uncle, after initially rejecting the role to star in an eponymously titled film about Rob Roy, which also premiered in 1995.
He said Gibson urged him to join the Braveheart cast.
“I said, ‘Well, there is a very good part at the beginning, a guy called Argyle but I’m wrong for him because he should be cadaverous and thin’,” Cox said.
“And he said: ‘No, you can play it’.”
Despite winning five Academy Awards, the film has been widely criticised for its historically inaccurate depiction of the Scottish Wars of Independence.
It contained a romance between Wallace and Isabella of France, starting after the Battle of Falkirk. In reality, Isabella was a child and still living in France at the time.
The childhood backstory given to Wallace is fictional as little to nothing is known about his younger years. The inclusion of Robert the Bruce has also been panned as inaccurate due to there being no evidence the pair ever interacted with one another.
Characters are also seen wearing tartan, which was yet to be invented.
Cox added: “I just didn’t want to be in a kilt. Of course, they didn’t have kilts in those days, but they had to have kilts [in Braveheart] because that is what it is about.”
The actor went on to defend Gibson, calling him “wonderful to work with”.
“He gets a bad rap but actually he is a really good man. I saw him deal with some lads [on the film] who were alcoholically inclined and he used to deal with them absolutely beautifully”, Cox said.
Gibson has repeatedly come under fire for racist, antisemitic, homophobic and misogynistic comments, as well as charges received for driving under the influence and investigations over domestic violence.
