Charisma and leadership

From Randall Wallace's excellent commentary on Man in the Iron Mask:

"Charisma is a part of leadership... and true charisma comes from character and caring."

Never a truer word spoken, Randall. The scene it was talking about:

Paris is rioting. They have no food. While others suggest firing on the crowd, D'artagnan says no, he will talk to them. He shuts himself in with the crowd, at their mercy - but they keep a wide berth of him. They respect him.

Well, most of them do. Someone throws an apple - in slow motion, no less! - and instead of taking it as an insult, D'artagnan cuts it in half, then impales it on his sword (now how did he do that? Must've been two apples... that wasn't mentioned in the commentary ... hmmm) , tastes it, and says, "yes, it is rotten. I'll sort it out." Or words to that effect.

Great stuff.

And it was very refreshing to hear a decent commentary, after sitting through the appaling commentary for The Matrix.

Oh, it was okay. Apart from the long silences. And the slightly defensive (slightly?) comments by Visual Effects director John Gaeta (after describing at length how they got the machines to look just right, he says, "What, you don't believe me?" to editor ... and then just basically goes off about how much work he put in... ah well, he did a freakin' fantastic job, personal paranoia notwithstanding).

Where was I? Oh yeah, Randall Wallace. Charisma ... comes from caring. That's right. Cheers.