wow.

Rating: 1/10 (20 January 2005)

From the moment I saw the trailer for this epic, I was quite anxious to see it. I love Anthony Hopkins and Val Kilmer, Collin Farrel was fantastic in The Recruit and other films, and Oliver Stone was making it. How could it possibly go wrong? When it came out I was loathe to believe the reviews which slammed it and tore it to pieces, and finally I went to see it on the biggest screen I could find and I gave it the best chance it could have had. What a loser. This film, although just over three hours, feels like an eternity. The plot wanders all over and feels far more like a made for TV docudrama than a major feature film. After the first scene or two the pace slows to a crawl, but does pick up for a battle scene or two. However even these which are well realized and intense briefly, fail to resolve, and we leave the battle field wondering what the heck just happened. I don't care how historically accurate or inaccurate it is, it is a horrible story. Perhaps Stone should have found one event around which to base the film instead of trying to give a passing overview. The characters were completely non-empathetic and there was simply no chemistry or development of his loves, both male and female. The real Alexander the Great may or may not have slept with his male friend, but I somehow doubt that he was the feminine eye-shadow sporting, sensitive lad that this film portrayed him as. Or if he was, they shouldn't have made a major Hollywood film about him because the market of people interested in such an antagonist is a tiny fraction of the typical filmgoing audience. All said and done, the horse vs. elephant sequence was brilliant (appart from some odd and poorly justified colour alteration) but the rest of the film had me glancing at my watch every few minutes, hoping that I could leave this disgrace of a film.