Lots of.... walking

Rating: 3/10 (28 December 2006)

I'm a big fan of epics, of Greek and Roman history, of anything where you get to see one guy with a sword smack someone else with a sword. So, for that simple reason, Alexander was something of a disappointment. The combat scenes were sadly lacking in enthusiasm. But this aside.
I often wonder if, at the bottom of Stone's Lifetime Achievement Award, there reads a plaque as to why he has it. I'm not sure if 'Taking the most interesting person in history and making the most boring film in history about him' would fit, but it's worth a try. I don't want to sound like I'm attacking Mr. Stone personally, but it was one of the biggest ego-boosts of a film that I've ever seen.
So many major plot points simply glossed over, the burning of Persapolis, the years in exile during his youth, the infamous Knot... why cut out the interesting bits? So that we could see more scenes of his army walking very, very slowly? Very accurate and all in appearance, just very, very dull.
One of the reasons that Troy was a success compared to Alexander. Troy had no real relevance to the history involved. But it was damned entertaining. Alexander simply wasn't. It failed to deliver on any of the things that should have made an Alexander movie truly Great.
Swing and very, very long and pointless miss.