OH MY KING Alexander: YOU WERE CURSED WITH A HORRIBLE SCRIPT!

Rating: Null/10 (4 December 2004)

Oliver Stone is one of the most unique film makers in recent film history, but he really struck out with this one. I will not completely lambast this film like I would Leonard Part 6, or Hot to Trot, but this one really struck out. Colin Farrell plays Alexander, and he does a fair job of it, but he is not good enough of an actor to carry a movie by himself, and this movie really isn't worth carrying. The film just wreaks of a plot and a point, I really can't figure out why the films sucks, it just does. There is absolutely no plot, it just seems to ramble on, and the awkward phraseology of ancient Greece just goes too far, it does not fit, it should, but it doesn't this movie doesn't work at all it is so silly and so overdone you really do not get the true spirit of Alexander although I get the feeling Mr. Stone tried very hard to, just really REALLY fell short. Part of the problem was there were so many homoerotic themes at least to me, making Alexander out to be gay. Not that I have a problem with that, the movie in the what Oliver Stone tried to portray it really seemed like it drowned the quality of this film, like it really took away from any accurate historical significance, and portray an entirely different myth that surrounds Alexander, in other words to me it appeared that Oliver Stone was trying to make a completely different myth to compliment Alexander the Great. I found this film very hard to sit through in places, because I felt like the story dragged on for along time, longer than it should have. The film overall had no point, it appeared to me that Stone really did not want to tell a story with this film, he just wanted to have some fun playing around with Alexander The Great, regardless of whether it was true or not.
Having seen the original Alexander the Great, with Richard Burton, which had it's own historical inaccuracies I watch this and I would prefer the old one because that was more character and acting driven, whereas here I could not really figure out what drove this movie, and I don't think Oliver Stone could either. The original also had decent dialogue, the words spoken by the characters were not so contrived and silly. That movie was nominated for a few Academy Awards, for this Alexander film I think the Academy should put out a hit on Oliver Stone. What results in Oliver Stone's vision of Alexander is a movie that isn't quite silly, I wasn't completely lost on the movie, but I really could not get into it either. Most of the performances, while appealing for the most part were contrived. The dialogue was unbelievable, and silly, making the actors, many of which were very talented unable to take their own parts seriously. No one in this movie really seemed into their parts, except for Val Kilmer playing Phillip, and Christopher Plummer, who plays Aristotle. No one else really seems natural, despite most everyone doing a decent job with what little they had to work with.
Coming out of this movie I couldn't figure out what to make of it. I didn't feel like being too critical of it, but I didn't feel like praising it, definitely didn't feel like praising it. I think the problem with this movie was Oliver Stone got his oddly erotic revisionist message across, and it was a horrible message. I do not know if Stone really wanted to write an actual account of history, he didn't, but did he really think it would? There was so much allegory and symbolism, and stirring speeches, I didn't expect this from the man who brought forward the straight-forward articulate JFK (You have to agree it was very powerful even if you disagree with the film itself.) How someone who prides himself on being so straightforward can make something that rambles on and on like this is beyond my comprehension, perhaps Stone has gotten back on drugs again, 'Hey, wouldn't it have been cool man if Alexander was gay man?' That's what it seems like here, Stone just wanted to produce some sort of silly film about Alexander the Great, but didn't want to put any thought into it, just wanted to make some movie, but almost played with history because it was fun. Stone is an effective filmmaker, he always gets his point across, and I think here is his point is that Alexander the Great lived an erotic fantasy, that he heard awkward and silly neo-Greek speeches his whole life and his entire life was filled with unique and fascinating special effects that served as symbolism for his greatness, but Stone's vision does not serve as a good movie.