Very disappointing movie.

Rating: Null/10 (26 November 2004)

Making a movie of Alexander the Great is an ambitious undertaking. Unfortunately Oliver Stone bit off much more than he could chew. The movie does not attempt to dramatize what made Alexander great, but rather, leaves it up to Anthony Hopkins to deliver a monologue containing a history lesson, and not an especially sophisticated one. The movie devotes most of its dramatic energy to, and is most successful with, the family dynamic among Alexander, his father (the only really convincingly played character), Alexander's mother, Alexander's Afghani wife, and Alexander's boy-friend. This stuff is the kind of small potatoes that can be seen any day of the week in the T.V. soaps. Even the battle scenes are nothing special as battle scenes and do nothing to convey what made Alexander and his army unique in military history. It is a rare movie goer who will not have better things to do with three hours of their time, including to read a few pages of a history book about Alexander.