Alexander has major flaws, but its worthwhile to see it.

Rating: Null/10 (3 December 2004)

Be aware that you will be seeing a movie that is just short of 3 hours long. Make your own intermission when you need to.
Oliver Stone tried to do too much. A friend of mine commented that it would take 3 movies to cover Alexander The Great's life. The movie tries to get too much of it in. During one battle scene, Stone shows us the chaotic, on the ground struggle between the men trying to kill and not be killed. He also shows us a bird's-eye view - literally, following a bird in flight - of the battle from above! The filmmakers want us to understand the strategic battle plans of Alexander. It was too much to understand, but it was a valiant effort.
Was Alexander's wife black, as in the film? I doubt it, she was from Bactria. What were the Bactrians like? I don't know.
Sometimes the flowery language, as in epic films from 40 years ago, works and sometimes it doesn't. But at least Stone doesn't attempt to modernize the language so much that he puts modern American slang terms in, as many other filmmakers do in films about ancient times.
Cinematography and the look of that ancient era is fantastic. The scene with the Hindu Kush mountains (eastern Afghanistan) was breathtaking, but very brief. Don't know where it was filmed, but it LOOKS like the Hindu Kush. The scenes in ancient Greece/ Macedonia which show the athletic contests at public events and the crowd scenes were very realistic and if you use your imagination you can put yourself back in those days on those streets. Which is one of the reasons we go to the movie theater, it can't be achieved by waiting for the DVD!
I learned enough to make me want to read more about Alexander. Although some of the dialogue was not good, and accents were all over the place, if you go in there not expecting a perfect movie but wanting to be transported back 2,300 years - then consider seeing it. You might learn about someone who accomplished more in his last 10 years than almost anybody since has done in a lifetime.