This is not Homer's Troy

Rating: Null/10 (24 May 2004)

I see a lot of people criticising this film for not being faithful to Greek philosopher Homer's mythological story of Troy. I think what the filmmakers came up with is in its own right a very good story -- possibly even a much better story. It's not cluttered with stories of gods warring with each other and interfering in men's wars, this is purely a fight amongst men.

Throughout this movie you will see references debunking the role of gods in their wars. In mythology, Achilles was a near-immortal superhero; in this one, he's merely a super-skillful warrior -- he even mocks any suggestion that he's immortal by saying, "Well then I wouldn't need a shield then would I"? Hector (Eric Bana) scoffs when a war strategy session starts talking about reading superstitious signs; he prefers instead to talk about the practical strategy of fighting this war, such as troop morale. It's men's egos and rivalries that caused this war, and not gods.

Just by eliminating the supernatural aspects of the story, Wolfgang Peterson, has made a much more relevant movie about war and the ambitions of men. The power hungry emperor, Agamemnon, goes to war on the pretense of defending the honour of his brother Menelaus's marriage to Helen, but really he has had designs on Troy for a long time, and this was just the perfect excuse to go to war. To this day, world leaders still come up with irrelevant excuses to go to war, witness George Bush and his Iraqi "weapons of mass destruction" argument.
The special effects and war scenes were spectacular, i.e. Lord of The Rings quality. You see huge armies of tens of thousands of men going up against each other. And unlike in some other movies there really wasn't a good guy side and a bad guy side. You cheer for the Trojans when they repel a Greek attack, and you cheer for the Greeks when they repel a Trojan attack.

Speaking of Lord of the Rings, there were two LOTR alumni in this movie, Sean Bean and Orlando Bloom. Sean Bean who played Boromir in LOTR, plays Odysseus here; Orlando Bloom who played Legolas The Archer in LOTR, plays Paris here. Interestingly, Paris gravitates towards archery as his weapon of choice here too. BTW, I thought Bloom looked quite heavily like his LOTR castmate Elijah Wood (Frodo) in this movie; it must have been the curly dark hair and all.
Brad Pitt also gave a good performance as Achilles. I thought he brought a somewhat Russell Crowe-type personality to this role. He reminded me heavily of Crowe in the manner in which he spoke, etc.