A very short long movie.

Rating: 10/10 (23 May 2004)

Wolfgang Peterson really shortened this epic, yet missed on on what I believed to be very important moments in the poem/novel. He did not include Diomedes, son of Tydeus, which is IMHO the best characters of the story. Peterson missed many epic battles, like when Ajax fights Hector, or the amount of archers is the novel. But Peterson did do some good things, such as not including the Funeral Games for Patroclus which would have been awkward and very boring to most audiences, and the long chase between Achilles and Hector. The only thing that I think improved the movie was the acting and the conflicting characters. Rose Byrne acted very well, stealing the show from Diane Kruger who played Helen. I thought it was quite humorous as well, such as the facial expressions on Brad Pitt when Peter O Toole gets a little to close to him. Overall, it was a good epic, but will soon be overshadowed by the others that are to come (maybe Alexander the Great).