Wow...what a waste of 200 million dollars.

Rating: Null/10 (4 May 2004)

Well, I was among the "privileged" few to see Troy before it's official release. My purpose in writing this review is to instill in your minds at least one negative thought before going to see this "epic" for yourself. I know I would have appreciated the same considering I went in ready to be amazed. Amazed I was not.
I guess I should begin by detailing the few good qualities I believe this film possesses. Well, it's "inspired" by an incredible story. The cast was, to nobody's surprise, attractive. And, well I've honestly been sitting here for ten minutes trying to come up with another positive remark. But, that's all I've got.
Now for the rest of the movie. Orlando Bloom, I have one word of advice, change professions. You should not be allowed to act, legally. I hope they didn't invest too much of their 200 million on you. That's about all I can say about Orlando without getting mean, you'll see for yourself soon enough.
As for Brad Pitt, well, his performance was better than Orlando Bloom's. My hopes that he would carry the film did not come to fruition. I must say though, he did look really good with his shirt off, especially the scene where he was conveniently covered in vaseline.
In Brad Pitt's defense, he didn't exactly have much to work with (the same goes for Orlando Bloom but I'm definitely not defending him). David Benioff successfully took one of the greatest stories of all time and desecrated it. Come May 14th, Homer will be rolling in his grave. It pains me to think that many future movie-going patrons will pay to see this movie without ever having read the remaining works of the Iliad. And to you higher education students, don't see this movie instead of reading Homer's masterpiece, you'll fail any test of your knowledge of the text. The skeleton of the story is there, I'll give you that. But why, David Benioff, with the works of the Iliad to work from, did you have to steal lines from Gladiator? Homer will see you "in this life or the next".
I had every reason, going in, to believe that James Horner, with his incredible resume, would not disappoint. He did. Let's face it, if I'm not humming the theme song as I write this then he failed. This is an "epic", where was the epic music?
As for the direction, I'm not sure there was any. Wolfgang Petersen was MIA. I have to ask what you did with the budget money. Seriously, where did you stash the money? Warner Bros. is going to find you. If you spent much of it employing a special effects company, I guarantee you they are laughing their asses off as we speak.
I'd like to finish by saying that my opinion is, of course, not going to mirror that of everyone to see this film. This film will almost definitely, however unfortunate, exceed it's budget in revenues. I just hope you don't go in with the "epic" expectations that I did.