T(r)oying with the original story a bit too much

Rating: 5/10 (24 November 2010)

When making a film based on Homer's timeless Epic called The Illiad comes forth a mass amount of potential. Great story, engaging characters, brutally intense fighting scenes, in depth costume design, accurate historical facts, and one hell of a love story are all things that should be in the 2004 Troy. Pretty much the only thing the film manages to be superior in is the costume design, while the rest of the film is occupied by semi developed, partially false character development, false information, and a poor computer generated army of a false number of warriors fighting to the death. What a letdown.
To be fair, Troy has upsides. The Trojan War is confusing because there are so many characters and you have to pay attention to detail which may be hard if your interest on the subject isn't too high. The Trojan War is a topic of some interest to me, but this movie was something I'd expect to be great and memorable. Sadly, I doubt a good Trojan War movie will come for quite sometime. After this big budget mediocre film I don't think people want to jump on The Trojan War wagon too soon.
In The Illiad, Paris gave Helen, the Goddess of beauty, an apple and took her away from her home of Troy which erupted a war that dragged on for many years. In the movie the same sort of thing occurs, but the nail that seals the coffin is that there are no Gods in the entire film. Sure occasionally someone will say "May the Gods be with you", but Zeus, Poseidon, and all the other Gods are never uttered by any character in this entire film. Director Wolfgang Peterson, to my knowledge, never gave a legitimate reason why he chose to make Gods absent from Troy. My guess is the story is already complicated enough and to add Gods in would confuse the average movie goer. Not to mention the fact that some characters personalities are combined into one in this film made for the good old "composite character" term so adding Gods to a complicated recipe will give spice no average Joe wants.
Some say it was best to exclude the Gods, but I say that if it ain't broke, don't fix it. If you want to make a respectful adaptation you need to follow the original story line. I understand wanting to do your own thing, but when you tackle a monster sized project like this and you want to change things up, maybe you should make YOUR OWN version of the film, how you see it. Don't bring an unfaithful adaptation of one of the most famous stories of all time.
Acting wise, Brad Pitt and Orlando Bloom aren't horrible in the film, but it's almost like their biceps were the true reason for their roles. Of course Achilles (Pitt) is known for his strength and strong fighting skills, but c'mon anymore abs in this film and it's the final Twilight film.
One last small annoyance of the film is the God awful exaggerated armies that consist of mostly CGI. When one watches the special effects bonus features, which are way more interesting than the movie, it shows how the film was made and how the effects came full. Clearly they were being lazy and added CGI armies in last. They used around 150 real guys and then when they sat at a computer screen they cloned the guys numerous times to create mass armies that are unrealistic anyway. If The Trojan War really did have these many soldiers it would be like twice the population of Greece at the time.
For what it's worth Troy is superior with it's costume design, but thats pretty much it. The five stars goes in the regard to some of the actors like Bloom, Pitt, Cox (Agamemnon), and the late and great Peter O'Toole (Priam) who is fantastic in pretty much everything and the costume design. The story could have lived up to be so much more. We could have been delivered a masterpiece war film with engaging characters, lighting fast fights, and a satisfying feel and memorable approach to The Trojan War. What we got was a forgettable, undone collage of rushed effects, and a miserable unidentified explanation to why the Gods are absent. Whoever said "nothings perfect" will no regret a syllable when they see Troy.
Starring: Brad Pitt, Eric Bana, Orlando Bloom, Diane Kruger, Owain Yeoman, Brian Cox, Sean Bean, Julie Christie, and Peter O'Toole. Directed by: Wolfgang Peterson.