Puts the Ache in Ache Man.

Rating: Null/10 (8 July 2004)

Huge pre-release hype may have destroyed "Troy" as much as anything else. This long, drawn-out, dull, pretentious, silly and highly disappointing epic shows that tons of money, a great cast, an excellent director and amazing technical and visual effects are not enough to overcome bad writing and poorly executed dialogue. This is of course based on the musings of Homer, a writer and philosopher from Greece who lived about 800 years before Christ walked the Earth. "The Illiad" is the inspiration; it is a long poem that doubles as a novel which focuses on a very strange mix of mythology, fact and opinion. Helen of Troy (Diane Kruger) cheats on her Greek husband (Brendan Gleeson) with the youngest son (Orlando Bloom) of the king of the titled location (Peter O'Toole). Kruger and Bloom end up fleeing Greece and a war is declared. The ruler of Greece (Brian Cox) has dominated armies because of the excellence of the world's greatest warrior (Brad Pitt). There are strained relationships abound though as Cox and Pitt do not get along at all, even going so far as using military man Sean Bean as a liaison. Also Troy may have a hero of their own as O'Toole's older son (Eric Bana) could actually be Pitt's equal. Bana's captured cousin (Rose Byrne) gets close to Pitt and sees something in him that no one else seems to see while Bana's beautiful wife (Saffron Burrows) worries constantly about the fate of her husband and also the fate of her home. "Troy" sounds more interesting than it is. Cox and O'Toole are dominant as the head honchos, but everyone else seems like they were just discovered playing beach volleyball on a tropical island and have no acting talent. The cast looks good as the men are muscle-bound and the women are red hot, but really the performers should have spent their time with acting coaches instead of personal trainers. This is a hard film to listen to because it just does not sound good (this is because of the screenplay and the crazed battle sequences). When the movie shows life through land battles they stop abruptly and another long stretch of empty conversations start up. Director Wolfgang Petersen really drops the ball here unfortunately as he cannot cope with the meandering script and he is left to try and save the production with spectacle and action (neither helps much though). A wonderful role by O'Toole is demolished by lack of screen-time and a total disregard for the complexities of his character. Just imagine "Gladiator" with its good parts taken out and you have "Troy", a gigantic disaster of epic proportions. 2.5 out of 5 stars.