Pretty good as far as it went

Rating: Null/10 (14 May 2004)

This was a really well made movie that dwealt on the human aspects of Homer's Iliad. In Troy the war and its consequences were caused by passions and jealosy, fought by mortals who won or lost based on courage, deceit and cleaverness. Problem is that in the real Iliad, all these dimensions are dwarfed by the influences of the gods. The mortals are puppets on their strings, playing out the Gods' personal dissentions. Humans are bound by fate, influenced by the gods and try their best to asset their autonomy in the Iliad. That drama would have been much more complex than this movie and might have required a LOTR scale trilogy. Also, somehow about 9 11/12 years of the 10 year Trojan war got missed. I did get a chuckle that they had to find a way to have Orlando Bloom use his well rehearsed archery skills to kill Achilles. All that practice as Legolas didn't get wasted. They also included a brief scene featuring Aeneas and friends escaping from Troy, a much later Roman addition to the story. My recommendation is to see this movie as a great depiction of ancient world warfare, enjoy its spectacular battles and FX, ogle at Brad Pitt's biceps but then go home and read the Iliad for the real thing. While you're at it, also read the Odessey to find out what happened to Odesseus after the credits.