Boring

Rating: 5/10 (13 August 2005)

I recently watched "Troy" for a second time and realized just what a mediocre snooze fest it is. I hadn't been all that impressed with Troy after the first viewing, and this movie does not hold up well with repeated viewings.
Like most period pieces these days, Troy at least is a good looking picture. The costumes, the landscapes, the ships, the palaces, etc are all very nice to look at. Brad Pitt is nice to look at as well, but his character Achilles is as dull as a doorknob. One just does not care about what happens to Achilles. The other characters are similar. Diane Kruger brings nothing to the role of Helen - for the face that launched a thousand ships, she's pretty lifeless. Orlando Bloom's Paris has a little more personality than everyone else in the movie - but he's such a loathsome coward that one is rooting for him to die soon rather than truly interested in what will happen to him.
The storyline just drags on and on. Even when there are fights and battles, they are boring. I was disappointed that the supernatural elements of the original myth were not included in this movie. Paris ticking off the goddesses, Achilles being dipped in the Styx, and other events involving the gods of Olympus would have spiced up the story a little bit. As it stands, the plot is dull and way too long.
Part of the problem is that one is really not sure who to root for in the movie. It isn't clear who the good guys and the bad guys are supposed to be. There is no hero in this movie, and there isn't even an anti-hero. Perhaps a better screenwriter could have done a nice job of playing up the ambiguity between good and evil in Troy and made it interesting. Instead the lack of a protagonist and antagonist makes one care nothing about any of the characters and makes for a very painful 3 hour movie. When Troy is finally over, you don't feel sad that Achilles has died, or happy that Troy has burned, or any of that. You're just glad that the movie is finally done.