uneven though sometimes rewarding film

Rating: 6/10 (11 July 2005)

Wolfgang Peterson's "Troy" is an attempt to recapture the look and feel of those sword-and-sandal epics of the 1950's and 1960's - those multi-million dollar, wide screen extravaganzas that helped lure audiences away from their television sets at home and back into the movie houses they had so recently abandoned. As is to be expected, "Troy" shares many of the strengths as well as many of the weaknesses of those earlier films.
On the positive side, "Troy" provides us with the pleasure of watching history (or pseudo-history in this case) unfolding on a grand scale with events greater than ourselves being enacted on the screen. It also boasts spectacular battle sequences with thousands of extras (or the computerized equivalent thereof) stretching back as far as the eye can see. On the negative side, the movie suffers from over length, corny dialogue and banal characters who frequently get lost on the vast canvas of the film. The good news is that, for the most part, "Troy" manages to triumph over most of its weaknesses.
"Troy" is based very loosely on "The Iliad," the epic poem by the Greek writer, Homer. So loose is it, in fact, that the screenplay dispenses completely with the gods and goddesses who play so crucial a role in the original tale and, instead, concentrates exclusively on the humans who are left on their own to act out the drama. Those characters read like a Who's Who of great mythological figures. On the Greek side, we have Achilles, the pouty warrior who sits out most of the fighting because he feels personally slighted by the king who doesn't appreciate him the way he should; Agamemnon, the arrogant chieftain who is more concerned with personal glory than with doing what is right; Menelaus, the impulsive cuckold who has no compunction about taking his nation to war over a personal humiliation; Odysseus, the pragmatic fighter who tries his hardest to get Achilles to see the error of his ways; and Patroclus, the impetuous youth eager to prove his mettle and his devotion to Achilles on the field of battle. Lined up on the Trojan side are Hector, the sensitive tactician; Priam, the wise king and loving father of Hector and Paris; Paris, the callow youth; and Helen, the world's most beautiful woman, for whose sake the epic battle is ultimately fought. In fact, it is Paris' "abduction" of Helen from her Greek husband, Menelaus, that inspires that nation to launch a thousand ships, cross the sea to the fortified city of Troy, and do battle with the Trojans.
Because of the quality of the source material, "Troy" boasts a slightly more complex and conflicted hero than we are used to finding in action/adventure films. For even though he is reputed to be the world's most invincible warrior, Achilles is also petulant and spoiled, quick to anger and often more concerned with amending personal injuries than with safeguarding the welfare of his own countrymen. The squaring off between the two bitter rivals, Achilles and Hector - two men who, under different circumstances, might have been the best of friends - is excitingly well done and suspenseful. Ditto for the scene in which a mourning King Priam slips into the tent of his enemy to beg for the body of his son. On the other hand, Achille's love affair with the Trojan "war prize" Breseis emerges as pure Hollywood hokum. And poor Agamemnon has become far more of a conventional villain in this version than he is in "The Iliad." Although the screenplay stays relatively faithful to the broad outlines of "The Iliad"'s storyline and characters, it can't duplicate the beauty and soul of Homer's poetic verse. The closest the writers seem to be able to come is having the characters repeat over and over again to one another that men for thousands of years will still be speaking of Achilles, Hector, Troy, et. al. and the events in which they are engaged. All this pretentious, self-reverential speechifying merely succeeds in throwing us out of the drama every time someone utters one of those "prophetic" lines.
Brad Pitt, Orlando Bloom, Brian Cox, Eric Bana, Diane Kruger, Rose Byrne and Sean Bean round out the cast, but it is the veteran actor Peter O'Toole who, as Priam, delivers the one truly compelling performance. It's also nice to see Julie Christie in a movie again, although her role as the sea nymph, Thetis, Achilles' mother, is too inconsequential for her to have much of an impact.
"Troy" is little more than an Illustrated Highlights version of "The Iliad," but for those unfamiliar with the work, it serves as a decent enough introduction for those willing to take on the real thing.