"Inspired" by Homer's Iliad

Rating: 4/10 (29 July 2004)

I walked into the movie theater knowing that Troy was going to be a bastardized version of the Iliad, but I was unprepared for how freely they mauled the epic. Yes, the battle for Troy lasted TEN YEARS, and they didn't even show up until the last year, so the whole taking of the beach head by Achilles was an exercise in irreverent Hollywood flair. I couldn't believe how they turned Menelaos into a villain, and killed him (instead reserving that to his wife back home). Ajax bought it too, instead of going mad and killing livestock in the fields after the war.I can't remember the post-Iliad chronology, but didn't Achilles die outside of Troy's walls by a poison arrow to the heel rather than sneaking in via the Trojan horse? Nestor was lame; in the book, he was always recounting long, wistful war stories, and seemed more like a valued but annoying old folks' home tenant than a grim tactician. Besides Menelaos, however, the treatment of Briseis was absolutely ridiculous. Women, slave women, were cattle in the Homeric days. They had no voice. Though Achilles was fond of her, she could never have spoken to him like she did, nor would he have have run about the streets willy-nilly looking for her. It didn't even work on a Hollywood level; Achilles killed her brother! Why would she still be crazy in love for him?!
The movie didn't even work if you ignore the fact that it was "inspired" by the Iliad. The pacing was weird, and the initial march to Troy took RIDICULOUSLY LONG! First we see Priam looking out. Then a shot of Andromache. Looking out. Then Achilles, looking. Then Hektor, who is... looking. Then Paris, looking. They basically go through every person in Troy, looking out on the marching horde. I know it's the biggest battle of the age; how many times did they say it already? This bit of "drama" was followed later by the laughable fight scene with the C4-packed hay bales they rolled down to the boats. As the Trojans are near victory, Achilles' cousin (not lover, apparently... Hollywood wouldn't touch that) Patroklos dies, and like some sort of cricket match, Hektor calls it off for tea time.
My grievances go on and on. I thought Hektor and Odysseus were decent adaptations. Pitt looked the part, and did a good job sulking like he did in the book, but his line readings were awful, and he couldn't really decide on his accent. Sometimes it was grimly American, sometimes British. I didn't even like Menelaos' bearing... he was too unctuous and not brash enough.
I did like the token homages to the poor classicists in the audience. They gave a nod to Aeneas near the end, there was an aristea-like quality to the way Hektor and Achilles suited up; they mentioned (not by its name, xenia) the guest-host relationship, and Achilles had a conversation with his mom, but ... wasn't his mom a goddess? Thetis? The one who dipped him in the river styx, all but for his ankle? They never mentioned her name, leaving it open.
But.. why *didn't* the producers want to involve the gods?! They could have had incredible scenes of Ares himself out on the battlefield, of Aphrodite getting a spear in the arm, trying to save her son Aeneas from the nasty Achaeans. They wanted titanic battles, yet it doesn't get more titanic than the gods themselves chucking lightning bolts and clubbing mortals with weapons forged by Hephaestos.
I know they wanted to keep it "human," and they also probably wanted to keep a cap on the huge number of characters in the work. But they sure hamstrung themselves by once again underestimating the caliber of their movie-going audience. They dumbed it down. Boy howdy, did they dumb it down.