A Wasted Effort

Rating: 3/10 (15 May 2004)

Troy is an impressive movie in many ways, but it could have been sooooo much better. It doesn't achieve what Peter Jackson's Lord of the Rings trilogy does by integrating action sequences, excellent cgi effects and a good script in a satisfying manner.
The culprit here is the script. It's mostly soap opera drivel. The opening sequence in which Achilles squares off with a brutish Mr. Clean clone is not worthy of a serious effort; it's cheap and stupid! Paris's first dialogue with Helen is even more painful:
"Last night was a mistake," she says.
Really poetic, huh! Maybe that's why Orlando Bloom and Diane Krueger have ZERO chemistry. The script makes Agamemnon and Menelaus into utterly cardboard villains and it kills whatever Brad Pitt could have done with the equally cardboard Achilles.
It's a shame the script does away with the gods in the story, but that would probably have meant making two or three movies. What's more unforgivable is the absence of the strong female characters in Homer's epic; Cassandra, Hecuba, Klytemnestra. What's left is the wimpering Andromache and Briseis misinterpreted to a comical degree. Helen, who supposedly is the catylst that causes all this, is a cipher in this treatment. It's also a shame the good performance of Julie Christie as Thetis is wasted on one scene. Surely a flashback showing her dipping the young Achilles in the river Styx would have explained his one spot of vulnerability.
The action sequences are impressive and the cgi effects are quite good, if not on a par with the best. The cast is very attractive physically, but most of them are defeated at every point by the shallow screenplay. The two that survive the best are Eric Bana's elegant, human Hector and the great Peter O'Toole's tragic Priam. The only scene in the movie that reaches any emotional height is O'Toole's scene with Pitt in which he pleads for the return of his son's body. Here the screenwriter found some poetry and depth. If the entire movie had been written this well, it would be a classic.
Most of the rest of O'Toole's performance is speant in the ridiculous viewing stand that the Trojan's built for their royal family to watch battles or whatever else goes on on the front lawn!
Brian Cox's Agamemnon particulary suffers from the inept script. He is forced to be a predictable and dull villain. Orlando Bloom is a similar causualty although I find it hilarious that many of the national movie critics have criticized him for playing Paris as a cowardly, vain, callow youth. That's exactly what Paris is; it's the writing that is bad; not neccessarily Mr. Bloom.
I also think Wolfgang Petersen is a coward for purposely distorting the homo-erotic features of ancient Greek society. Patrocolus is Achille's cousin in this treatment, rather than his friend, soul-mate and sometimes lover. We only see Patroculus practicing swordplay with Achilles. It is erotic in it's own right, but that's as far as Petersen goes. In fact, he makes sure that we see Pitt sleeping completely nude with women several times in the movie, lest he turn off the typically brutish, straight homophobes that would likely buy tickets in droves for this movie. Don't educate these schmucks; cater to them.
So, yes, it's at least an enjoyable popcorn movie. But with the money poured into this project, it might have been truly great had they trusted Homer's original a bit more and perhaps made two or three movies that would have adequately covered the epic story. They thought Peter Jackson wanting to make multiple movies was doomed to failure and he laughed all the way to the bank!