The Critics are idiots

Rating: Null/10 (4 August 2004)

Okay first things first, if you've read any criticisms of this movie whose chief argument is that the movie makers changed the original story, go ahead and disregard them like so much chaff in the wind. To those critics all I can say is, why do you even bother going to movies if you seem to idolize books so much? Keep your nose in the books and us movie-lovers will keep ours turned to movies. Comparing the two is always going to be apples and oranges, unless you feel like going to see a movie that ends up being two weeks long.
Such criticism are more based in the critics desire to brag about their vast knowledge of the source material anyway, rather than any problems they had with the movie as a movie, in and of itself. Go brag to your fellow egg heads and leave the rest of us to enjoy the movies that are made from these classic stories.
Having said that, I'll get to my comments on the movie itself. It was a great movie. I've seen it twice.
The movie had a great story. Whether it followed the source material or not is really irrelevant. The characters moved and changed. The plot twisted and turned. Actions had consequences, which led to more actions, which built and built to an intense conclusion. I found myself actually caring about the characters, even though they were people from 3 thousand years ago, they were still human beings. It was everything a good story is supposed to be.
The acting was nothing to complain about either. There wasn't a single actor in the entire movie whose performance took me out of the movie's world. There wasn't even a single moment on screen that did that.
The battle scenes and special effects were cool too - very intense and entertaining, and isn't that what we go to movies for in the first place? The sets and costumes were impressive as well. All of these things worked together to create a world that I had never seen before.
My only criticisms really were the fault of the theater I'd gone to see the movie in. The sound was atrocious, burbling like a 1950s classroom projector through the whole thing, and a couple of idiots' cellphones went off and they actually answered them and started talking right in the middle of the movie. (Honestly, if theater owners can enforce a "no outside food or drink" policy, why can't they force people to check their cellphones at the door or something?)
All this is beside the point though. Troy was a quality production which I will no doubt purchase on DVD when it comes out.