That's Greek to me...

Rating: Null/10 (1 June 2004)

When they say this film takes place in ancient history, they ain't kidding. The time in which `Troy' takes place is so old the Greeks hadn't invented Greek accents yet and instead spoke with the tongue of the English. Sometimes when moviemakers think their film is going to be too long yet still needs some background storytelling, they throw in a voiceover or a scroll as they did in `Star Wars'. Here, they had to do both. It's explained to us the shaky political situation of the day and how the Greek King Agamemnon united them all under a tenuous empire  sort of. (You won't remember it all, anyway.) So Agamemnon sacks and pillages, (once again, the Greeks get yet another original concept stolen later by the Romans), with the help of the mightiest warrior the world has ever seen  Achilles. According to legend, (and I suppose there's nothing else to go on anyway), Achilles was the son of the mortal Peleus and the Nereid Thetis. He was the mightiest of the Greeks and was the hero of Homer's `Iliad.' Peleus placed the child in the care of the Centaur Chiron, who raised and educated the boy. She held the young Achilles by the heel and dipped him in the river Styx where everything the sacred waters touched became invulnerable, but the heel remained dry and therefore unprotected.
So Achilles, played dourly by boy-toy Brad Pitt, reluctantly agrees to fight for Agamemnon. `Imagine a king who fights his own battles. Wouldn't that be a sight?' Achilles says with Agamemnon responding, `Of all the warlords loved by the gods, I hate him the most.' This isn't what you'd call great protocol from the Human Resources Department. The Trojans, most notably Prince Hector and Prince Paris, make peace with one of Agamemnon's conquests, Bogarius. Unfortunately, Paris wants Bogarius' wife, Helen, stuffing his grape leaves, and they proclaim their love for each other and they sail away together. Though Hector is furious about what happened, he can't bear for his brother to be without the one he loves so he's OK with it. After all, it's not like the combined weight of the entire Greek military is going to come after them. Bogarius pleads with Agamemnon to bring his wife back, (she hadn't learned to boil water yet), and Agamemnon says, sure, why not? It's clear Agamemnon doesn't give a darn about Helen, he just wants to conquer the unconquerable walled City of Troy and now has an excuse to do so. But he'll need Achilles' help. Achilles' is forewarned if he goes he'll be remembered forever but he'll die. Oooh  love that Greek tragedy part. I wonder where they got it from? So the Trojans, (at least Helen will be having safe sex), welcome Helen with open arms. Now, what was it that Helen was complaining about? Did Bogarius beat her? No. Did he insult her overuse of makeup? That must've been it. Why did she marry Boagrius in the first place? Was it a forced marriage like Michael Jackson and Lisa Marie Presley? Hmmm  they don't say. She was a Queen and she decided to throw it all away for Orlando Bloom who may look like a virile figure standing next to Johnny Depp on a pirate ship, but looks like salsa next to Eric Bana's Price Hector. And it's Hector that's the real hero of the film, not Achilles. Hector is understanding, sweet, subservient to Troy, while Achilles is bored with life because he thinks he can never die. Unfortunately, that part about being dipped in magical waters making him invulnerable never made it to the screen. Indeed, there are many references to the Greek Gods in the film yet screenwriter David Benioff never went there. Hector is upset that the God Apollo does not show his wrath when Achilles destroys his temple.
Now you and I are supposed to be sitting there thinking, `Well, duh, that's because there are no such things as the Greek gods.' Fair enough except Achilles wouldn't be Achilles unless there were Greek gods hence making the character who he is. Even Achilles admits he's seen the Gods and says, `The gods envy us... because every breath might be our last. Everything's more beautiful that way.'	This is why Achilles is such an Olympian bummer. He's ticked off that he can't die like any other mortal and is in a conundrum of being a warrior without the beauty of being mortal he speaks of. But this is not brought to bear on the audience. You just see this really sour pseudo-philosophical adolescent natured adult who needs to go to Rocky Point and relax. Instead, he chose the battle seeking immortality in history yet seeking mortality on the battlefield.	Achilles proves to be a really nasty mean spirited punk that you can't stand. But wait, that's really Brad Pitt. Who wants to dislike Brad Pitt? Even men think he's good looking and he's a fine actor. Try imagining Cary Grant or Tom Cruise as a bad guy. Not meant to be  maybe for John Travolta You want to like Achilles because he's Brad Pitt but it's clear you wish the guy would just die already. You never get a chance to see him hit with a spear through the heart and watch him live to shoot the arrow back at the attacker to his amazement. Perhaps Warner Brothers didn't want this to look like an episode from `Hercules' or `Xena: Warrior Princess.'	Rule number one for movie stars should be never be in a scene with an actor that's a true superstar as is the case with Peter O'Toole. O'Toole plays the King of Troy making Pitt look like he'd never been in front of a camera before in one brief scene.	A horse is a horse, of course, of course, unless it's a Trojan Horse. The Trojan Horse plot was pretty diabolical, even for Homer to write, but now it sounds like a `Pinky and the Brain' scheme. I can just here Brain saying, `Pinky, tonight we're going to build a wooden horse, get inside, and be hauled into the Trojan gates! Tonight Troy, tomorrow the world!' Narf.	The script is finely tuned, the acting is above par, James Horner's soundtrack unfortunately is not memorable, though director Wolfgang Petersen's, (`The Perfect Storm', `Air Force One', `In the Line of Fire'), direction is more than capable. So, shell out those drachmas, and watch a Greek urn his place in history.